Ford Motor Co. will invest nearly $2 billion in retooling a Kentucky factory to produce electric vehicles that it says will be more affordable, more profitable to build, and will outcompete rival models.
The automaker’s top executive unveiled the new EV strategy at Ford’s Louisville Assembly Plant, which, after producing gas-powered vehicles for 70 years, will be converted to manufacture electric vehicles.
“In our careers, as automobile people, we’re lucky if we get to work on one, maybe two, projects that really change the face of our industry,” CEO Jim Farley told plant workers in Kentucky on Monday. “And I believe today is going to light the match as one of those projects for all of us here.”
The Big Detroit automakers have continued to transition from internal combustion engines to EV technology, even as President Donald Trump’s administration unwinds incentives for automakers to go electric. Trump’s massive tax and spending law targets EV incentives, including the imminent removal of a credit that saves buyers up to $7,500 on a new electric car.
Yet Farley and other top executives in the auto industry say that electric vehicles are the future and there is no going back.
The first EV to roll off the revamped Louisville assembly line will be a midsize, four-door electric pickup truck in 2027 for domestic and international markets, the company said Monday.
The new electric trucks will be powered by lower-cost batteries made at a Ford factory in Michigan. The Detroit automaker previously announced a $3 billion investment to build the battery factory.
The automaker sees this as a “Model T moment” for its EV business — a reference to revolutionary changes on the production line led by the company’s founder, Henry Ford, when it began churning out vehicles from a factory more than a century ago. Farley said the changes will upend how electric vehicles are made in the U.S.
“It represents the most radical change in how we design and how we build vehicles at Ford since the Model-T,” Farley said.
The company said it will use a universal platform and production system for its EVs, essentially the underpinning of a vehicle that can be applied across a wide range of models.
The Louisville factory — one of two Ford assembly plants in Kentucky’s largest city — will be revamped to cut production costs and make assembly time faster as it’s prepared to churn out electric vehicles.
The result will be “an affordable electric vehicle that we expect to be profitable,” Farley said in an interview with The Associated Press ahead of the announcement. “This is an example of us rejuvenating our U.S. plants with the most modern manufacturing techniques.”
The new platform enables a lineup of affordable vehicles to be produced at scale, Ford said. It will reduce parts by 20% versus a typical vehicle, with 25% fewer fasteners, 40% fewer workstations dock-to-dock in the plant, and a 15% faster assembly time, Ford said. The traditional assembly line will be transformed into an “assembly tree” at the Louisville plant, it said. Instead of one long conveyor, three sub-assembly lines will operate simultaneously and then join together, it said.
Other specifications for the midsize electric truck – including its reveal date, starting price, EPA-estimated battery range, battery sizes, and charge times — will be announced later, the company said. Ford revealed in its release that the truck will have a targeted starting price of about $30,000.
Ford said its investment in the Louisville plant will secure 2,200 hourly jobs.
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said Monday that the automaker’s plans for the Louisville plant will strengthen a more than century-old partnership between Ford and the Bluegrass State.
“This announcement not only represents one of the largest investments on record in our state, it also boosts Kentucky’s position at the center of EV-related innovation and solidifies Louisville Assembly Plant as an important part of Ford’s future,” Beshear said.
Ford said its combined investment of about $5 billion at the Kentucky assembly plant and Michigan battery plant is expected to create or secure nearly 4,000 direct jobs between the two plants while strengthening the domestic supply chain with dozens of new U.S.-based suppliers.
Ford previously forecast weaker earnings growth for this year and further losses in its electric vehicles business as it works to control costs. Model e, Ford’s electric vehicle business, posted a full-year loss of $5.08 billion for 2024 as revenue fell 35% to $3.9 billion.
Ford’s new EV strategy comes as Chinese automakers are quickly expanding across the globe, offering relatively affordable electric vehicles.
“We’re not in a race to build the most electric cars,” Farley told the AP when asked about competition from China. “We’re in a race to have a sustainable electric business that’s profitable, that customers love.
“And this new vehicle, built in Louisville, Kentucky, is going to be a much better solution to anything that anyone can buy from China,” he added.
An explosion at a U.S. Steel plant near Pittsburgh left dozens injured or trapped under the rubble Monday, with emergency workers on site trying to rescue them, officials said.
There are no confirmed fatalities at the Clairton Coke Works, said Abigail Gardner, director of communications for Allegheny County. The explosion sent black smoke spiralling into the midday sky in the Monongahela Valley, a region synonymous with the state for more than a century.
“It felt like thunder,” Zachary Buday, a construction worker near the scene, told WTAE-TV. “Shook the scaffold, shook my chest, and shook the building, and then when we saw the dark smoke coming up from the steel mill and put two and two together, and it's like something bad happened.”
Allegheny County Emergency Services said a fire at the plant started around 10:51 a.m. and that it has transported five people. The agency did not provide any more details on those people transported.
An Allegheny County emergency services spokesperson, Kasey Reigner, said dozens were injured and the county was sending 15 ambulances, on top of the ambulances supplied by local emergency response agencies.
Air quality concerns and health warnings
The plant, a massive industrial facility along the Monongahela River south of Pittsburgh, is considered the largest coking operation in North America and is one of four major U.S. Steel plants in Pennsylvania that employ several thousand workers.
