TruckElectric
Well-known member
- First Name
- Bryan
- Joined
- Jun 16, 2020
- Threads
- 609
- Messages
- 2,004
- Reaction score
- 1,493
- Location
- Texas
- Vehicles
- Dodge Ram diesel
- Occupation
- Retired
- Thread starter
- #1
Environmental protection associations complain about incomplete building application documents for the planned Gigafactory. That could delay the approval process.
View over the construction site
More than 100 people are currently working on the site.
(Photo: Marc-Steffen Unger for Handelsblatt)
Berlin The Brandenburg Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke is sure of his cause. So far, he has not known any problem that would stand in the way of a final building permit for the Tesla plant in Grünheide, said the SPD politician at the beginning of October. "I assume that a legally impeccable permit is possible here."
But it's not quite as simple as Woidke portrays it. With provisional permits and at your own risk, the US electric car company has been pulling its factory 35 kilometers southeast of Berlin for months. If everything goes according to plan, up to 12,000 employees will produce 500,000 vehicles annually here from summer 2021. But now there is new criticism of the project.
After the public discussion of the project documents , nature and environmental protection associations speak up and question the project. "The whole process is unacceptable," said Michael Ganschow, state manager of the Brandenburg Green League , the Handelsblatt.
Ganschow accuses the Brandenburg state government of wanting to create a fait accompli. His concerns about the settlement of the planned Gigafactory at the Grünheide location are great: "Here a project is being pushed ahead at the wrong location, which, due to its dimensions, requires extensive technical control." An orderly procedure is not possible under this time pressure.
At a public hearing that ended in early October, conservationists and local residents discussed the more than 400 objections with representatives from the State Environment Agency and Tesla . "The discussion gives us the opportunity to answer fact-based," a Tesla spokesman had previously assured. There would be no questions left unanswered.
Associations are calling for the planning documents to be interpreted again
Now the opposite seems to be the case. During the eight-day hearing, objections were raised that could make it necessary to re-interpret the planning documents for the new Gigafactory. Thus , the carmaker sees suddenly confronted with risks to his factory.
The planning documents are still too vague in many places, said Ganschow. "During the hearing, the nature conservation associations demanded various missing documents, plans and expert reports that neither the company nor the authorities delivered in time." That is why her lawyer Thorsten Deppner called for the entire planning documents to be re-interpreted during the discussion. "The proper discussion," said Ganschow, "is only possible if all plans are available to the public."
Construction site of the Gigafactory
So far, Tesla is building with provisional authorizations for individual construction phases.
(Photo: Marc-Steffen Unger for Handelsblatt)
The Green League is not alone with its criticism: "The authorities would do well to deal intensively with the applications now and ensure transparency," said Christiane Schröder, managing director of the Brandenburg Nature Conservation Union (Nabu) , the Handelsblatt. "Otherwise the procedure would be very vulnerable."
The Nabu also criticizes the fact that the company's plans sometimes do not correspond to the documents. “All of this is due to the time pressure, but it does not allow a reasonable examination of the overall project,” said Schröder. "We do not want to prevent the settlement, but our concern is to ensure that nature, the environment and humans are adequately taken into account in the process."
The infrastructural connection is also unclear
There are certainly technical solutions for everything, "but we do not allow ourselves to be fobbed off with incomplete and long-outdated planning documents, some of which are based on research data that is almost ten years old, as is the case, for example, with the groundwater measurement data ," criticized the Nabu expert. When asked, Tesla did not respond to the associations' criticism.
FDP economic politician Michael Theurer sharply criticized the nature conservationists' approach. "They have to be asked how serious they really mean it with their commitment to e-mobility," said the Deputy Chief of the Liberals in the Bundestag. "Anyone who calls for the electric car in Sunday speeches for climate protection reasons must not prevent the construction of an electric car factory on Monday."
For Theurer, the associations' tough struggle over every single aspect of the legal planning requirements and the building permit for the Tesla settlement also reveals how “urgent” it is to simplify and accelerate planning and approval procedures. For the time being, in addition to the procedurally flawless handling of all objections, the only thing left is that the state and federal government seek talks with the environmental associations.
Above all, the Green League criticizes the high total water requirement of the factory. Tesla had announced that it wanted to implement a "next generation paint shop" in the Gigafactory. "According to the documents available to us, not even the current state of the art would be maintained in the paint shop", so the allegation. According to Ganschow, the paint shop consumes water to an extent “that the average European car manufacturer no longer needs it”.
The infrastructural connection of the area is also unclear. A train connection is no longer mentioned in the current application. On the other hand, truck traffic will triple to 1257 trucks a day without empty trips. The construction of such an industrial plant in a drinking water protection area also requires transparency of all technical data in order to be able to discuss necessary safety issues at a public hearing.
"During the discussion there were open questions about some topics that still need to be clarified," said the managing director of the Brandenburg regional association of the German Transport Club (VCD), Anja Hänel, the Handelsblatt.
The VCD takes a critical view of the factory's forecast traffic. The approval documents submitted showed different information on traffic in the individual chapters. “Unfortunately, Tesla did not provide any information on how the arrival and departure traffic would be spatially distributed,” said Hänel. In order to relieve the neighboring towns, it was only stated that the traffic for arriving and departing employees should be handled primarily via the adjacent Autobahn 10.
According to Hänel, the “main problem” is that precisely such calculations for temporal and spatial distribution were missing for the official approval. "That is why we asked for a clarification of the facts." Because ensuring the traffic development is a prerequisite for the approval.
