Environment Agency overturned
Does Woidke use a trick to get the Tesla factory more water?
6/9/2023 7:37 am
Car manufacturer Tesla needs large amounts of water to expand the factory in Grünheide. When it comes to procurement, Brandenburg’s Prime Minister Woidke apparently uses a loophole to bypass the responsible environmental agency.
Politicians in Brandenburg may have leveraged the State Environment Agency to procure additional water for the expansion of the Tesla factory and other industrial settlements. This is proven by research by “Stern” and RTL. This puts the local population’s drinking water supply at risk. The region around the Tesla factory is one of the areas with the lowest rainfall in the entire Federal Republic. The groundwater level has fallen continuously there over the past 20 years.
Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke promised in a letter to Tesla boss Elon Musk in March that he would solve the water problems at the gigafactory in Grünheide. Because without additional water commitments from the responsible state office for the environment, Tesla apparently cannot implement the further expansion stages. Commercial areas cannot be approved by the municipalities in the region either.
At a political event at the beginning of 2023, Woidke had promised local politicians to break new ground in order to enable commercial settlements. After the event, a district administrator said in front of witnesses that the prime minister had promised to “shape the approval through the district”. Apparently, the plans were already decided at the time.
When asked, a spokeswoman for the Märkisch-Oderland district confirmed that the district had already approved earth exploration drilling in a planned commercial area in Altlandsberg in November 2022. In Vogelsdorf, the district allowed the commercial investor to build a service water well in March 2023. And Tesla also applied in January to the Oder-Spree district, south of the Gigafabrik near Braunsdorf and Lebbin, to be allowed to search for water itself.
This is made possible by a loophole, as the State Office for the Environment confirms on request: Wells with a flow rate of up to 2000 cubic meters per day can be approved without the State Office’s approval. The number of wells is irrelevant. The lower water authority of the district is then responsible.
André Bähler, head of the local water association Strausberg-Erkner, called the policy action “very worrying”. The negative consequences for the ecosystem are obvious. “The interests of public services were apparently deliberately circumvented in order to push through a commercial settlement no matter what the hell.” Steffen Schorcht from the Grünheide citizens’ initiative also criticized: “Woidke’s further industrialization plans lead to an ecological catastrophe.”
Tesla left a request from “Stern” and RTL unanswered, the Brandenburg State Chancellery referred to the Ministry of the Environment. This wrote that the company’s groundwater extraction must not have a negative impact on the public supply.