Tesla could face massive production issues after a suspected arson attack near its Berlin Gigafactory earlier today forced the building to be evacuated.
The local police force said the fire brigade was working to put out a fire in the area near the Tesla Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg in what it called a suspected arson attack.
It added that the arson could have caused an electricity pylon to catch fire in a field close to the site in Gruenheide, southeast of the German capital.
A spokesperson for the Elon Musk-owned brand said production had stopped and the site had been evacuated.
Protests have been taking place outside the Tesla factory in Berlin
REUTERS/GETTY
Michael Stübgen, Interior Minister for the state of Brandenburg, said a “perfidious attack" had taken place on the electricity infrastructure.
He added: "The rule of law will respond to such an act of sabotage that occurred at the Tesla Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg with full force."
Since the incident, a group described as "left-wing extremists" have taken responsibility for the attack, according to the Potsdam-based Tagesspiegel.
In a statement, the so-called Vulkangruppe, vowed to take Tesla offline, adding: "Together we are bringing Tesla to its knees. Switch off for Tesla.
"Greetings to everyone on the run, in the underground in prisons and in the resistance! Love and strength to all Antif@s! We sabotaged Tesla today."
Production at the site has been halted while authorities investigate
REUTERS
In response to the attack, Tesla CEO Elon Musk posted on X, saying: "These are either the dumbest eco-terrorists on Earth or they’re puppets of those who don’t have good environmental goals.
"Stopping production of electric vehicles, rather than fossil fuel vehicles, ist extrem dumm."
The local electricity provider, Stromnetz Berlin, reported some outages in the Berlin districts of Müggelheim, Rahnsdorf, and parts of Neukölln, DW reported.
It is estimated that around 2,000 households have been affected by the suspected arson attack.
The US automotive brand has previously spoken of plans to expand the site to 100-gigawatt hours of battery production and the ability to produce one million electric cars every year.
However, the brand has been met with massive environmental protests in recent weeks after local residents voted down a motion to cut down trees to enlarge the area of the production site.
Campaign and protest groups have built and occupied treehouses in the forest near the factory which would be cleared if the expansion were to go ahead.
A local protest group, known as Robin Wood, told Reuters that it had no knowledge of the incident and that it was “totally surprised by the situation”.
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Elon Musk opened the Berlin Tesla Factory in March 2022
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Another group Wald Statt Asphalt (forest instead of asphalt) said it was standing in the way of Tesla’s expansion of the car factory.
It added: “Cars are to be produced in a water protection area for a capitalist ‘business as usual’ – a highway to social climate catastrophe.”
Tesla has also been accused of polluting rivers with harmful substances from the Gigafactory near the German capital.
Officials from the Strausberg-Erkner water association claimed that the electric vehicle manufacturer had been ejecting six times more hazardous pollutants into the water system than its permits allow.
According to Stern magazine, officials from the water company have written to mayors across the region, calling on them to force Tesla to close its wastewater line until further notice.
If this move were to go ahead, the measures could threaten to halt production at the German factory and further hamper progress for the EV brand.