Contractor named for Sunderland gigafactory

The Wates Group and Turner & Townsend have been appointed by Envision AESC to lead the design and project manage the build of its advanced car battery gigafactory at the International Advanced Manufacturing Park (IAMP), which spans 50 hectares of land in South Tyneside and Sunderland.

The £450M gigafactory will form part of a £1bn partnership with Nissan UK and Sunderland City Council to create an electric vehicle (EV) hub to deliver the next generation of electric vehicle production at IAMP, and will play a critical role in decarbonising both UK manufacturing and transport.

Chris Caygill, Managing Director of the Envision AESC battery plant, said: “We are pleased to be working with both Wates Group and Turner & Townsend as key partners in this next stage of our UK gigafactory development.  Each brings unique strengths to the project that will help deliver a world-class battery manufacturing facility essential to helping the UK automotive industry transition to a fully electrified future. We pride ourselves particularly on the safety record of our batteries, which continually achieve zero critical incidents in new product and process designs. Together with smart, digitally integrated clean energy generation, storage and use in our battery plants, we are supporting the global transition towards net-zero carbon energy targets.”