Ford invests £190m in Dagenham plant for clean diesels

Ford has invested in the future of the UK car manufacturing by pumping £190 million into its Dagenham production facility, helping to secure another 318 jobs at the plant.

The funding has been provided for the development and building of new ultra-low emission 2.0-litre diesel engines for commercial vehicles, then passenger cars. We expect versions of this diesel to make their way into the all-new Mondeo and Focus family cars by 2018.

Ford says the investment is a response to London Mayor Boris Johnson's announcement of a planned 'Ultra-Low Emission Zone' in the capital and surrounding areas, meaning charges for anyone driving current diesels that are not Euro6 compliant. 

With the pollution charges set to come in as early as 2020, Ford has sprung into action to invest in cleaner engines that will be exempt from the emissions zone fines.

The new diesel engines have been designed and developed at Dagenham and the Ford Dunton Technical Centre in Essex. The company claims the powerplants will have 'dramatically lower' NOx emissions, crucial in cities with high traffic levels.

The announcement is the second phase of investment in the new engine programme, with the original £287 million going to producing the clean diesels for Ford commercial vehicles around the world. 

Both sums combine with funding from the UK Government's Regional Growth Fund to bring the project total to £475 million, showing long-term commitment to the East London plant and its workers.

The first to get the engines will be commercial vehicles, such as the Transit with variants across Europe expected to be fitted with the engines as early as the end of next year.

Production will start at 350,000 engines a year for vans and trucks, increasing to half-a-million units when Ford's passenger vehicles receive the powerplants.

Ford plans to invest a total of £1.5 billion in environmentally-friendly vehicles in the next five years, and the UK is central to a lot of that development, with Dagenham and a production plant at Bridgend in Wales.

Read our in-depth review of the new Ford Transit van here.