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Warren Buffett, legendary investor and one of the world's richest people, is about to leverage his part-ownership of China's largest battery manufacturer to deliver a shot in the arm to America's ailing auto industry.

Here, apparently, is how he plans to do it: BYD autos, one of his few overseas investments, into which he plunged $230 million in 2008, may finally bring Chinese-made electric vehicles to the U.S.

But batteries are very heavy and therefore expensive to ship thousands of miles! Also, Buffett is a known patriot, so if his Chinese holding makes all that stuff overseas and just ships it over here, that kind of contributes to the ongoing decline of the American empire.

These reasons — plus a bunch of others that can probably only be expressed in a spreadsheet — convinced Buffett to build BYD's latest battery plant in a massive new "energy park" in what used to be a General Motors plant, in Michigan.

The results of this will include "thousands" of new jobs and a massive boost to local tax revenues.