Tesla’s New Shanghai Factory to Produce 10K Energy Batteries Annually

On December 22nd, Tesla announced the signing of a land transfer agreement for its Shanghai Energy Storage Super Factory project. The new factory, with an initial annual output plan of 10,000 commercial energy storage batteries and a storage scale of nearly 40GWh, is set to begin construction in the first quarter of 2024 and commence production in the fourth quarter.

Tesla announced in April plans to establish a new super factory in Shanghai, which would produce Tesla’s large-scale commercial energy storage batteries, known as Megapacks, with groundbreaking planned for the third quarter of the year and production to start in the second quarter of 2024. However, Tesla’s announced timelines for the start and production of the new super factory are later than the original plan. The company has yet to provide reasons for this delay.

The Shanghai Energy Storage Super Factory, Tesla’s first energy storage super factory project outside the United States, was previously described by Tesla CEO Elon Musk as an expansion of the Megapack production capacity of the California factory. A representative from Tesla China disclosed in an interview that the products manufactured by the Shanghai factory would be marketed globally.

In Tesla’s Master Plan Part 3, released earlier this year, the company set the goal to fully transition to sustainable energy, aiming to achieve 100% sustainable energy by 2050. The Energy Storage Super Factory project is a key step towards this goal. As Tesla explained, “The future of renewable energy relies on large-scale energy storage.”

Morgan Stanley Huaxin Fund manager Chen Xiuzhu notes that the energy storage industry has been gradually scaling up from its commercialization phase over the past two years. With favorable policies being introduced in many countries and regions, the industry’s operational model is maturing. Chen projected that 2023 will be a significant year for the growth of the energy storage industry, with a high certainty of global energy storage demand growth and the installed capacity in the Chinese and American markets expected to double.

SEE ALSO: Tesla Plans to Resume the Shanghai Phase 3 Factory Project, Supplying Energy Storage Products Domestically