The redevelopment plan is expected to create more than 4,000 direct jobs, including local suppliers, as well as support thousands of indirect jobs
Ford Motor Company’s idled Wixom Assembly Plant will be redeveloped into one of the nation’s largest renewable energy manufacturing parks, Chairman Bill Ford said.
Ford announced that the automaker has reached an agreement in principle to sell Wixom Assembly Plant to Xtreme Power of Austin, Texas, and Clairvoyant Energy of Santa Barbara, California, which will manufacture energy storage systems and high-efficiency solar panels at the site.
The two clean-energy companies are planning to invest $725 million dollars into the project initially. Construction will begin next year and the energy park is expected to employ as many as 4,000 when it fully operational. In all, investment in the project is expected to reach $1.275 billion.
Bill Ford told reporters after the official announcement that he could not think of better use for the plant, which Ford initially opened more than 50 years ago to serve the booming post war markets.
“The Wixom Assembly plant served well for a half century and we wanted to ensure it served Michigan well into the future,” Ford said.
“I can’t imagine a better way to use this facility – for ourselves, our children and our grandchildren,” the Ford chairman said.
Xtreme power plans to renovate over 1 million square feet of the Wixom site to manufacture large-scale power systems that store renewable energy. Clairvoyant Energy will redevelop a portion of the site to build state-of-the art, high-efficiency solar panels.