Tesla is looking to double the capacity of its factory in Germany and will drill for new water sources at the site.
The car manufacturer recently told a local municipal council meeting that it will pay for exploratory drilling as it updates a decades-old database of groundwater sources. While Tesla has not yet filed an application to begin digging, a spokesperson for the local environmental ministry confirmed to Reuters that it must apply to use any new water sources that it does find.
The development concerns some environmental groups and some local politicians. Many fear that Tesla will try to get priority access to any new water sources that it finds.
“We know this company,” head of the environmental organization Gruene Liga said. “It does what it wants, and it’ll do the same with the water it finds.”
Read: “Total Chaos” At Berlin Gigafactory As Tesla Struggles To Hire And Retain Staff
Tesla’s factory in Berlin has been at the center of controversy since before it was even built. Not only were many locals concerned with the environmental impact that it would have but Tesla began building the site before it had even received all of its required licenses.
A representative from one of the areas that Tesla wants to explore, Spreenhagen, says that making use of any new water sources that Tesla finds may take time as it will need to lay the pipes for new wells to the plant.
The factory in Gruenheide, Brandenburg currently has the capacity to build 500,000 vehicles annually but Tesla wants to double this to 1 million.
Tesla’s plans to drastically increase the size of the German plant despite it only managing to fill 7,000 of the planned 12,000 positions at the factory. As of October, it was also building just 2,000 Model Ys each week, despite planning to be building 5,000 examples per week.
