The Tata Group has reportedly pledged INR4,000 crore (US$600 million) towards building a lithium-ion battery manufacturing plant in Gujarat, India.
A 126-acre parcel of land in the area has already been secured for the plant, which could boast up to 10GW of capacity, according to the Times of India.
An industrial city is planned for the region under the name of Dholera Special Investment Region.
The newspaper reported Jaiprakash Shivhare, managing director at Dholera Industrial City Development, as saying: “Tata Group has already made an announcement to set up a lithium-ion battery manufacturing unit. They have procured land of 126 acres and in the first phase, the company will make an investment of INR1,000 crore.”
Shivhare was speaking on the sidelines of the Gujarat Aviation Conclave organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry in Ahmedabad.
India aims to have electric vehicles make up 30% of all vehicle sales in the country by 2030. The goal is ambitious when you do the maths: there were 250 million registered vehicles in the country in 2017, and the following year the total number of EVs registered was just 56,000.
To tackle the deficit, India launched the second part of its Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and Electric Vehicles (FAME) initiative in April.
The INR10,000 crore, three-year scheme aims to boost electric mobility adoption and increase the number of electric vehicles in commercial fleets
The scheme sets out incentives for electric buses, three-wheelers, four-wheelers and two-wheelers used for commercial purposes.
Plug-in and strong-hybrid vehicles and those with larger lithium-ion battery packs and electric motors are also included in the scheme.
