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Andy Palmer, senior vice president and head of product planning at Nissan, says that investments to produce batteries at its Tennessee plant in the U.S. could exceed $1 billion, accounting for the bulk of Nissan’s government loan it was granted last month.

Nissan received a total of $1.6 billion to modify its Smyrna, Tennessee plant to produce zero-emission electric vehicles and lithium-ion battery packs to power them.

Palmer said that the site will have three “modules,” equivalent to the production of 54,000 batteries. Each module will cost $350 million to produce.

Nissan also plans to retool an existing line at its Smyrna plant to produce electric-vehicles in 2012. It is hoping to produce 15,000 electric-vehicles there a year.

First Drive: Nissan Cube EV Prototype:

- By: Omar Rana

Source: Reuters

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