BMW’s UK engine factory in Hams Hall, North Warwickshire, has celebrated 25 years of producing motors for BMW, Mini and Rolls-Royce cars.
Since 2001, the factory has built more than 7.6 million engines.
The milestone comes after Hams Hall production has been continually expanded over the years to include three- and four-cylinder petrol engines, plus high-performance V8s and the V12 exclusively used by Rolls-Royce.
The Hams Hall plant made the engine for the iconic BMW i8 plug-in hybrid sports car, and today builds the engine for the latest hybrid BMW M5.
“This anniversary is a special milestone for our site,” said the plant’s head, Dirk Dreher.
“We are a competitive plant and there’s always been a real passion among our workforce to continually improve our manufacturing processes and site.
“Building on our strong foundation, we are looking forward to remaining a successful plant in the future.”
Hams Hall was originally developed when BMW owned Rover Group. When it sold Rover in 2000, it retained the factory, still then in construction.
The first engines off the line were advanced four-cylinder ‘Valvetronic’ motors, used by the BMW 3 Series and others.
Since it opened, there’s been a 61 percent reduction in energy use per engine built at Hams Hall.
100 percent of its electricity comes from renewable sources and there are also initiatives to reduce its use of natural gas.
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