Elon Musk handed the first Model Y cars to customers himself. Tesla’s plant at Grünheide, near Berlin, was officially opened on Tuesday with Musk and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in attendance.
The opening came after a final permit arrived from regional authorities earlier that month. Until then Tesla had done something unheard of in recent German corporate history: it nearly finished a plant big enough to deserve the name Gigafactory on the strength of about 20 preliminary permits. Had the final approval been refused, everything built would have had to be torn out. Musk pushed ahead anyway.
Fast by German standards
Construction began in May 2020, so around 22 months passed before the opening. Musk blamed German red tape for the delays. Many Germans saw it differently, with some feeling the project had moved far too fast. Despite several rounds of public hearings, they said their environmental worries, especially about the plant’s water use, had not been properly dealt with. The latest delays came from unfinished reviews of Tesla’s plans for sewage treatment and emergency response, including what would happen if hazardous chemicals leaked.
Tesla’s Shanghai factory, about the same size, took only 15 months.
Jobs and output
Production is due to speed up in the second half of 2022, and Tesla may build roughly 30,000 units in the first six months. The long-term target is half a million cars a year. Until now, Model Y cars for Europe have come only from Shanghai.
Regional politicians call Giga Berlin the biggest investment project in eastern Germany. Brandenburg, which surrounds Berlin, relies on agriculture, mining and tourism, and coal mining is to be phased out. IG Metall estimates the plant will eventually employ 12,000 people, up from more than 2,000 now. Few of them come from Brandenburg so far.
The site will also house a battery cell plant that Tesla says will be the world’s largest. Musk has said annual capacity could reach 100 gigawatt hours at the start and later 200 GWh. In November, Tesla pulled its application for battery plant subsidies that could have reached €1 billion. The company said it wanted to protect its cell know-how.
The Model Y currently sells for over €55,000 in Germany.
