Tesla recently acquired a 300-hectare property in Germany for its Gigafactory 4. Building the facility requires significant tree removal, yet the company plans to plant three times more trees than the ones cut down. However, carrying out this task might not be as easy as expected.
After negotiating the purchase contract earlier this month, the company bought the 300-hectare land for only $45.48 million. Soon after, Tesla started to get the land ready for the construction of the new electric car facility and removed trees from a 90-hectare portion of the property. The electric car maker promised to replant trees, though.
According to Brandenburg BUND Conservation Officer Axel Heinzel-Berndt, the afforestation process might be more complex than expected because there is little land to allow for optimal tree growth in the area.
In an interview with Taz.de, Heinzel-Berndt said that “it will be difficult to find arable land on this scale. But it is also conceivable that, instead, species-poor pine forest is converted into mixed forest”.
In an effort to solve this problem, the company resorted to a local company for help in order to determine the types of trees that would grow healthily in the areas to be replanted. The choice of trees should also be suitable for the endangered animal species in this area including sand lizards and bats.
Tesla’s tree removal from the newly-acquired land is expected to be completed by February 27 since the bird breeding season in Brandenburg begins in the first days of March. The company has already started to post jobs for the new facility in Germany planning to hire up to 8,000 people in the years to come.
