Nissan drops plan for EV battery plan in Portugal

Did they give any reason?

 

Portugal is one of the main EV supporting Countries in the EU. I think the UK, Ireland and Denmark are supporters too. France is starting to get involved also.

Could the news be connected to the euro 'issues'? Or Portugals poor credit rating? Were the Portugese Government going to offer incentives to Nissan and then had to remove these because of austerity measures?

 

To add to the explanation, the article says that:

The Portuguese factory was going to be battery only.

 

Maybe EV's aren't quite selling in the numbers they expected but also, most of Europes economy is heading south - fast. Why invest in a secondary battery plant in Europe when you might not sell the cars to use them.

 

That doesn't make sense, since they would also need to cut the number/size of car plants if they aren't going to get the portugese cells. I think actually battery production is going better than expected, with higher aH cells allowing less modules per vehicle for the same total pack capacity. If they get 25% increase in capacity they can drop 25% or cell production.

 

Nissan halts battery plant project in Portugal | Reuters

 

And remeber there's the HV battery plant being built in Wales too. Perhaps Nissan decided to keep the European production in the UK with the Leaf to be built in Sunderland and the batteries in Wales?

Portugal is pro EV but its economy is in tatters (even compared to ours). Why build a plant there if you'll never sell the product there. It's a bad day for Portugal but their bad news is our good news.

 

From what I read, the new Portugese govt wasn't too pro-EV.

I remember when Cameron took over, there was talk of scrapping EV incentives (and even the Sunderland plant ones). Nissan had threatened to withdraw from UK as well - but those incentives survived the Cameron cuts.

Anyway, the new European policy will ensure that Europe is weekened (with a deep recession) - but the Euro is strong

 

Yeah but a £20 million grant is not going to make much difference when you're spending £billions on a new plant. But it's a small price to pay - esp compared to the £billions sent Europes way every year to prop up their failing golden Euro project.

I give the Euro in its present form about 6-9 months. Greece will have to leave and then one they do it'll set a precedent and they'll be followed by Portugal and then maybe Ireland and then God knows.

Perhaps Nissan think the same and don't want to throw good money after bad? Why else build the plant and then pull out at the last minute?

 

Management accounting uses pot odds. It doesn't care how much you've put in, only the size of the pot.

If current demand is too low to require the additional capacity in Portugal and they're the cheapest to cut out, there's no point operating the plant.

If the thought Portugal was going to quit the Euro it'd be quite good because, although it'd make the currency less stable you'd expect the New Escudo to be devalued.