"It’s one of the biggest loans to a US carmaker in more than a decade – and a watershed moment in Biden’s $400 billion plan to go all in on green technologies."

"A deep-pocketed US government program designed to finance futuristic energy businesses is issuing a conditional $9.2 billion loan to Ford Motor Co. for the construction of three battery factories. The enormous loan — by far the biggest government backing for a US automaker since the bailouts in the 2009 financial crisis — marks a watershed moment for President Joe Biden’s aggressive industrial policy meant to help American manufacturers catch up to China in green technologies.

The new factories that will eventually supply Ford’s expansion into electric vehicles are already under construction in Kentucky and Tennessee through a joint venture called BlueOval SK, owned by the Michigan automaker and South Korean battery giant SK On Co. Ford plans to make as many as 2 million EVs by 2026, a huge increase from the roughly 132,000 it produced last year.

The three-factory buildout by BlueOval plus an adjacent Ford EV assembly unit have an estimated price tag of $11.4 billion. BlueOval was previously awarded subsidies by both state governments. That means taxpayers would be providing low-interest financing for almost all of the cost."

Akshat Rathi, Ari Natter, and Keith Naughton Green report for Bloomberg Green June 22, 2023. [2]