Inside the Gigafactory: Tesla's most important project - needs this factory’s batteries to succeed
Inside the Gigafactory: Tesla's most important project
The automaker needs this factory’s batteries to succeed.
Roberto Baldwin 1h ago in Transportation
A group of journalists sit in cars and a shuttle as a
guard checks to make sure every passenger is on his list. They're the security
guards for Tesla's biggest and most important endeavor, the Gigafactory. When
completed, it will occupy the equivalent of 107 football fields. The automaker
has invited us for a tour of the largest battery-manufacturing factory on the
planet.
To construct the enormous three-floor factory and meet
the goal of producing 400,000 pre-ordered Model 3s by the end of 2018, Tesla is
building the Gigafactory in phases. As a section is completed and equipment is
moved in while the next portion is being erected. It's not so much a single
building but a series of connected structures.
Section A is already cranking out battery packs for
Powerwalls. Sections B and C have battery cell manufacturing equipment being
installed and are being primed for production. Section D has one exterior wall
and floors, but it's still mostly steel girders and rebar. Meanwhile, two days
before we arrived, work started on Section E, which is currently just a
skeleton of steel.
This section-by-section process continues inside. For
example, the third floor will be one long cell assembly line. There's already
one line installed and being prepped for testing. The next room over is being
readied fo identical equipment. And the next room over from that, and again,
and again until the length of the third floor is a series of cell-producing juggernauts.
With each new setup, the process will be tweaked based on
what Tesla and Panasonic have learned from the machines already pumping out
batteries. It's about optimization, according to CEO Elon Musk. Something that
been part of the factories DNA from the beginning. Since the original plans,
the partnership has already figured out that the Gigafactory will be able to
produce three times as many battery packs as first thought.
But it needs to move quickly and start building the
400,000 pre-ordered Model 3s. "We need to get roughly a third the size of
the original building to support half a million cars a year," Musk said at
the event. Those orders forced the company to push up it's Gigafactory plans by
two years and now Tesla believes it can meet the production schedule for
entry-level Teslas in 2018.
Musk notes that the Gigfactory is more than just a way to
get batteries into its cars. He said, "the factory itself is considered to
be a product. It's the machine that builds the machine and actually deserves
more attention from creative problem-solving engineers than the part that it
makes." Tesla will gradually transition a majority of its research to
improving its factory's workflow.
That efficiency will drive the battery price per kilowatt
hour down by at least 30 percent by 2020, according to Musk.
It's all going to start in this already massive
Gigafactory, 30 minutes outside of Reno. When complete it will produce enough
battery packs for 1.5 million cars a year. In 2015, Tesla sold only 50,580 EVs,
which means it has plenty of room to grow. If demand explodes outside the
United States, the automaker plans to open additional Gigafactories that will
also build the automobiles.
Today's factory -- even though it's not even 20 percent
completed -- is a remarkable undertaking not only by Tesla, but by Panasonic
which has jumped on board at the planning phases and hasn't looking back. And
while the goal is to ween people off fossil fuels and get more electric cars on
the road, the Gigafactory's output will only be for Tesla products. Other
automakers will have to get their batteries elsewhere. Musk talked about the
importance of being faster than anyone else. "Speed is the ultimate defense,"
he said. The CEO is acting more like an early settler out to get the best piece
of land than the leader of a company. But it's not just about being first or
the quickest to him. He seems to really enjoy what he's doing.
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