Volkswagen Boosts E-Car Investment Plan In Spain To 10 Billion Euros

German carmaker Volkswagen AG will invest 10 billion euros ($10.6 billion) to make electric vehicles and batteries in Spain, Chief Executive Herbert Diess said on Thursday, around 3 billion euros more than it had previously committed.

The company also announced a partnership deal with Spain’s largest power utility Iberdrola, which will set up a solar park to partly power the battery plant to be built in the municipality of Sagunto near Valencia.

Volkswagen had already announced in March a 7-billion euro investment plan to build a battery plant and produce electric vehicles at its two existing car factories in Spain.

“We will electrify the second-largest car producer in Europe (Spain) with a new giga-factory of batteries and the production of electric cars in two plants,” Diess told an event in Sagunto, adding the plan was to create “a full ecosystem of suppliers from lithium extraction to the assembly of batteries”.

Diess was visiting the land where the factory will be built with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.

The German carmaker aims to begin serial production at the 40 gigawatt-hour (GWh) plant by 2026.

($1 = 0.9463 euros)

(Reporting by Emma Pinedo, Editing by Inti Landauro and Mark Potter)