A Tata Motors concept EV on show at the India Auto Expo 2023 on Jan. 12, 2023.
Anindito Mukherjee | Bloomberg | Getty Images
The Tata Group will develop a major facility for the production of electric car batteries in the U.K., with the Indian conglomerate set to invest more than £4 billion (around $5.17 billion) in the project.
The news represents a significant boost for the U.K.’s plans to secure its own supply of EV batteries as it looks to move away from vehicles that use gasoline and diesel.
In a statement Wednesday, the U.K. government said the site would create as many as 4,000 direct jobs and provide Jaguar Land Rover — a subsidiary of Tata Motors — with batteries. Other customers in the U.K. and Europe are also being eyed.
The government said the factory would generate thousands of extra jobs further down the supply chain, in sectors connected to critical raw minerals and battery materials.
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“This investment will be crucial to boosting the UK’s battery manufacturing capacity needed to support the electric vehicle industry in the long term,” the government said.
“With an initial output of 40GWh it will also provide almost half of the battery production that the Faraday Institution estimates the UK will need by 2030,” it added.
The gigafactory will be one of Europe’s largest. The aim is for production to start in 2026. So-called gigafactories are facilities that produce batteries for electric vehicles on a large scale. Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been widely credited as coining the term.
It’s been widely reported that the U.K. will provide Tata with significant subsidies for the project. The government said details of its support to Tata Sons would be “published in due course as part of our regular transparency data.”
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Speaking to the BBC on Wednesday morning, Grant Shapps, the secretary of state for energy security and net zero, said the news represented “certainly the biggest U.K. car investment for 40 years” and “a big vote of confidence in the British economy.”
Pushed on the value of the incentive given to Tata, Shapps acknowledged it was “large and … I make no bones about that,” but would not give an exact figure. The numbers, he added, “will come out in the usual way, because of the commercial sensitivity.”
The U.K. wants to stop the sale of new diesel and gasoline cars and vans by 2030 and will require, from 2035, all new cars and vans to have zero-tailpipe emissions.
News about the gigafactory plans was welcomed by those within the industry.
“This is a shot in the arm for the UK automotive industry, our economy and British manufacturing jobs, demonstrating the country is open for business and electric vehicle production,” Mike Hawes, chief executive of the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, said.
“It comes at a critical moment, with the global industry transitioning at pace to electrification,” he added.
Production of batteries within the U.K. was, Hawes said, “essential if we are to anchor wider vehicle production here for the long term.”
British Columbia got its first 400 kW DC fast charger last week at Canadian C-store chain On The Run, but that’s not the good part. As part of a limited time offer, these chargers are FREE!
The Canadian convenience store chain just took the wraps off its new, ABB-developed, 400 kW chargers earlier this month, but they’re already planning to bring the ultra-fast 400 kW dispensers to at least four more locations in BC this spring, and have them online just in time for the summer road trip season – something On The Run hopes its customers will appreciate.
“The A400 charger delivers an enhanced customer experience, with reliability and performance from a 32-inch screen to higher power charging sessions and power sharing,” reads the company’s official announcement, via LinkedIn. “Download the Journie Rewards app to start the charge – free for a limited time.”
On The Run’s new 400 kW ABB DC fast chargers are compatible with CCS and CHAdeMO plugs, and can accommodate Tesla and other NACS-equipped vehicles with an adapter. That said, the company seems to imply that Tesla drivers in particular will have a maximum charging speed of “just” 50 kW, which feel hilarious (given the current state of affairs between Tesla and the Canadian government), but probably isn’t.
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In addition to the ABB A400 400 kW units shown here, On The Run locations also employ the ABB Terra 184 dispensers rated at 180 kW. On The Run plans similar deployments at the four BC locations mentioned above, as well as two more each in Quebec and Ontario slated to go live towards the end of this year.
