Tesla skirts Austin’s environmental rules at Texas gigafactory
Tesla has used a new Texas state law to exempt its Austin gigafactory from Austin’s environmental regulations, as reported by Austin Business Journal.
Tesla’s Texas gigafactory is commonly referred to as being in Austin, but it is actually situated not far outside the city’s official borders.
This is technically part of Austin’s “extraterritorial jurisdiction” (ETJ) an area around the city which doesn’t technically belong to the city, but which the city can still exercise some control over the development of.
Due to the large amount of unincorporated land in Texas, and its growing population causing cities to tend to sprawl outward, it is prudent for some cities to help plan the areas immediately outside their limits, so that infrastructure can be compatible if the city later grows to encompass those areas. This is why Texas and some other Western states have ETJ laws.
But, last year, the Texas legislature passed a law, SB 2038, allowing developments to remove themselves from these ETJs relatively easily.
Earlier this year, Tesla filed a petition to remove itself from Austin’s ETJ, and that petition was accepted, according to Austin Business Journal.
The law has been challenged by several cities in Texas, though Austin is not one of the cities opposing it.
Tesla’s removal from the ETJ allows it to skirt Austin’s environmental regulations, particularly over regulation of water quality and flooding issues, according to an Austin spokesperson interviewed by Austin Business Journal.
Both of these would be important at the gigafactory site, since the property encompasses 2,100 acres and runs directly along the Colorado River, just after it runs through Austin’s center.
Tesla itself has pointed out the ecological importance of its location, as when the site was first selected, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the area would be an “ecological paradise.” That promised ecological paradise has not yet materialized, but the company did present a plan to create a 120-acre public space alongside the river last October.
Tesla is also building something called a “Giga Water Loop” at the site, but we don’t actually know much more than that about what it is.
Water issues have been in focus at other Tesla locations, particularly its gigafactory in Grünheide,outside Berlin, Germany. While some opposition to the factory has come from front groups for the oil industry, there have also been criminal allegations by legitimate environmental groups related to Tesla’s management of its water usage.
The issues have rankled Tesla’s relationship with the local community in Grünheide, with locals voting down expansion of the factory and, in a crazier and much less productive move, resulting in sabotage that led to the factory’s temporary shutdown.
In Germany, Tesla has responded to local issues by attempting to manage its water use better, and by replanting trees to make up for the site’s encroachment into a managed forest area nearby.
But now, in Texas, it seems like Tesla would rather not have to deal with that sort of thing at all (though, as usual, Tesla did not comment on why they took this move). By exempting itself from Austin’s regulations, there will be less oversight of what sort of water usage or discharge the site has, and whether that might affect other parts of the river.
And yet, Tesla has still benefitted from its proximity to Austin, as the city extended utility connections to the site during the construction process. Austin did this without first annexing the area, as at the time, Texas law was clear that the area was in the city’s ETJ.
Now due to changing Texas law, Tesla gets to keep those benefits, but has exempted itself from environmental oversight, despite making many environmental claims about the site in question.
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Tesla (TSLA) has introduced a new direct discount for the Model Y in China as the latest of a series of incentives to boost demand during this critical end-of-quarter push.
The automaker regularly offers discounts at the end of every quarter, but the incentives to boost demand have been the most wide-ranging ever this quarter.
Over the last month, we have been documenting the many sale incentives and discounts that Tesla has put in place to ensure it creates the demand for a record quarter.
Tesla aims to deliver a record number of more than 515,000 vehicles in Q4 in order for its sales not to be down for the whole year. That’s ~30,000 more vehicles than Tesla’s last record quarter, which was Q4 2023.
In Europe, the incentives include a year of free Supercharging and heavy discounts on inventory vehicles.
In the US, there are also good inventory discounts, 3 months of free Supercharger and Full Self-Driving subscription, FSD transfer, and more.
More recently, Tesla also slashed the lease price of the base Model Y and even offered discounted home charging under Tesla Electric for those taking delivery of new vehicles.
