Tesla has complained that “irritating” German bureaucracy is hampering the fight against climate change as it struggles to obtain approval to set up the world’s largest electric car factory in woodlands east of Berlin.
Elon Musk’s company has spent the past 16 months fending off environmental objections to the €5 billion facility, which will produce up to half a million vehicles a year.
The firm has already cleared thousands of trees and begun erecting vast concrete hangars on the site of a former secret police base at Grünheide, where East German officials used to snoop on letters during the communist era. It hopes to finish the work by July.
However, it has yet to obtain final permission for the site and conservationists argue the factory risks damaging the surrounding nature reserves by drawing off large quantities of water.
The conditional construction licence means that Tesla could, in theory, be forced to tear down everything it has built if the authorities ultimately rule against it.
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In a sign of its frustration, Tesla yesterday declared its support for a lawsuit against the German government over its climate plans.
In a statement submitted to the judges, the company said the labyrinth of German regulations was obstructing progress in the struggle against global warming. The delay is proving awkward for the German government, which had touted Musk’s investment as evidence of the country’s competitive edge in 21st-century technology.
