LORDSTOWN — Foxconn is proposing a project at its Lordstown automaking plant that would allow the Taiwanese technology giant to more than quadruple the number of vehicles it can produce there in a year, according to a document filed with a state regulatory agency.

Details contained in a draft air pollution permit from the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency to Foxconn affiliate, Foxconn EV System LLC, state the emissions upgrade would increase vehicle production from 75,000 per year to 350,000.

“The project will allow Foxconn to produce a variety of vehicles, including electric,” the paperwork states. “Foxconn is making the necessary changes to the existing permitted equipment at the facility to account for the increased production volume.”

The Ohio EPA already has given its OK to the draft permit to install new emission units and a thermal oxidizer to control air emissions from the units.

The purpose of the draft permit is to allow the agency to solicit public comments on the permit. A public notice will run in the Ohio EPA’s Weekly Review and the Tribune Chronicle, according to the draft. Comments and / or a request for a public hearing, it states, will be accepted within 30 days of the notice being published.

Foxconn — the world’s largest contract manufacturer of consumer electronics — acquired the auto assembly plant, the former General Motors small-car factory, for $230 million in May 2022 from Lordstown Motors Corp.

Since, it has made agreements to manufacture Monarch’s battery-powered, driver-optional farm tractor, the MK-V, and Lordstown Motors’ all-electric truck, the Endurance; however, the relationship between Foxconn and Lordstown Motors has soured.

Foxconn also has an agreement with California’s INDIEV to make the prototype versions of its Indi One, and could be the factory where Fisker Inc.’s crossover, the PEAR, is manufactured.

The Ohio EPA documents state the plant is idle.

That is because production of the Endurance ceased after Lordstown Motors in June filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and sued Foxconn, claiming fraud and bad faith led to the bankruptcy.

The dispute between the companies goes back to April when Lordstown Motors received a delisting notice from Nasdaq, stating the company’s stock had fallen below the minimum bid price requirement of $1 per share for 30 consecutive trading days.

That triggered a letter from Foxconn stating it believed Lordstown Motors, because of the notification from Nasdaq, had breached a $170 million investment agreement jointly announced in November.

Foxconn then told Lordstown Motors it wouldn’t close on a $47.3 million stock purchase included in the agreement because of the breach.

Lordstown Motors threatened to sue last month and followed through June 27.

Chapter 11 bankruptcy allows a company to reorganize and maintain operations.

rselak@tribtoday.com