Berlin (AFP)
The boss of the American manufacturer Tesla, Elon Musk, went on Monday to the construction site of his automobile "gigafactory" near Berlin, faced with administrative problems which are delaying its opening, noted an AFP journalist.
The American CEO arrived at the end of the morning at the site of the group's first European factory, located a few kilometers from the German capital, in the Brandenburg region.
This visit, which the authorities were "informed", is "essentially technical", said on Twitter the Minister of the Economy of the region.
No meeting with local politicians is planned, he added.
It intervenes in a tense context, while the plant faces administrative setbacks, which delay its inauguration.
Tesla informed at the end of April that the opening, initially scheduled for July, was postponed to "end of 2021".
At issue: the site, which began in November 2019, has still not received final approval from the authorities, who are studying in particular its consequences on the region's water resources and biodiversity.
The American manufacturer has certainly benefited from an exceptional procedure, allowing it to carry out the work at full speed, despite the absence of a building permit.
But if the site was ultimately not authorized, in theory he would have to dismantle the installation at his own expense.
And entire sections of the work have already been suspended several times in recent months, delaying the project.
In April, Elon Musk said he was "irritated" by the slowness of the German bureaucracy.
"Obstacles in the authorization process slow down industrial transformation" and create the "risk that Germany will miss its climate targets," he argued.
Tesla is targeting an annual production of 500,000 Model Y electric vehicles in its Berlin "gigafactory".
Elon Musk had already visited the factory last November, in particular to conduct recruitment interviews.
© 2021 AFP