Ford Motor Co. Shutting Down EV Battery Plant, Shifting Energy Storage Focus to Grid Customers
Ford Motor Co. is putting the brakes on its ambitious electric vehicle strategies almost as fast as it accelerated building of a new EV battery factory in Kentucky, but the U.S. automaker apparently still sees value in energy storage for the equally trumpeted future data center buildout.
The company and numerous news outlets on Monday reported that Ford was shutting down its nearly brand-new EV battery plant in Glendale, Kentucky and laying off some 1,600 workers. The downturn in electric vehicle sales, coming after the Trump Administration and Congress ended tax credits on EVs, will force Ford to take a $19.5 billion accounting charge on its lost EV business.
Ford said it would cancel its much-publicized Ford Lightning EV pickup truck and shift its battery business to commercial grid and possibly off-grid opportunities in the future.
“The operating reality has changed, and we are redeploying capital into higher-return growth opportunities: Ford Pro, our market-leading trucks and vans, hybrids, and high-margin opportunities like our new battery energy storage business,” Ford CEO Jim Farley said in a statement.
Ford will continue making EVs but focus on smaller models under the Universal EV platform such as those being assembled at the Louisville, Kentucky plant. It also will keep producing its BlueOval Park batteries in Michigan.
The big shift comes in the customer focus on battery storage elsewhere. Ford will invest several billion dollars and transition its Glendale, Ky. Plant to make batteries for utilities and renewable energy developers.
“The challenges facing the EV market have led us to conclude that we no longer see a path to long-term profitability for our EV business without taking the strategic actions described herein,” Ford Motor Co. reported in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
At the same time, the electric utility sector is anticipating a huge demand increase with future load from data center’s AI training factories, cloud-based computing and industrial electrification. Tesla has sold utility-scale and distributed energy battery storage solutions to both utilities and microgrid developers for years.
About the Author
Rod Walton, EnergyTech Managing Editor
Managing Editor
For EnergyTech editorial inquiries, please contact Managing Editor Rod Walton at [email protected].
Rod Walton has spent 17 years covering the energy industry as a newspaper and trade journalist. He formerly was energy writer and business editor at the Tulsa World. Later, he spent six years covering the electricity power sector for Pennwell and Clarion Events. He joined Endeavor and EnergyTech in November 2021.
Walton earned his Bachelors degree in journalism from the University of Oklahoma. His career stops include the Moore American, Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise, Wagoner Tribune and Tulsa World.
EnergyTech is focused on the mission critical and large-scale energy users and their sustainability and resiliency goals. These include the commercial and industrial sectors, as well as the military, universities, data centers and microgrids. The C&I sectors together account for close to 30 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S.
He was named Managing Editor for Microgrid Knowledge and EnergyTech starting July 1, 2023
Many large-scale energy users such as Fortune 500 companies, and mission-critical users such as military bases, universities, healthcare facilities, public safety and data centers, shifting their energy priorities to reach net-zero carbon goals within the coming decades. These include plans for renewable energy power purchase agreements, but also on-site resiliency projects such as microgrids, combined heat and power, rooftop solar, energy storage, digitalization and building efficiency upgrades.