Electric car plant could park in metro Atlanta

Metro Atlanta could gets its first assembly plant for electric cars.

CT&T Korea Ltd., a Seoul-based electric vehicle and battery maker, is eyeing Georgia and South Carolina to assemble street-legal, low-speed vehicles.

Georgia has a good shot at getting the 100,000-square-foot plant, said Curt Westlake, senior director of marketing at CT&T’s Duluth-based U.S. subsidiary.

The plant would employ about 150 and assemble about 10,000 cars annually at capacity, Westlake said, noting the company is considering sites from Coweta to Gwinnett counties. A final site selection is expected to be made by fall, with production scheduled to begin in 2011.

The vehicles, which have lead acid or lithium-polymer batteries, retail from $8,000 to $24,000 when fully equipped.

CT&T, which has no plants in the United States, plans to develop a network of 40 regional assembly centers in the country and employ about 2,600 over the next five years. The company plans to build an assembly plant in Hawaii later this year.

CT&T began selling its electric vehicles in the Charleston, S.C.-area in April and expects to open a dealership in Duluth late this summer. Westlake declined to disclose sales figures.

Read the full story in the Atlanta Business Chronicle.