Honda Canada to build electric vehicle manufacturing facility in Ontario

Honda Canada is investing approximately $15 billion to create Canada’s first comprehensive electric vehicle supply chain.

Located in Ontario, this large-scale project will see four new manufacturing plants, including an electric vehicle assembly plant – the first of its kind for Honda Motor Co., Ltd. – as well as a new stand-alone battery manufacturing plant at Honda’s facilities in Alliston, Ont. To complete the supply chain, Honda will build a cathode active material and precursor (CAM/pCAM) processing plant through a joint venture partnership with POSCO Future M Co., Ltd. and a separator plant through a joint venture partnership with Asahi Kasei Corporation.

Once fully operational in 2028, the new assembly plant will produce up to 240,000 vehicles per year.

“Today’s announcement is a historic investment by a manufacturer in the Canadian auto industry,” says Jean Marc Leclerc, president and CEO, Honda Canada. “It proudly honours the highly skilled associates who have earned a global reputation for manufacturing excellence and represents Honda’s recognition of the long-term attractiveness of the Canadian electric vehicle manufacturing ecosystem.”

Striving to realize carbon neutrality for all its products and corporate activities by 2050, Honda has set a goal to make BEVs and FCEVs represent 100 per cent of vehicle sales by 2040.

As the first step in achieving this electrification goal in North America, Honda positioned its existing auto production plants in the state of Ohio in the U.S. as its EV Hub for production, including the retooling of existing plants, an investment of USD$700 million, and the construction of a joint venture EV battery plant with LG Energy Solution, with an expected investment of USD$4.4 billion.

The Ohio EV hub will serve as the foundation for future EV and EV battery production, sharing knowledge and expertise with other Honda plants in North America, including the new EV assembly and battery plants in Ontario. Honda expects EV production to begin at the Marysville Auto Plant in late 2025.

As a second step in this initiative, Honda will strive to establish a comprehensive EV value chain that includes all aspects of EV production in Canada, from the procurement of raw materials mainly for batteries, to the production of finished EVs. Honda will leverage EV production knowledge learned at the Ohio EV Hub, combined with the resources and clean energy available in Canada, to establish a stable supply system for batteries, the key component of EVs, and increase cost competitiveness of its EVs as a whole.

The Canadian government says Honda’s investments in an electric vehicle assembly plant and a battery manufacturing plant in Alliston will create more than 1,000 manufacturing jobs in Ontario, with the CAM/pCAM processing plant and separator plant helping to create thousands of additional direct and indirect jobs in Ontario and across Canada, including during the construction phase and across Ontario’s leading auto parts supplier and research and development ecosystems.