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Tesla factory delays show ‘how we stand in our own way’: German industry experts sound off
Water pumping approvals. Bats in trees. An empty tank. These are just a few things that have stopped Tesla’s progress in Germany as it attempts to launch its first electric vehicle manufacturing facility in Europe. It has been a long and trying road for the electric automaker, which has attempted to surf through the waves of German bureaucratic red tape since early 2020. After another delay in the approval process, which has expected production start dates ranging across three quarters, industry experts challenge Germany’s reputation as a place for companies to conduct business.
“Tesla shows the world how we stand in our own way,” Ferdinand Dudenhöffer, Director of the Center of Automotive Research, said. While Dudenhöffer does agree that Tesla should have treaded more carefully during the approval of a battery production facility and been smarter regarding document submissions, the industry expert believes that German red tape has mainly told a story of how hard it is to get things started if you are planning to open a business in the country. “But such hurricanes of resistance show how little sustainable Germany is,” he said in an interview with Handelsblatt.
Coverage of the Gigafactory Berlin project has spanned over two years for journalists in the sector, including myself. Musk announced that Tesla would bring a production facility to Germany in late 2019 while accepting an automotive industry reward. The project began just months later, in the early days of January 2020. More than two years later, a factory, a parage, a carnival, and a lot of speculation regarding when Tesla will finally receive the green light still exist. Earlier this week, German media reported that Tesla would likely not receive permission to begin production and deliveries until mid-March “at the earliest.” It is a far cry from the Summer 2021 start dates that many close to the project anticipated.
The delays are starting to worry those who see Germany as a potential leader in the future automotive industry, which over the past ten years has changed more than it did in the previous ninety. Car companies are not just about making cars anymore. They’re relatively closer to tech companies than anything due to the advancements in software and the widespread focus on developing autonomous driving platforms. Regardless of what a company brings to the table, they will likely have to encounter some major pushback and delays in their project. Even EV leader Tesla is having problems. Dudenhöffer wonders which companies are observing the red tape and the pushback, thinking that other options may be better.
Giga Berlin’s new graffiti panels as of early February 2022. (Credit: @Gf4Tesla/Twitter)
It isn’t just companies, either. Dudenhöffer says that the renewal of motorway bridges can take years or even decades to be rebuilt completely due to new approval procedures. It is not about getting things done quickly, it seems.
When things as simple as bridge repairs are taking over ten years to complete, there has to be an indication that the processes for planning and approval need to be revised. That is what Chief Executive Holder Loesch said, who encouraged the agencies responsible for approving projects to take a look at refining the approval steps. Loesch, whose association is overseeing the installation of wind turbines and industrial plants to double by 2030, says that his plans will include the submission of around 20,000 permits during the course of action. “This mammoth task can only be mastered with a comprehensive reform of planning and approvals that includes processes for industrial plant structures,” he said.
Even Brandenburg Economics Minister Jörg Steinbach submitted ideas to help expedite potential approvals. Driven by the lagging approval process in the Tesla project, Steinbach said that “It should be possible to make changes to the building plan in the ongoing approval process without the process having to be completely restarted.”
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Elon Musk
Tesla owners surpass 8 billion miles driven on FSD Supervised
Tesla shared the milestone as adoption of the system accelerates across several markets.
Tesla owners have now driven more than 8 billion miles using Full Self-Driving Supervised, as per a new update from the electric vehicle maker’s official X account.
Tesla shared the milestone as adoption of the system accelerates across several markets.
“Tesla owners have now driven >8 billion miles on FSD Supervised,” the company wrote in its post on X. Tesla also included a graphic showing FSD Supervised’s miles driven before a collision, which far exceeds that of the United States average.
The growth curve of FSD Supervised’s cumulative miles over the past five years has been notable. As noted in data shared by Tesla watcher Sawyer Merritt, annual FSD (Supervised) miles have increased from roughly 6 million in 2021 to 80 million in 2022, 670 million in 2023, 2.25 billion in 2024, and 4.25 billion in 2025. In just the first 50 days of 2026, Tesla owners logged another 1 billion miles.
At the current pace, the fleet is trending towards hitting about 10 billion FSD Supervised miles this year. The increase has been driven by Tesla’s growing vehicle fleet, periodic free trials, and expanding Robotaxi operations, among others.
Tesla also recently updated the safety data for FSD Supervised on its website, covering North America across all road types over the latest 12-month period.
As per Tesla’s figures, vehicles operating with FSD Supervised engaged recorded one major collision every 5,300,676 miles. In comparison, Teslas driven manually with Active Safety systems recorded one major collision every 2,175,763 miles, while Teslas driven manually without Active Safety recorded one major collision every 855,132 miles. The U.S. average during the same period was one major collision every 660,164 miles.
