Electric bus and truck manufacturer coming to Joliet

The Lion Electric Co., a manufacturer of electric buses and trucks, is bringing a factory to Joliet.

Gov. JB Pritzker and local officials joined executives from Canadian-based Lion Electric on Friday in announcing the plans at the site of the future manufacturing and research facility.

The facility is expected to employ 745 workers and begin production in the second half of 2022. The plant will have the capacity to produce 20,000 vehicles a year.

“This is really going to be the hub of medium and heavy-duty electric vehicle manufacturing in the United States,” said Nate Baguio, Lion Electric vice president of sales.

It is Lion Electric’s first plant in the U.S., where the company plans to expand its business.

“They looked at a lot of states,” Pritzker said. “We believe that Illinois is the right place to come if you’re an electric vehicle manufacturer.”

Pritzker pointed to moves the state has made to support the development of the electric vehicle industry in Illinois as factors in attracting Lion Electric and future companies.

“We think the electric vehicle manufacturing industry in Illinois is going to be one of the very best in all the nation,” Pritzker said.

The selection of a Joliet site was welcomed by local officials, who have been working to add manufacturers to an industrial market that has been dominated for years by new warehouses and distribution centers.

The Will County Center for Economic Development issued a statement calling the Lion Electric announcement “a milestone for the region.”

Lion Electric will move into a 900,000-square-foot building under construction at 3835 Youngs Road in Clarius Park, an industrial development on the Joliet-Channahon border where Whirlpool and Amazon have distribution facilities.

Mayor Bob O’Dekirk said a welcome climate for industry contributed to Lion Electric’s decision to come to Joliet.

“I think it’s great to see our city compete and win at a national level,” O’Dekirk said.

He noted that speculative buildings, which go under construction before a user is found, have met with public criticism. But the Lion Electric location is a speculative building that was significantly built before it was picked as the site of the future factory.

“I think the position that the City Council has taken that we are open here to business and development directly led to this happening,” O’Dekirk said.

Lion Electric will lease the building.

Baguio said a strong transportation network in the area along with a manufacturing heritage and “world-class education system” in Illinois were factors in selecting the Joliet location.

“We’re looking at distributing these vehicles all across the United States,” Baguio said. “Being able to get product out from a central location in the United States is real big to us.”

He noted that the Joliet location also will be a Lion Electric research center.

The nexus between manufacturing, distribution and education is something state and local officials emphasized Friday.

“Will County has a proud heritage of manufacturing in a broad range of industries, and projects like Lion Electric will help ensure that manufacturing will be part of our future,” Doug Pryor, vice president of economic development for the Will County Center for Economic Development, said in a statement.

Pryor also pointed to the potential for regional growth in the supply chain to the plant, something also noted in a Lion Electric news release announcing the Joliet location.

“The Will County region has a rich history of manufacturing, and Lion plans to build a robust local supply chain within the area,” the release said. “In addition, the Joliet location offers Lion a geographically centralized base of manufacturing and operations, with access to key infrastructure and distribution channels.”

While the Lion Electric location is close to recently opened distribution centers, it also is in the vicinity of longtime industrial operations, including the ExxonMobil Joliet Refinery.

Lion Electric represents a new age of manufacturing, something mentioned by speakers at the Joliet event and by company CEO and founder Marc Bedard in the release.

“This significant expansion into the U.S. market will not only allow us to drastically increase our overall manufacturing capacity of electric trucks and buses but to also better serve our customers, while adding critical clean manufacturing jobs that will form the backbone of the green economy,” Bedard said.

The Joliet announcement came the same day that Lion Electric was first publicly traded on the New York and Toronto stock exchanges. Lion Electric representatives planned to be at the New York Stock Exchange to ring the closing bell Friday afternoon.