New Shelbyville battery plant will bring thousands of jobs

SHELBYVILLE, Ky. — A new battery manufacturing company is coming to Shelbyville and is expected to bring almost 1,600 new jobs with it.

Gov. Andy Beshear, D-Ky., announced Shelbyville Battery Manufacturing, a subsidiary of e-Storage, will be the largest economic development project ever in Shelby County. The project will cost almost $712 million to complete. It’s also the largest jobs announcement in the state in over two years.

Beshear said, “This is the single largest investment and job creation announcement we have on record for Shelby County, and it is the largest project Kentucky has seen this year. This project will solidify our role as a leader in the country’s energy storage sector and will transform our economy, creating opportunities for Kentucky families for generations.”

According to the governor’s office, the project will create a state-of-the-art, 6-gigawatt hour battery cell, module and packaging manufacturing facility in a 1 million-square-foot building on Logistics Drive in Shelbyville.

Friday’s announcement is the third-largest jobs announcement Beshear has made during his time as governor. His office said previous announcements have established Kentucky as the electric battery capital of the United States. The other projects were Ford and SK On’s $5.8 billion, 5,000-job BlueOval AK Battery Park in Hardin County; AESC’s $2 billion, 2,000-job gigafactory project in Warren County and Toyota’s $1.3 billion investment in Scott County and INFAC North America’s $53 million investment in Taylor County.

Colin Parkin, president of e-Storage, said, “This new plant will allow us to provide our U.S. customers with cutting-edge, American-made battery energy storage products.”

e-Storage, based in Ontario, Canada, is a subsidiary of Canadian Solar.

Production at the Shelbyville plant is expected to begin by the end of 2025.