Tesla’s China Plant Is Hooked Up to State Grid Power Supply

(Bloomberg) -- Tesla Inc.’s first Chinese car factory is officially plugged in.

State Grid Corp of China has opened the first transmission line in a power connection project that increases electricity supply to the Tesla plant to a level required for preliminary production, according to a statement from the Chinese company’s Shanghai branch. State Grid said it will eventually increase the power supply eightfold for the factory to run at capacity.

State Grid said the project - involving 55 kilometers of cables and about 17 kilometers of ducts - was among the quickest it has completed, taking only six months.

Palo Alto, California-based Tesla plans by the end of this year to produce at least 1,000 of its best-selling Model 3 cars a week at the plant, where construction only began at the start of this year. China has exempted Tesla from a 10% sales tax, and the company -- founded by Elon Musk -- has also secured hundreds of millions of dollars in loans from local banks.

Tesla was included on a list of car manufacturers that China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released Thursday for consideration for approval and public review, which runs to Oct. 23.

(Adds paragraph on ministry manufacturer list)

To contact Bloomberg News staff for this story: Chunying Zhang in Shanghai at czhang714@bloomberg.net;Dan Murtaugh in Singapore at dmurtaugh@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Young-Sam Cho at ycho2@bloomberg.net, Will Davies

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