General Motors has picked a site to build a new electric battery cell factory in Lordstown, Ohio, next to the site of a former car assembly plant it shut down last year.
GM and Korea's LG Chem are behind the $2.3 billion project that they say will create about 1,100 jobs to the Mahoning Valley. GM announced Tuesday that it has selected a 160-acre site for the new plant in Lordstown.
GM announced in December that it plans to build lithium-ion battery cells in an effort to make electric vehicles more profitable and affordable. But GM CEO Mary Barra wouldn’t say if former Lordstown workers would receive priority hiring for the new venture.
GM stopped making cars at its assembly plant there last March after 50 years of production. It later sold the factory to a newly formed company that wants to make electric pickup trucks. Production of those vehicles is expected to begin this year.
Many of the 1,200 workers employed at the GM plant relocated to accept other jobs within the company.
