Plant will be built at site close to M5 motorway

Contractors have begun eyeing the chance to price the job to build a huge car battery plant in Somerset for Tata.

The Indian firm said it and its subsidiary JLR would be the anchor customers for the new factory, which will begin supplying units from 2026.

The news was announced earlier this month and will see a massive new electric vehicle battery plant built at the Gravity Business Park near Bridgwater.

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The business park is going up at a site near Bridgwater, close to the M5 motorway

Building understands that firms including Mace, ISG, Sir Robert McAlpine, Wates and Laing O’Rourke are all running the rule over the job which is thought to be worth around £4bn.

One would-be bidder said: “All we’ve seen so far is a very large set of planning drawings. The whole thing will be billions but it’s very early stages right now.”

ISG was working on the stalled gigafactory scheme in Northumberland which was put on hold last year because of funding issues while Wates began work last year on a new gigafactory in Sunderland for Japanese electric vehicle battery technology company Envision AESC.

The business park is a 616-acre, so-called “smart campus” currently being built near the M5 motorway at Puriton. The scheme, a former Royal Ordnance factory, is being developed by private banker Salamanca. 

Work on the complex first began in 2019 with Welsh contractor Alun Griffiths building a link road to connect the site directly to the M5 at junction 23.

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