Volvo announces plans for another European plant

Volvo Cars is planning a significant expansion of its production capacities and intends to build another plant in Europe in the medium term. Initially, production capacity at the existing European plants in Torslanda near Gothenburg and Ghent in Belgium is to increase to 1.2 million vehicles.

This is what CFO Björn Annwall told the German publication Automobilwoche. As Volvo is known to be aiming to become an all-electric brand by 2030, a significant proportion of these vehicles will come to market with electrified powertrains.

Volvo states the current production capacity in Torslanda and Ghent at a total of 800,000 vehicles. The increase to 1.2 million vehicles is expected to happen by the middle of the decade – it is achievable “with minor investments, such as tooling and more shifts”, according to Annwall.

At that point, a third production facility in Europe is to be added. Verbatim, Annwall said in the above report, “To grow beyond 1.2 million cars, we need more production capacity and we are considering building another plant in Europe.”

For the Ghent plant, Volvo had already recently announced the expansion of its electric vehicle capacity to 135,000 units per year in the wake of the C40 Recharge model launch. As early as 2022, the company expects that more than half of all vehicles produced at the site will have a fully electric drive. In Ghent, the Swedish company also built a battery assembly plant to combine the purchased modules into ready-to-install packs.

The C40 Recharge is the first Volvo model to be offered exclusively with electric drive. “The Volvo C40 Recharge represents our future,” said Javier Varela, Senior Vice President, Industrial Operations and Quality at Volvo Cars, in October. “Our production activities and close cooperation with our suppliers are key to achieving our electrification and carbon neutrality goals.”

automobilwoche.de (in German)