Tesla will resume production at its German Gigafactory on Wednesday after power was restored late Monday night. The financial impact of the recent power outage is not as severe as initially feared, according to the company.
Experts predict that Tesla will take less than a day to restart production at the plant, with operations expected to be fully operational by Wednesday, as reported by the German Handelsblatt. Initially, Tesla had announced that production would be suspended until the end of the week following the arson attack on a nearby electricity pole last week, which caused a blackout in the company and surrounding areas.
Energy supplier Edis has been working around the clock in three shifts to reconnect Tesla to the grid after the power came back on Monday night around 9:30 p.m. local time.
Tesla had initially estimated financial losses in the nine-digit range due to the attack, but the actual cost is now expected to be around 400 million euros, approximately half of the initial estimate. Plant manager Andre Thierig had anticipated a longer production stoppage, according to the Handelsblatt.
The estimated financial impact is based on Tesla’s weekly production of around 6,000 cars in Grünheide. Using the base price for a Model Y of approximately 45,000 euros as a benchmark, the company lost an estimated 270 million euros in sales in one week. The disruption to the supply chain is also expected to result in additional costs, with reports of trucks queuing outside the factory at the end of last week.
The Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office in Germany has taken over the case, with initial suspicions pointing to possible involvement of a terrorist organization. Previously, the public prosecutor’s office in Frankfurt (Oder) had been investigating the incident for anti-constitutional sabotage, disruption of public businesses, and arson.
Since Thursday, environmental activists have been occupying part of the forest that is slated for clearance for the plant’s expansion. Despite the citizens of Grünheide rejecting the expansion plans in mid-February, Tesla aims to build a freight depot, warehouses, and a company daycare centre on an additional 170 hectares alongside the existing 300-hectare factory site.
Tesla’s plans to double its production capacity in Grünheide to one million electric vehicles per year also include increasing battery storage production capacity from the current 50 to 100 gigawatt-hours per year, including battery cell production, according to Brandenburg’s Ministry of the Environment.
