Berlin: news from Tesla and a second communique from the Volcano Group

A week after a high-voltage power line tower in Berlin caught fire at dawn on March 5, deliberately bringing Tesla’s European electric vehicle production plant to a standstill, the plant was only reconnected to the power grid on March 11. And two days later, on Wednesday March 13, it was finally able to start up again in the presence of its CEO Elon Musk, who came to Berlin-Grünheide to be cheered by his brave workers, before meeting local politicians. However, “it will still be some time before production resumes in full, but the most important step has been taken”, according to plant manager Andre Thierig. Knowing that each day spent without electricity or production cost between 50 and 60 million euros, we leave it to you to calculate Tesla’s losses for these eight days of shutdown.

While the 5,000 inhabitants of the Freienbrink district were reconnected the very same day, it was a completely different matter for grid operator E.DIS to be able to reconnect the Tesla factory, given the huge amount of energy required by the 12,500-strong gigafactory. A vast emergency worksite was therefore immediately deployed in the field where the burnt-out pylon was located. Firstly, to build a temporary access road from the adjacent forest in order to transport heavy machinery, then to dig out from under the muddy earth some of the cables linking this pylon to the Erkner transformer station, and finally to gradually install a structure parallel to the damaged steel giant after draining the soil beneath its feet. All this in an area that is now entirely fenced off, with work being carried out at breakneck speed in 3×8 shifts (day and night), under constant police protection backed up by private security guards.
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