Shanghai GM’s new Wuhan Branch just saw its inaugural Buick Excelle compact sedan roll off the line, marking the start of production for the $1.12 billion manufacturing plant. It is the fourth manufacturing facility erected in the country by the SAIC-GM partnership.
According to an official press release, the plant has an annual production capacity of 240,000 units, although further investments in expansion are already planned. A $1.2 billion second phase investment in the plant will just about double the facility’s capacity when it reaches production in 2017, and an additional $1.6 billion will be put into Powertrain projects.
Shanghai GM’s Wuhan Branch is a thoroughly modern production facility, with 452 robots total throughout the plant. In fact, General Motors is boasting a 97 percent automation rate in the facility’s body shop. Considering the rapid rate of maturation of the Chinese marketplace, and the impressively high demand already (Shanghai GM sold a staggering 1.7 million vehicles in 2014), this certainly won’t be the last massive investment made by General Motors in Chinese production.
Comments
Hopefully, GM is investing equal energy into electrified vehicles for China. DId you
see the common air-quality warnings in Beijing and Shanghai? The government
there posts “stay inside” days due to a major air pollution problem in those
megacities. “Brown air” dictates stay-inside days that, if you go outside, you
risk major health issues even death! Google it.
Tesla is well into it’s battery Gigafactory in the Nevada desert – hopefully GM
follows suit with major investment in electric vehicles. A Chinese Bolt and Volt?
More likely – a Buick Electra – that’s truly electric. Chinese government mandates
should be stronger than ours for clean air vehicles and no-emissions zones in
big cities like Europe is doing now.
Just to predict the “Chinese use coal-fired power” rebukers who’ll likely comment: That argument was dead years ago when “Well-to-wheel” studies proved what we already knew. Even the dirtiest coal-fired electric plant’s energy is cleaner to the vehicle than: OPEC country to tanker ( needs military protection ) – tanker across ocean to refinery – refinery electrical energy spent – refinery to transportation – transportation to storage – storage to local gas station. You EV critics have to consider the whole supply and processing chain. Electric plant to wire to transformer to outlet = cleaner by far. Not to mention places like Seattle, where I live where electricity is over 84% clean hydro and wind-sourced. China has the world’s largest hydro-electric dam.