Jan. 24 (UPI) — Tesla is increasing its investment into its battery manufacturing Gigafactory in Nevada, adding an additional $3.6 billion to grow the facility.
Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company announced Tuesday that it will add 3,000 employees and two new factories to the campus, including a factory to mass produce Tesla semi trucks.
“Thank you to the Tesla team, our supply chain partners and the local community that has made accelerating the world’s transition to sustainable energy possible at Gigafactory Nevada,” the company said in a press release.
Semi is Tesla’s first venture into producing road-ready freight vehicles. The fully electric semis are capable of traveling 500 miles on a full charge.
The second new factory coming to Gigafactory is a cell factory that will have the capacity to produce batteries for 2 million electric vehicles per year.
We’ve come a long way since we broke ground at Giga Nevada in 2014.
To date, the team there has successfully produced:
– 7 billion battery cells
– 1.5 million battery packs
– 3.6 million drive units
– 1 million energy modules— Tesla (@Tesla) January 24, 2023
Construction began on the Gigafactory in 2014. Tesla invested $3.5 billion to build the factory and more than $2 billion additionally into operations in the state of Nevada. About 17,000 workers were needed to complete construction.
“Last night, I said that Nevada is open for business, effective immediately — and I meant it,” Gov. Joe Lombardo tweeted.
“Today, @ElonMusk announced Tesla’s new $3.6B factory in northern Nevada. This is an incredible investment in our state.”
Tesla reports it has produced 7.3 million battery cells, 1.3 million battery packs, 3.6 million drive units and 1 million energy modules at the Gigafactory, using about 11,000 employees to do so.
“This announcement is the latest in more than $300 billion in private sector investment in clean energy and semiconductor manufacturing announced since the President took office,” said Mitch Landrieu, senior advisor to President Joe Biden, in a statement to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.