For a long time it was quiet about the further expansion of the Gigafactory Grünheide and the battery production located there. Now there are new plans from Tesla. Starting next week, citizens can participate in the approval process for the planned expansion of the Tesla plant in Grünheide and express their concerns. The application documents can be viewed from July 19 to August 18 on the Internet at uvp-verbund.de, as well as at various authorities such as the State Environmental Agency and in town halls.A hearing is expected to take place in the Erkner town hall from October 23. This was announced by the Brandenburg Ministry of the Environment on Wednesday.
Tesla wants to expand its plant in Grünheide and double production capacity to one million cars per year. Conservationists have concerns because part of the plant is in a water protection area. The expansion will require not only a new environmental permit from the state, but also an increase in water and electricity supplies. The state government has assured Tesla CEO Elon Musk of its support for the plant expansion.
According to the Ministry of the Environment, Tesla plans to build another large hall to accommodate additional production equipment. It also said that "optimizations to the production facilities already built" are planned. The expansion will also increase battery production capacity from the current 50 gigawatt hours per year to 100 gigawatt hours per year in the future.
According to information from the state environment ministry, Tesla is planning to change the approval process. During the construction of the first construction phase, the company had famously worked with numerous preliminary permits, with the risk of having to reverse them at its own expense before the comprehensive overall permit was available. Now, according to the state environment ministry, Tesla wants to "apply for the project in several partial approval steps."