The Brandenburg state government points out that the procedure is still ongoing. "All applications and information presented in the discussion are checked by the licensing authority," said a spokeswoman for the Ministry of the Environment in Brandenburg. That is currently in progress. Further statements can only be made after this test
SOURCE: HANDLESBLATT
View over the construction site
More than 100 people are currently working on the site.
(Photo: Marc-Steffen Unger for Handelsblatt)
Berlin The Brandenburg Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke is sure of his cause. So far, he has not known any problem that would stand in the way of a final building permit for the Tesla plant in Grünheide, said the SPD politician at the beginning of October. "I assume that a legally impeccable permit is possible here."
But it's not quite as simple as Woidke portrays it. With provisional permits and at your own risk, the US electric car company has been pulling its factory 35 kilometers southeast of Berlin for months. If everything goes according to plan, up to 12,000 employees will produce 500,000 vehicles annually here from summer 2021. But now there is new criticism of the project.
After the public discussion of the project documents , nature and environmental protection associations speak up and question the project. "The whole process is unacceptable," said Michael Ganschow, state manager of the Brandenburg Green League , the Handelsblatt.
Ganschow accuses the Brandenburg state government of wanting to create a fait accompli. His concerns about the settlement of the planned Gigafactory at the Grünheide location are great: "Here a project is being pushed ahead at the wrong location, which, due to its dimensions, requires extensive technical control." An orderly procedure is not possible under this time pressure.
At a public hearing that ended in early October, conservationists and local residents discussed the more than 400 objections with representatives from the State Environment Agency and Tesla . "The discussion gives us the opportunity to answer fact-based," a Tesla spokesman had previously assured. There would be no questions left unanswered.
Associations are calling for the planning documents to be interpreted again
Now the opposite seems to be the case. During the eight-day hearing, objections were raised that could make it necessary to re-interpret the planning documents for the new Gigafactory. Thus , the carmaker sees suddenly confronted with risks to his factory.
The planning documents are still too vague in many places, said Ganschow. "During the hearing, the nature conservation associations demanded various missing documents, plans and expert reports that neither the company nor the authorities delivered in time." That is why her lawyer Thorsten Deppner called for the entire planning documents to be re-interpreted during the discussion. "The proper discussion," said Ganschow, "is only possible if all plans are available to the public."
Construction site of the Gigafactory
So far, Tesla is building with provisional authorizations for individual construction phases.
(Photo: Marc-Steffen Unger for Handelsblatt)
The Green League is not alone with its criticism: "The authorities would do well to deal intensively with the applications now and ensure transparency," said Christiane Schröder, managing director of the Brandenburg Nature Conservation Union (Nabu) , the Handelsblatt. "Otherwise the procedure would be very vulnerable."
The Nabu also criticizes the fact that the company's plans sometimes do not correspond to the documents. “All of this is due to the time pressure, but it does not allow a reasonable examination of the overall project,” said Schröder. "We do not want to prevent the settlement, but our concern is to ensure that nature, the environment and humans are adequately taken into account in the process."
The infrastructural connection is also unclear
There are certainly technical solutions for everything, "but we do not allow ourselves to be fobbed off with incomplete and long-outdated planning documents, some of which are based on research data that is almost ten years old, as is the case, for example, with the groundwater measurement data ," criticized the Nabu expert. When asked, Tesla did not respond to the associations' criticism.
FDP economic politician Michael Theurer sharply criticized the nature conservationists' approach. "They have to be asked how serious they really mean it with their commitment to e-mobility," said the Deputy Chief of the Liberals in the Bundestag. "Anyone who calls for the electric car in Sunday speeches for climate protection reasons must not prevent the construction of an electric car factory on Monday."
For Theurer, the associations' tough struggle over every single aspect of the legal planning requirements and the building permit for the Tesla settlement also reveals how “urgent” it is to simplify and accelerate planning and approval procedures. For the time being, in addition to the procedurally flawless handling of all objections, the only thing left is that the state and federal government seek talks with the environmental associations.
Above all, the Green League criticizes the high total water requirement of the factory. Tesla had announced that it wanted to implement a "next generation paint shop" in the Gigafactory. "According to the documents available to us, not even the current state of the art would be maintained in the paint shop", so the allegation. According to Ganschow, the paint shop consumes water to an extent “that the average European car manufacturer no longer needs it”.
The infrastructural connection of the area is also unclear. A train connection is no longer mentioned in the current application. On the other hand, truck traffic will triple to 1257 trucks a day without empty trips. The construction of such an industrial plant in a drinking water protection area also requires transparency of all technical data in order to be able to discuss necessary safety issues at a public hearing.
"During the discussion there were open questions about some topics that still need to be clarified," said the managing director of the Brandenburg regional association of the German Transport Club (VCD), Anja Hänel, the Handelsblatt.
The VCD takes a critical view of the factory's forecast traffic. The approval documents submitted showed different information on traffic in the individual chapters. “Unfortunately, Tesla did not provide any information on how the arrival and departure traffic would be spatially distributed,” said Hänel. In order to relieve the neighboring towns, it was only stated that the traffic for arriving and departing employees should be handled primarily via the adjacent Autobahn 10.
According to Hänel, the “main problem” is that precisely such calculations for temporal and spatial distribution were missing for the official approval. "That is why we asked for a clarification of the facts." Because ensuring the traffic development is a prerequisite for the approval.
The Brandenburg state government points out that the procedure is still ongoing. "All applications and information presented in the discussion are checked by the licensing authority," said a spokeswoman for the Ministry of the Environment in Brandenburg. That is currently in progress. Further statements can only be made after this test
SOURCE: HANDLESBLATT
Last edited:
