Elon Musk has confirmed his attendance at Giga Berlin’s groundbreaking ceremony. Tesla’s Gigafactory 4 has been making rapid progress in the last couple of weeks. Activities within the former GF4 forest has progressed so much that many have speculated that the groundbreaking ceremony will happen relatively soon.
Elon Musk responded to a Tesmanian article about Brandenburg Minister of Economics Jörg Steinbach’s open invitation to the Tesla CEO to attend Gigfactory 4’s groundbreaking ceremony. Musk simply commented, “Definitely,” answering Minister Steinbach’s invite.
Based on Musk’s reply, he will be present during the groundbreaking ceremony for Giga Berlin as he was with Giga Shanghai’s launch event last year. So far, Giga Berlin seems to have followed the same process that Giga Shanghai did at the beginning.
Definitely
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 2, 2020
The land where Tesla’s first European Gigafactory will be built has gone through several preparations since the beginning of the year. First, recovery ammunition teams surveyed the property for any leftover WWII bombs.
By February, tree-felling in the GF4 forest started. Some activists the area protested against tree-felling in the forest, which led to some delays in the process. However, the Berlin-Brandenburg Supreme Administrative Court (OVG) ultimately ruled that Tesla was allowed to continue cutting trees.
Since the OVG’s final decision, progress on Giga Berlin’s land has progressed smoother. Presently, about 90 hectares of land have been cleared of trees in the forest.
Minister Steinbach recognized the swift work that has been done on Tesla’s land but admitted that he would be happier when work on the Giga Berlin factory actually begins. “I constantly tell myself that I was happy with the basic decision on the whereabouts, but in reality, I will be happy only when the first worker ordered by Tesla picks up a shovel to dig a construction hole,” he said.
Both Steinbach and the Mayor of Grünheide in Brandenburg, Arne Christiani, believe that Giga Berlin’s groundbreaking ceremony could take place later this month. “It could be that the groundbreaking ceremony will take place at the end of March. “Even if you never know what the objections will be, and even if there are complaints against a permit are possible,” Mayor Christiani told TeslaMag.
H/T: @DerCaspar/Twitter
Featured Image Credit: @Silasfehe200/Twitter
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Claribelle Deveza
Longtime writer and news/book editor. Writing about Tesla allows me to contribute something good to the world, while doing something I love.