- Japanese automaker aims to ramp up global output to 1m electric vehicles by 2026
According to Nikkei Asia article published on February 21, 2023, Toyota Motor will start producing electric vehicles in the U.S. state of Kentucky as early as 2025, Nikkei learned Tuesday, as it tries to capture growing demand for clean-energy cars.
The Japanese automaker will update an existing factory to make electric models alongside gasoline-fueled autos. It intends to produce 10,000 electric sport utility vehicles monthly by the end of 2025.
The move capitalizes on new government incentives in the U.S., which is Toyota's largest market, making up one-fifth of its global sales. Last year's Inflation Reduction Act offers tax credits of up to $7,500 for purchases of new electric vehicles assembled in North America.
Together with a battery plant slated to open in North Carolina by around 2025, the Kentucky factory will let Toyota make electrics entirely in the U.S., from key components to final assembly.
Toyota aims to make about 200,000 electric vehicles in the U.S. annually from 2026 onward, accounting for nearly 20% of its output there, along with production in Japan, China and India. It plans to supply 1 million worldwide per year by that time.
Incoming President Koji Sato has signaled that he will make pivoting to electrics a priority.
Despite being the world's largest automaker, Toyota produced just 24,000 EVs worldwide under its own and the Lexus brands in 2022, compared with the 1.31 million units sold by Tesla. Plans call for increasing global EV sales to 3.5 million units a year by 2030.
British market research firm LMC Automotive forecasts global EV sales of 36.71 million vehicles in 2030, roughly quintupling from 2022 and representing 35% of the new-car market.
