Tesla gets eco nod to produce EVs at Gigafactory Berlin, with riders

Electric vehicle giant Tesla has officially received environmental approval to start production at Gigafactory Berlin, but also as expected, there are a few caveats that will prevent Tesla from officially starting production.

After months of delays, German reports stated earlier this week that Tesla is expected to finally receive final environmental approval to start production at Gigafactory Berlin later this week, auto-tech website Electrek reported.

The environmental approval for the giant factory faced a lot of opposition with concerns ranging from deforestation to water supply and more.

There were several setbacks for Tesla that prevented the company from securing the approval, which has been believed to be the last regulatory step needed to start production.

Few details have been released along with a 536-page conditional building permit, but the word "conditional" is important here -- there are about 400 conditions that Tesla needs to fulfil to start production.

The automaker said that it plans to cover all of them within the next two weeks; however, some points appear to be on a different timeline, like another notice of public objection, which is going to be published for two weeks and then comments will be accepted for a month.

However, Tesla and German officials don't seem to think this should delay the start of production.

The documents revealed that Tesla is approved to produce 500,000 electric vehicles per year at Gigafactory Berlin, along with several other production processes approved, including battery cell production.

They also revealed that Tesla has already hired about 3,000 workers at the plant, the report said.

--IANS

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