In 2015, Elon Musk announced his plans to build a Tesla...

In 2015, Elon Musk announced his plans to build a Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) "Gigafactory," a factory producing enough batteries to store literal gigawatts of electricity annually -- 35 gigawatt-hours, to be precise, at least initially. As much as 150 GWh eventually.By April 2019, however, those plans hit a snag when Tesla partner Panasonic pulled the brakes on plans to expand production capacity, standing pat at the 35 GWh level. (And news reports suggest actual production is even lower -- only 24 GWh.) Now it looks like Tesla rival General Motors (NYSE:GM) is going to take advantage of Tesla's setback, and build a gigafactory of its own.IMAGE SOURCE: TESLA.Once more, with feelingGM shared its battery production plans on Thursday, announcing a joint venture with Korea's LG Chem to build a brand new facility in Lordstown, OH, capable of churning out "more than 30 gigawatt hours" worth of battery production annually -- nearly as much as Tesla's own Gigafactory 1 in Nevada. As GM explained, it will take a 50% interest in the new venture, anteing up at least half the project's $2.3 billion cost, and is planning to start construction of the plant in mid-2020. Once production is under way, the new plant will first begin supplying batteries for the battery-electric trucks produced at the former GM manufacturing complex in Lordstown, sold to Lordstown Motors Corporation last month. Later production will also supply GM's "next generation of battery-electric vehicles, including an all-new battery-electric truck coming in the fall of 2021."