On Friday, Japan’s Nikkei reported Nissan Motor Co along with its China-based battery maker partner Envision AESC group will build new battery plants for electric vehicles in Japan and in the United Kingdom; the duo are set to invest more than $1.82 billion (200 billion yen) to this end.

The new plants are scheduled to churn out batteries as early as 2024 with a total capacity to power as many as 700,000 electric vehicles per year, said the report.

“Nissan will continue to accelerate electrification toward carbon neutrality, however we have no further plans to announce at this time,” said Nissan’s spokeswoman.

Incidentally, batteries are one of the costliest components of EVs with raw materials accounting for the largest part of the cost.

In order to save costs, earlier this month Nissan’s alliance partner Renault said, the two companies are in talks to collaborate and use the same battery technology; a common specification of batteries have already been agreed.

($1 = 109.8500 yen)