Volkswagen wants to turn its home plant in Wolfsburg, Germany into a production hub for its compact electric offerings. This factory doesn’t currently produce any EVs, but that will change come 2023 once VW starts investing the first tranche of a planned €460-million, or around $485-million, which it plans to complete by 2025.
In 2023, it wants to start producing the facelifted ID.3 in Wolfsburg, and it will be ramped up until reaching peak production capacity the very next year. Once that is completed, Volkswagen will begin preparing for production of an ID.3-sized crossover, still unnamed, which will be built on an evolution of the current MEB platform called MEB+.
According to VW, this revised MEB architecture should increase vehicles’ range up to 435 miles (700 km) mainly by improving efficiency, although we expect higher capacity battery packs will also play their part; charging speeds will also be improved with MEB+.
Thomas Schäfer, CEO of the Volkswagen brand and Group Board Member said that
The ID.3 ramp-up is the first important step towards the electrification of our main plant. At the same time, we are working closely with the Works Council to bring a further electric model based on the MEB+ to Wolfsburg – this will be a high-volume model for the booming SUV segment. With these strong decisions and investments, we intend to bolster the competitiveness of this factory further and give the workforce a concrete long-term perspective.
The manufacturer seems to have very high hopes that the ID.3-sized electric crossover due in 2025 will be successful. It will sit below the ID.4 and ID.5 high riders and be priced accordingly, but since it is based on MEB+, it may even surpass them in terms of range and charging speed.
This sizable investment will also enable the factory to build VW’s future electric flagship currently known as Project Trinity. It may have been pushed back to the end of the decade due to software issues, but when it does enter production, there’s a good chance it will happen in Wolfsburg. VW is also analyzing the prospect of building a brand new manufacturing location in Warmenau, and if this plant does get built, then it’s very likely that Trinity will be moved there.
