North East launches £30m bid for electric car industry

Feb 26 2009 by Paul James, The Journal

A GROUNDBREAKING £30m bid has been launched to base the car industry of the future in the North East.

Development chiefs want the region to become a global centre for electric cars and are already planning to install charging points at homes, businesses and public buildings.

One North East said it had already secured support for the bold project from supermarket giant Tesco and from health trusts and councils in the region to host the charging points and to trial the technology in their fleets of vehicles.

The move would secure thousands of jobs at Nissan and in its supply chain and would also boost the region’s developing renewable energy sector, which would generate the electricity required to run the new cars.

Chris Pywell, head of strategic economic change at ONE, said the region could find global fame as a centre for electric cars in the same way it did for the heavy industries of the past.

He said installing the infrastructure in the North East would help the region steal a march on rivals across the globe looking to secure the same work. Contracts have already been advertised for consultants to prepare the North East for “large-scale demonstration and trials of electric vehicles”.

Last night business leaders hailed the move as an innovative approach to tackling the recession as the Government repeated its aim of persuading Nissan to bring its electric car business to Washington.

Mr Pywell said the move would tap in to expertise in electric batteries at Newcastle University and that the agency was also in talks with the Washington-based Tanfield Group, which is developing electric transit vans for Ford.