Nissan will invest $500 million to update its assembly plant in Canton, Mississippi to handle production of two all-new battery-electric vehicles.
The facility has produced a variety of vehicles since opening in 2003, currently including the Altima sedan, as well Frontier and Titan pickups. Starting in 2025, it will handle both the new BEVs, as well as vehicles using internal combustion engines.
“Today’s announcement is the first of several new investments that will drive the EV revolution in the United States,” said Ashwani Gupta, chief operating officer, Nissan Motor Corp. “Nissan is making a strong investment in Canton’s future, bringing the latest technology, training and process to create a truly best-in-class EV manufacturing team.”
From pioneer to laggard
The second-largest Japanese automaker was a pioneer in electrification, its original Leaf model becoming the first mass-market battery-electric vehicle. But despite promising to remain a leader in the emerging segment, Nissan has fallen behind not only Tesla but “legacy” competitors such as General Motors, Ford and Volkswagen. The second Nissan BEV, the Ariya, is only set to launch in autumn 2022, about a year behind its original schedule.
The automaker is now racing to catch up. It announced an $18 billion electrification program, dubbed Ambition 2030, last November. Like archrival Toyota, it plans to offer a mix of different battery drivetrain technology. Of the 23 electrified vehicles Nissan plans to bring to market by 2030, 15 will be pure battery-electric. The others will feature various hybrid systems. BEVs, it forecast, will make up 40% of its U.S. sales by the end of this decade.
Nissan isn’t offering up much about the two models coming to Canton — but a teaser video gives a bit of a clue. One will target the flagship Nissan brand and appears to be a sedan with an aerodynamic fastback design. The second shares a similar shape and will be offered through the upscale Infiniti brand.
Neither product was identified by name, nor were we provided details about their powertrains and range.
Few details but plenty of clues
It’s unclear if the two new models will share the same skateboard-style architecture as the Ariya SUV. As part of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance, the three manufacturers are developing five different EV “architectures,” the CMF-AEV, KEI-EV, LCV-EV, CMF-EV and CMF-BEV. Some will be used for only pure electric vehicles, others will be able to handle different electrified drivetrains, including plug-in hybrids.
But the two new models will have several things in common with Ariya, with their motors and battery pack located below the load floor.
Ariya will be sold in a variety of configurations with a base, single-motor version delivering 238 horsepower and 221 pound-feet of torque through the front axle. A twin-motor all-wheel-drive system will boost output to 389 hp and 442 lb-ft of torque.
New battery tech coming
Two lithium-ion packs have been developed, though the base 66 kilowatt-hour version won’t be offered in the U.S. American drivers will have an 87 kWh pack capable of delivering up to 300 miles range, depending upon the drivetrain.
The timing of the new models raises some questions about the battery technology they will use. Nissan hopes to get out in front of competitors with next-generation solid-state batteries. It plans to launch pilot production in 2024, though a high-volume operation won’t follow until later in the decade.
The $500 million going into the Canton plant will increase the facility’s flexibility to handle BEVs but it will continue to produce vehicles using internal combustion engines, said Nissan spokesperson Lloryn Love-Carter. “We (will) have the capacity and infrastructure to support these new products” and those currently built in Canton, she told TheDetroitBureau.com.