Electrek’s Take
Tesla’s controversial CEO Elon Musk once mocked 350 kW charging speed as being “for a child’s toy,” despite the fact that, nearly nine years later, his own cars and Superchargers can barely make it to 325 kW while others have sailed right on past. I made fun of that fact on the Quick Charge episode shown, above – and, while I do think it’s funny and relevant, the much more relevant piece of news here is that companies like BP Pulse, Revel, and Wallbox are actively deploying 400 kW solutions, today (while others hit the same mark as far back as 2017).
Terawatt Infrastructure‘s first medium- and heavy-duty electric charging truck stop in California is now online, in Rancho Dominguez.
Located 12 miles north of the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, the private Rancho Dominguez site, which is shared among multiple fleets, will support electric trucking fleet operations in and out of the largest container ports in the US.
First customers include Dreaded Trucking, Hight Logistics, PepsiCo, Quick Container Drayage, Southern Counties Express, Tradelink Transport, and WestCoast Trucking & Warehousing.
Terawatt’s electric charging truck stop features 20 pull-through and bobtail DC fast charging stalls with a capacity of 7 megawatts (MW), enabling charging for up to 125 trucks per day using a simple reservations system. Terawatt’s site features a proprietary charge management system, in-house technicians, 24/7 customer service, and onsite parts management.
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“This launch underscores growing collaboration between enterprises, shippers, carriers, and charging infrastructure providers to advance sustainable technologies across logistics and transportation operations, especially in the medium and heavy-duty sectors,” said Neha Palmer, CEO and cofounder of Terawatt. Palmer added that the company will bring another charging site online in Rialto, California, in June.
Terawatt joined some of the world’s largest shippers and carriers in September 2024 to launch the I-10 Consortium heavy-duty EV operations pilot, the “first-ever US over-the-road electrified corridor.” Terawatt is providing charging infrastructure, including software, operations, and maintenance support at six of its owned charging hubs along the I-10 corridor.
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In its most aggressive attack against offshore wind yet, the Trump administration halted the $5 billion Empire Wind 1, already under construction off New York’s coast.
Norwegian developer Equinor announced yesterday that it received notice from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) ordering Empire Wind 1 to halt all activities on the outer continental shelf until BOEM has completed its review. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum posted this tweet yesterday:
.@Interior, in consultation with @HowardLutnick, is directing @BOEM to immediately halt all construction activities on the Empire Wind Project until further review of information that suggests the Biden administration rushed through its approval without sufficient analysis.
— Secretary Doug Burgum (@SecretaryBurgum) April 16, 2025
Burgum gave no indication of what insufficiencies there were in the approval process for the fully permitted offshore wind project, despite Trump’s recent declaration of a national energy emergency that speeds up permitting processes.
The commercial lease for the 810-megawatt (MW) Empire Wind 1’s federal offshore wind area was signed in March 2017 during the first Trump administration. It was approved by the Biden administration in November 2023 and began construction in 2024.
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The project is being developed under contract with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA). Empire Wind 1, which was due to come online in 2027, has the potential to power 500,000 New York homes.
“Halting construction of fully permitted energy projects is the literal opposite of an energy abundance agenda,” said American Clean Power Association CEO Jason Grumet in a statement. “We encourage the administration to quickly address perceived inadequacies in the prior permit approvals so that this project can complete construction and bring much-needed power to the grid.”
As Electrekreported, Equinor secured $3 billion to finance Empire Wind 1 in January. The total amount drawn under the project finance term loan facility as of March 31 was around $1.5 billion.
As of March 31, Empire Wind has a gross book value of around $2.5 billion, including South Brooklyn Marine Terminal (pictured above), which was expected to become the US’s largest dedicated port facility for offshore wind.
In response to BOEM’s stop work order, New York Governor Kathy Hochul issued the following statement:
Every single day, I’m working to make energy more affordable, reliable and abundant in New York and the federal government should be supporting those efforts rather than undermining them. Empire Wind 1 is already employing hundreds of New Yorkers, including 1,000 good-paying union jobs as part of a growing sector that has already spurred significant economic development and private investment throughout the state and beyond.
As Governor, I will not allow this federal overreach to stand. I will fight this every step of the way to protect union jobs, affordable energy and New York’s economic future.
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