Toyota begins European diesel production
14 January 2003: Toyota has started building diesel engines at its engine plants in Valenciennes, France and Deeside, UK. The French plant will have the capacity to assemble 30,000 units of the 1.4 D-4D diesel engine annually, in addition to 150,000 petrol engines, for the Toyota Yaris.
Toyota's UK plant will build 70,500 2-litre D-4D engines, on top of 330,000 VVT-i petrol engines, for the Toyota Corolla and the new Toyota Avensis. Diesel engine production in the UK is expected to rise to 100,000 units in 2004. Recently, Toyota announced it will start production of diesel engines in early 2005 in a new plant in Poland with an annual capacity of 120,000 units.
The extra engine capacity is in response to the increasing demand in Europe for diesel-equipped cars and will play an important role in aiding Toyota achieve its target of selling 800,000 units annually by 2005 at the latest.
By 2004, Toyota will be in a position to build over 500,000 vehicles, 830,000 engines and 550,000 transmissions per year in Europe, at its production sites in France, the UK, Poland and Turkey. In addition, Toyota and PSA Peugeot Citroën will start manufacturing 300,000 entry-level small passenger cars in the Czech Republic starting in 2005, of which 100,000 will be for the Toyota brand.