During the measured period, Tesla reported 830 total major collisions with FSD (Supervised) engaged, compared to 16,131 collisions for Teslas driven manually with Active Safety and 250 collisions for Teslas driven manually without Active Safety. Total miles logged exceeded 4.39 billion miles for FSD (Supervised) during the same timeframe.
Elon Musk
The Boring Company’s Music City Loop gains unanimous approval
After eight months of negotiations, MNAA board members voted unanimously on Feb. 18 to move forward with the project.
The Metro Nashville Airport Authority (MNAA) has approved a 40-year agreement with Elon Musk’s The Boring Company to build the Music City Loop, a tunnel system linking Nashville International Airport to downtown.
After eight months of negotiations, MNAA board members voted unanimously on Feb. 18 to move forward with the project. Under the terms, The Boring Company will pay the airport authority an annual $300,000 licensing fee for the use of roughly 933,000 square feet of airport property, with a 3% annual increase.
Over 40 years, that totals to approximately $34 million, with two optional five-year extensions that could extend the term to 50 years, as per a report from The Tennesean.
The Boring Company celebrated the Music City Loop’s approval in a post on its official X account. “The Metropolitan Nashville Airport Authority has unanimously (7-0) approved a Music City Loop connection/station. Thanks so much to @Fly_Nashville for the great partnership,” the tunneling startup wrote in its post.
Once operational, the Music City Loop is expected to generate a $5 fee per airport pickup and drop-off, similar to rideshare charges. Airport officials estimate more than $300 million in operational revenue over the agreement’s duration, though this projection is deemed conservative.
“This is a significant benefit to the airport authority because we’re receiving a new way for our passengers to arrive downtown at zero capital investment from us. We don’t have to fund the operations and maintenance of that. TBC, The Boring Co., will do that for us,” MNAA President and CEO Doug Kreulen said.
The project has drawn both backing and criticism. Business leaders cited economic benefits and improved mobility between downtown and the airport. “Hospitality isn’t just an amenity. It’s an economic engine,” Strategic Hospitality’s Max Goldberg said.
Opponents, including state lawmakers, raised questions about environmental impacts, worker safety, and long-term risks. Sen. Heidi Campbell said, “Safety depends on rules applied evenly without exception… You’re not just evaluating a tunnel. You’re evaluating a risk, structural risk, legal risk, reputational risk and financial risk.”
Elon Musk
Tesla announces crazy new Full Self-Driving milestone
The number of miles traveled has contextual significance for two reasons: one being the milestone itself, and another being Tesla’s continuing progress toward 10 billion miles of training data to achieve what CEO Elon Musk says will be the threshold needed to achieve unsupervised self-driving.
Tesla has announced a crazy new Full Self-Driving milestone, as it has officially confirmed drivers have surpassed over 8 billion miles traveled using the Full Self-Driving (Supervised) suite for semi-autonomous travel.
The FSD (Supervised) suite is one of the most robust on the market, and is among the safest from a data perspective available to the public.
On Wednesday, Tesla confirmed in a post on X that it has officially surpassed the 8 billion-mile mark, just a few months after reaching 7 billion cumulative miles, which was announced on December 27, 2025.
Tesla owners have now driven >8 billion miles on FSD Supervisedhttps://t.co/0d66ihRQTa pic.twitter.com/TXz9DqOQ8q
— Tesla (@Tesla) February 18, 2026
The number of miles traveled has contextual significance for two reasons: one being the milestone itself, and another being Tesla’s continuing progress toward 10 billion miles of training data to achieve what CEO Elon Musk says will be the threshold needed to achieve unsupervised self-driving.
The milestone itself is significant, especially considering Tesla has continued to gain valuable data from every mile traveled. However, the pace at which it is gathering these miles is getting faster.
Secondly, in January, Musk said the company would need “roughly 10 billion miles of training data” to achieve safe and unsupervised self-driving. “Reality has a super long tail of complexity,” Musk said.
Training data primarily means the fleet’s accumulated real-world miles that Tesla uses to train and improve its end-to-end AI models. This data captures the “long tail” — extremely rare, complex, or unpredictable situations that simulations alone cannot fully replicate at scale.
This is not the same as the total miles driven on Full Self-Driving, which is the 8 billion miles milestone that is being celebrated here.
The FSD-supervised miles contribute heavily to the training data, but the 10 billion figure is an estimate of the cumulative real-world exposure needed overall to push the system to human-level reliability.
Tesla owners surpass 8 billion miles driven on FSD Supervised
The Boring Company’s Music City Loop gains unanimous approval
