Tesla has started building a huge battery factory in Shanghai
Tesla broke ground on a massive battery factory in Shanghai on Thursday, Chinese state media reported, making it the US electric car giant’s second factory in the financial center.
The project was announced last April after boss Elon Musk presented a vague but ambitious plan to investors to boost growth.
However, the company reported a 55 percent drop in quarterly results last month, due to a drop in EV sales in an intensely competitive market.
The new factory in Shanghai should make 10,000 units a year of Tesla’s Megapack batteries, according to state news agency Xinhua.
Tesla says Megapacks are intended to store energy and stabilize the supply of electricity grids, with each unit able to store more than three megawatt hours of power.
The factory is expected to start mass production in 2025, state media said in May.
“I believe the new factory is a milestone for both Shanghai and Tesla,” company Vice President Tao Lin told Xinhua.
“In a more open environment, we can… supply the global market with large-scale energy storage batteries manufactured in China.”
Musk has extensive business interests in China and is a fairly frequent visitor.
In April, he met with Chinese Premier Li Qiang and received a major security clearance for Tesla’s locally produced electric cars.
Musk’s interests in China have long raised eyebrows in Washington — President Joe Biden has said in the past that his ties with foreign countries were “worth” investigating.
The battery factory will be Tesla’s second in the Chinese city, after the massive Shanghai Gigafactory, which broke ground in 2019.