Democratic Sen. John Fetterman, who formerly served as the mayor of nearby Braddock, called the explosion “absolutely tragic” and vowed to support steelworkers in the aftermath.
“I grieve for these families,” Fetterman said. “I stand with the steelworkers.”
The Allegheny County Health Department said it is monitoring the explosion and advised residents within 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) of the plant to remain indoors, close all windows and doors, set air conditioning systems to recirculate, and avoid drawing in outside air, such as using exhaust fans. It said its monitors have not detected levels of soot or sulfur dioxide above federal standards.
The plant converts coal to coke, a key component in the steel-making process. According to the company, it produces 4.3 million tons (3.9 million metric tons) of coke annually and has approximately 1,400 workers.
The plant has a long history of pollution concerns
In recent years, the Clairton plant has been dogged by concerns about pollution. In 2019, it agreed to settle a 2017 lawsuit for $8.5 million. Under the settlement, the company agreed to spend $6.5 million to reduce soot emissions and noxious odors from the Clairton coke-making facility.
The company also faced other lawsuits over pollution from the Clairton facility, including ones accusing the company of violating clean air laws after a 2018 fire damaged the facility’s sulfur pollution controls.
In 2018, a Christmas Eve fire at the Clairton coke works plant caused $40 million in damage.
The fire damaged pollution control equipment and led to repeated releases of sulfur dioxide, according to a lawsuit. Sulfur dioxide is a colorless, pungent byproduct of fossil fuel combustion that can make it hard to breathe. In the wake of the fire, Allegheny County warned residents to limit outdoor activities, with residents saying for weeks afterward that the air felt acidic, smelled like rotten eggs, and was hard to breathe.
In February, a problem with a battery at the plant led to a “buildup of combustible material” that ignited, causing an audible “boom,” the Allegheny County Health Department said. Two workers who got material in their eyes received first aid treatment at a local hospital but were not seriously injured.
Last year, the company agreed to spend $19.5 million in equipment upgrades and $5 million on local clean air efforts and programs as part of settling a federal lawsuit filed by Clean Air Council and PennEnvironment, and the Allegheny County Health Department.
The fire at the Clairton plant knocked out pollution controls at its Mon Valley plants, but U.S. Steel continued to run them anyway, environmental groups said.
The lawsuits accused the steel producer of more than 12,000 violations of its air pollution permits.
Environmental group calls for an investigation
David Masur, executive director of PennEnvironment, another environmental group that has sued U.S. Steel over pollution, said there needed to be “a full, independent investigation into the causes of this latest catastrophe and a re-evaluation as to whether the Clairton plant is fit to keep operating.”
In June, U.S. Steel and Nippon Steel announced they had finalized a “historic partnership,” a deal that gives the U.S. government a say in some matters and comes a year and a half after the Japanese company first proposed its nearly $15 billion buyout of the iconic American steelmaker.
The pursuit by Nippon Steel for the Pittsburgh-based company was buffeted by national security concerns and presidential politics in a premier battleground state, dragging out the transaction for more than a year after U.S. Steel shareholders approved it.
Clairton Mayor Richard Lattanzi said his heart goes out to the victims of Monday's explosion.
“The mill is such a big part of Clairton,” he said. “It’s just a sad day for Clairton.”
Prince Harry and Meghan have extended their partnership with Netflix and their media company, Archewell Productions, with a multiyear, first-look deal, the couple announced Monday.
Archewell began collaborating with the streaming giant in 2020 and has produced a handful of documentary content, including the popular “Harry & Meghan.” The Duchess of Sussex also developed a lifestyle brand, As Ever, in partnership with Netflix.
The collaboration has also produced the documentary series “Polo,” “Heart of Invictus,” and “Live to Lead.”
“My husband and I feel inspired by our partners who work closely with us and our Archewell Productions team to create thoughtful content across genres that resonates globally, and celebrates our shared vision,” Meghan said in a statement.
The couple and Netflix also announced upcoming collaborations, including a second season of “With Love, Meghan,” a lifestyle and cooking show starring the duchess. The show will also receive a special holiday episode in December.
The show is Netflix’s most-watched culinary show since its March release, according to the company. It ranked low compared to other releases in the first half of this year, with 5.3 million views, according to Netflix’s semiannual report.
“Masaka Kids, A Rhythm Within,” a documentary short film that centers on a small orphanage in Uganda’s Masaka region, is also set to release this year. Archewell is also in production with Netflix on a feature adaptation of Carley Fortune’s novel “Meet Me at the Lake.” The drama “follows a decade-spanning love story that begins with a chance encounter and a broken promise,” the statement read.
“Harry and Meghan are influential voices whose stories resonate with audiences everywhere. The response to their work speaks for itself,” Bela Bajaria, Netflix’s chief content officer, said in a statement.
Their extended deal with Netflix is the latest in the couple’s years-long effort to develop business ventures in the United States. They had also penned a multiyear deal with Spotify in 2020 and produced a podcast, “ Archetypes, ” but cut ties with the company in 2023.
The couple has been detangling their lives from the British royal family and are living in California with their two young children.