£2.6bn sustainable Northumbria gigaplant to create “substantial “ number of local jobs

Sustainability and highly-skilled employment plans for Britishvolt’s 93-hectare battery Gigaplant in Cambois, Northumberland, were the key themes of a speech at the North East England Chamber of Commerce annual Global members lunch.

Sponsored by Womble Bond Dickinson, over 100 export and import businesspeople who use the Chamber’s international trade expertise, attended the event at Ramside Hall. They heard Liam Wilson, project assembly manager at Britishvolt, outlined the firm’s ambitious plans for the giant site.

The £2.6bn Britishvolt plant will be the largest single industrial investment in the North East since the arrival of Nissan and one of the largest single site mobilisations in the UK of the last 40 years, producing enough batteries for 300,000 electric vehicles (EVs) every year.

The company has teamed up with a number of world class battery partners including Siemens, Glencore, Warwick Manufacturing Group, Circulor, and Newcastle University. The company’s mission statement is to accelerate the transition to a low carbon society, powered by sustainable, domestically manufactured battery cells.

Lesley Moody, chamber president (AES Digital Solutions) said: “Britishvolt’s vision for not just Blyth but our whole region is fantastic and looks set to create such a substantial number of high quality jobs.

“We are also so pleased to hear about all the company’s work in the local community and how they can access employment opportunities which will be so transformative. Sustainability is at the heart of this business and it is going to blaze a trail for the next generation of electrical battery technology.”

Liam Wilson, proclaimed: “Britishvolt is a business with environmental, social, and governance built in from the ground up. We have started from a blank piece of paper and are reimagining how battery cells are produced, with lowest environmental impact and highest positive societal impact.

“As a local lad, I joined Britishvolt to truly make a difference with a company that shares my own values. I have been in the EV industry for around 10 years and understand that, for the business to really work, you need low carbon, sustainable, domestically and responsibly produced battery cells. Just like the ones Britishvolt will make at its Gigaplant.”