Nissan Chooses W.G. Yates as Smyrna Contractor

Japanese carmaker Nissan announced yesterday it has selected of Philadelphia as the main pre-construction contractor for the Smyrna facility in Tennessee. The plant, which will be used to manufacture the Nissan Leaf starting late 2012, will be built by W.G. Yates together with Albert Kahn Associates, who will handle the architectural and engineering design services for the plant.

Yates will be providing design support services for the start of construction.

Nissan will begin work at the plant later this year and plans to build a new battery plant and bring some changes to the existing structure for electric-vehicle assembly.

As soon as the plant will become fully operational, it will be capable of producing 150,000 Nissan LEAF electric cars per year, and will have an annual capacity of 200,000 batteries. Smyrna will be responsible for creating 1,300 jobs when the plants are operating at full capacity.

Earlier this year, Nissan received a $1.4 billion loan as part of the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program for the production of the Leaf. The entire endeavor is said to cost Nissan some $1 billion.

The Nissan LEAF is scheduled for launch in the US, Japan and Europe in December 2010, so the carmaker is currently preparing for market launch by closing deals with the State of Tennessee, the State of Oregon, Sonoma County and San Diego in California, Phoenix and Tucson, Ariz., Washington D.C., Seattle, Raleigh, N.C., and with Houston-based Reliant Energy.