And everywhere, Tesla is heavily subsidizing loans with lower interest rates. That has been the main incentive in China, Tesla’s biggest market, until now.
Tesla’s New Discount in China
Today, Tesla announced that it is offering a ¥10,000, the equivalent of $1,380 USD, discount on the final payment for new Model Y vehicles:
The new discount can be combined with Tesla’s subsidized 0% interest financing, which has been Tesla’s main incentive in China all year.
Electrek’s Take
Based on insurance data, Tesla is tracking ahead of last year’s deliveries in China, but it is going to need to beat its last record by a significant margin to make sure not to be down for the whole year.
Model Y is Tesla’s most popular vehicle, but Tesla is also going against the expectation of the design refresh coming early next year, which can negatively affect demand.
This discount is likely to combat that and maintain Tesla’s current good momentum in China.
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We now have more details on the massive recall, which just keeps growing. Hyundai and now Kia are recalling more than 208,000 electric vehicles in Canada and the US to fix a problem with the loss of driving power, which can increase the risk of a crash.
For the second time this year, the automakers are recalling huge swathes of EVs and other “electrified” vehicles in North America, citing concerns about a loss of driving power, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said on Friday.
In the US, Hyundai is recalling 145,235 EVs, including the 2022 through 2024 Ioniq 5, the 2023 through 2025 Ioniq 6, GV60 and GV70, and the 2023 and 2024 G80. In Canada, Hyundai is recalling 34,529 vehicles that were produced between March and November of this year, according to Automotive News Canada.
As for Kia, the recall includes close to 63,000 Kia EV 6 vehicles from 2022 through 2024 in the US, but the company has yet to offer details on its Canada recall.
It looks like the issue stems from “the integrated charging control units in these vehicles, which may become damaged and fail to charge the 12-volt battery. This malfunction could lead to a complete loss of drive power, posing safety risks for drivers,” the NHTSA stated.
Back in March, Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis issued a similar recall for 147,110 electric vehicles – that recall centered, again, around damaged integrated charging control units failing to charge the battery.
The South Korea automaker has said that all owners of affected vehicles will be notified by letter mail on the next steps to take. This will involve bringing your vehicle to one of the company’s dealers to inspect and replace the charging unit and its fuse if necessary, along with performing a software update for the charging units.
Importantly, no crashes, injuries, fatalities, or fires due to this issue have been reported in the US or Canada, Hyundai reported.
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A group of Tesla vehicles spotted under covers at the automaker’s test track at the Fremont factory is raising some questions.
Tesla has a very small test track on the ground of its first factory, Tesla Fremont, in California.
Now and again, people fly drones over the factory and catch glimpses of new cars being tested. Youtuber ‘Met God in Wilderness’ is one of those drone pilots who regularly fly over the factory and while he didn’t catch vehicle being tested, he did catch some curious vehicles under covers next to the track:
The vehicles are all covered, and therefore, it’s hard to tell exactly what they are, but the different shapes are intriguing and raise some questions.
It looks like three, maybe four, different kinds of vehicles:
We know that Tesla is working on three new specific vehicles: a Model Y design refresh, and two new cheaper models based on Model 3 and Model Y.
All three vehicles are expected to be unveiled early next year.
Electrek’s Take
At the risk of stating the obvious, getting much information from vehicles hidden under cover can be hard. It’s even possible that some of those have shape camouflage, which is sometimes used by automakers – although I don’t remember Tesla ever using that.
So here are my best guesses. Take them for what they are: guesses.
The most interesting ones to me are the first two on the left in the picture above. The last vehicle on the left looks like it could be a smaller Model 3.:
The next one could be its Model Y counterpart:
I also wouldn’t be surprised if a Model Y Juniper, the upcoming refresh, is under one of those covers, but we already had good looks at this one.
What about you? What do you think about these Tesla vehicles? Let us know in the comment section below.
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