RALEIGH, N.C. -- Toyota announced Monday that it plans to build a $1.3 billion electric vehicle battery plant near Greensboro, N.C., that will employ at least 1,750 people and help meet the auto giant's growing goals of electric vehicle sales this decade.
Company leaders joined Gov. Roy Cooper and other elected and economic-development officials gathered to unveil the project on hundreds of acres at the Greensboro-Randolph Megasite in Liberty, about 70 miles west of Raleigh.
Initially, Toyota could receive well over $430 million in cash incentives, tax breaks and infrastructure upgrades from the state of North Carolina and local governments if it meets job creation and investment goals, according to officials and documents.
The Japanese automaker said the plant is expected to start making batteries in 2025.
The announcement marks a big accomplishment for the Greensboro-area economy, which is still looking for replacement jobs after the region's generations-old textile industry shriveled in the 1990s and 2000s.
Local leaders had been working for several years to land such a big company at the site. North Carolina lost out to Alabama for a joint Toyota-Mazda automobile manufacturing plant about four years ago.
"Good things come to those who wait," Cooper said during the announcement at the proposed site, saying the production will help North Carolina meet its goal as a clean-energy leader. "We hope in the future everything that goes around the battery will be part of this as well."
The plant is part of $3.4 billion that Toyota plans to spend in the U.S. on automotive batteries during the next decade. It didn't detail where the remaining $2.1 billion would be spent, but part of that likely will go for another battery factory.
Toyota will form a new company to run the new plant with Toyota Tsusho, a subsidiary that now makes an array of parts for the automaker. The company also will help Toyota expand its U.S. supply chain, as well as increase its knowledge of lithium-ion auto batteries, Toyota said.
The site near Greensboro is relatively close to many of Toyota's existing U.S. auto assembly plants in Missouri, Kentucky, Indiana, Alabama and Texas. The company has yet to announce where it will build fully electric vehicles for sale in the U.S.
"North Carolina offers the right conditions for this investment, including the infrastructure, high quality education system, access to a diverse and skilled workforce, and a welcoming environment for doing business," Toyota Motor North America CEO Ted Ogawa said in a news release.
The jobs, which are expected to be created by 2029, will have average salaries of more than $62,000, according to economic development officials.
Invited guests make their way across what will soon be the future site of a new Toyota battery manufacturing plant in Liberty, N.C., Monday, Dec. 6, 2021. (Kenneth Ferriera/News & Record via AP)
Toyota Motor Administrative Officer Chris Reynolds, left, presents North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper with a model race car as a gift celebrating their new partnership during the announcement of the future site of a new Toyota battery manufacturing plant in Liberty, N.C., Monday, Dec. 6, 2021. (Kenneth Ferriera/News & Record via AP)
North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper announces that the future use of the Greensboro-Randolph Megasite will be as a new Toyota battery manufacturing plant in Liberty, N.C., on Monday, Dec. 6, 2021. (Kenneth Ferriera/News & Record via AP)
FILE - The company logo adorns a sign outside a Toyota dealership Sunday, March 21, 2021, in Lakewood, Colo. North Carolina officials have scheduled a Monday, Dec. 6, 2021, news conference to announce a major economic development project, which likely will be construction of a Toyota electric vehicle battery factory with 1,750 workers. Officials from the state and an unidentified company will attend. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, File)