CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — Volkswagen is “actively” looking for new assembly and battery plants in the United States, Volkswagen of America CEO Scott Keogh told CNBC on Wednesday.

Keogh declined to discuss possible locations for such operations. The German automaker’s electrification efforts are currently based in Tennessee, including localized production of the VW ID.4 Crossover EV, which is slated to begin later this year.

“We are actively looking at another manufacturing facility and also a battery facility,” Keogh said in an interview.

Volkswagen is still discussing and evaluating its options and no decisions have been made, a company spokesman said.

Such facilities, whether new or expansions, would mean a major decision and likely billions of dollars in new US investment for VW, which currently has North American assembly plants in Tennessee and Mexico.

Any investment would follow similar moves by other companies to increase EV production in the US — a key goal of the Biden administration.

The potential for new VW electric vehicle plants in the US was previously reported by European media.

Keogh’s comments followed the grand opening of the German automaker’s new $22 million electric vehicle battery laboratory, located near its only American assembly plant in Chattanooga. It’s part of a $7.1 billion commitment to increase its electric vehicle efforts in North America.

The new 32,000-square-foot battery lab will test and optimize electric vehicle batteries for the US market. It is one of four such facilities that VW has announced worldwide.

Keogh said Volkswagen expects to significantly increase its US availability and sales of electric vehicles in the second half of this year as it prepares to ramp up American production of its ID.4 crossover.

Volkswagen has been importing the ID.4 from Germany since last year in limited quantities of between 800 and 2,000 cars per month. Localized production at its Chattanooga facility is expected to ramp up quickly to about 7,000 ID.4 models by the end of this year, Keogh said.

“We don’t want to start with 100 cars. We want to start with a few thousand cars built up,” he said. “That’s huge.”

Pre-production models of the vehicle, used for testing, validation and other purposes, are currently being assembled at the factory. Official production is slated to begin next month. Vehicles are scheduled to flow into dealerships as early as September with significant availability, Keogh said.

Such a production ramp-up would be significantly faster than many new electric vehicles coming to market, including those from start-ups like Rivian as well as other traditional automakers like General Motors.

VW only sold 2,755 ID.4 models in the first quarter of this year. 16,742 vehicles were sold last year.

Keogh said the Chattanooga plant is expected to reach production capacity of up to 10,000 ID.4 electric vehicles per month once fully operational with three shifts of workers – a first for the plant.

Current EV imports, worth about $41,000, without federal or state incentives, would not have been enough to meet customer demand, Keogh said. The vehicles are “completely sold out”.