Tesla pause German gigafactory construction after environmentalists protest cutting trees

[Sauron]

2 minutes ago, mr moose said:

what is the environmental footprint of the factory versus not producing EV's?

Not building the factory has 0 impact while building it has a non 0 impact.

[mr moose]

3 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Not building the factory has 0 impact while building it has a non 0 impact.

It's not that simple, you can't just ignore the immediate physical impact the existence of something has in order to argue it's overall worth.  Imagine trying to argue never to build another power station or hospital because doing so has an immediate negative impact on the nevirnoment.

[Sauron]

5 minutes ago, mr moose said:

It's not that simple, you can't just ignore the immediate physical impact the existence of something has in order to argue it's overall worth.  Imagine trying to argue never to build another power station or hospital because doing so has an immediate negative impact on the nevirnoment.

I've been arguing over exactly how and why the impact of the factory is non trivial and why its output does not and can not entirely account for its impact for this entire thread, must have been at least 20 long posts by now. I wonder why that's not enough while you're willing to take Musk at face value for a single tweet with no evidence or supporting arguments other than "trust me guys it's good".

 

And you're still arguing against a straw man of my position - I never argued that no factories should ever be built or that environmental impact is the only factor to consider, I even clarified that multiple times, and yet you guys keep bringing it up. I'm tired of repeating myself.

[leadeater]

1 hour ago, Sauron said:

Life is obviously sustainable

Has been*, assumption error of status being true forever.

[leadeater]

1 hour ago, Sauron said:

It's not that it's not perfect or that it has downsides, it's that it doesn't solve the problem.

It solves air quality issues in cities.

[mr moose]

5 hours ago, Sauron said:

I've been arguing over exactly how and why the impact of the factory is non trivial and why its output does not and can not entirely account for its impact for this entire thread, must have been at least 20 long posts by now.

And you are not only wrong about it but you don't seem to understand why.  Before you continue, please provide some evidence that the overall building of the factory will have a larger impact on the environment than the cars it produces mitigates.

 

5 hours ago, Sauron said:

I wonder why that's not enough while you're willing to take Musk at face value for a single tweet with no evidence or supporting arguments other than "trust me guys it's good".

I'm not willing to take any side, I am just pointing out that ignoring great swaths of effecting conditions and using EV car production alone to argue against something is wrong.

 

5 hours ago, Sauron said:

And you're still arguing against a straw man of my position - I never argued that no factories should ever be built or that environmental impact is the only factor to consider, I even clarified that multiple times, and yet you guys keep bringing it up. I'm tired of repeating myself.

I don't think you know what  straw man is,  In order to make a strawman argument I have to first accuse you of saying something you haven't.

[Guest]

Who would win?

 

Car manufacturer company producing one of the most coveted cars on the planet, vs, a few shrubby bois 

[leadeater]

Just now, RorzNZ said:

Who would win?

 

Car manufacturer company producing one of the most coveted cars on the planet, vs, a few shrubby bois 

Obviously ERB are the only ones that can solve this question

[Goldilock]

On 2/18/2020 at 2:06 AM, Sauron said:

Oh, and 92 hectares (or 920000 m^2) aren't a small area. That's almost a million trees being cleared going by the average of trees per square metre. And that's only part of the environmental impact - the water necessary for a car factory of that size ("not much" according to Elon) is so much that a single source won't be enough beyond the first few batches of cars.

92 hectares are indeed small by corporate standard.

 

Palm oil plantation can clear 2,500 hectare and still considered "very small plantation", the bigger ones can range 15,000 to 20,000 hectares. I know because I used to work in the industry.

 

Although compared to other manufacturing industries 92 is big industries complex. Honda in Indonesia as example have 45 Hectare, and they are pumping out 5 Million motorcycle and 200,000 cars in a year.

[dizmo]

On 2/17/2020 at 12:25 PM, Bombastinator said:

Let’s pretend for the sake of argument that hydrogen is more sustainable than electric:  in the US it doesn’t matter, because hydrogen infrastructure can’t be built in the first place.  It’s a problem in all the large countries.

You can certainly build hydrogen infrastructure. It just takes time and investment, just like any other kind of infrastructure. Saying it's not possible is simply incorrect.

On 2/17/2020 at 12:37 PM, Sauron said:

Well you're wrong, I argue for public transportation. Which is more sustainable than any form of car if done properly.

You can't use public transportation as a replacement everywhere, in some cities it simply won't work. I live in a city with 1,000,000 people, however the city is spread over 684 square kilometers.

On 2/17/2020 at 1:21 PM, mr moose said:

Also, this is the country who's trying to build a coal power station because nuclear is to dangerous.

 

Obviously a sensationalist article so don't read into it other than the one inescapable issue of them increasing coal usage.

https://www.climatechangenews.com/2020/01/09/wont-let-germany-build-new-coal-power-plant/

I watched something on this and I believe it was public disapproval of nuclear energy that brought that on, not some decision made by the government by choice; nuclear is clearly a better solution than coal. They also tried using wind, however it's significantly worse than nuclear and their emissions actually went up when they switched to it.

On 2/17/2020 at 1:56 PM, Sauron said:

I didn't say I'm sure of it, I said it's possible (the protesters sure seem to think that) and Musk didn't address it.

No, because they don't have to build that factory there.

I can't think of any case where a city would be unable to provide public transportation but cars would be able to go around freely. As I said, if you're far from a city in a rural area this doesn't apply - the majority of car related pollution comes from daily commutes within a city or between a city and another, which can both be covered by buses, trams and trains.

See above, as I said we don't need to get rid of cars entirely. I live in a pretty small city and yet the streets are always chock full of cars for all sorts of small commutes because the public transport system isn't as well funded or as well organized as it could be. By contrast, when I studied in Germany I could get literally anywhere by taking a bus in about the same time as I could with a car.

Because having a separate vehicle for everyone (or at best every 5 people) is wildly inefficient compared to having a single vehicle that can carry 30 people. Even if the cars were electric, a combustion bus would have them beat by a significant margin in terms of emissions per capita - and that's not accounting for trams, which are mostly electric and less wasteful to produce since they don't need massive li-ion batteries. Electric buses exist too.

I like driving too but that's not an excuse to destroy the planet. It's not even a matter of not owning a car at all - it's a matter of drastically cutting down its use. You can have a car for your day trips in the mountains or whatever, it's just not good for everyone to use their car every day to go places a bus could take them.

Where? Wherever it is, why not build the factory there instead? Also that doesn't account for the wildlife and water pollution.

See the soda can example - the problem runs deeper and pretending you're offering a solution when you're not is dangerous.

Ok, so let's say they build it elsewhere, where every employee has to travel by car to get to work, they have to import their materials farther, etc etc. Not only does that cost more, that will have an impact on the environment that could be far greater than tearing down trees meant for the production of cardboard. It's not like we're talking about tearing down old growth forest. There is a difference.

 

The city I live in is incapable of providing sufficient public transportation. There are areas of the city you simply can't get to by bus, because there aren't any routes, and walking isn't a possibility, as it's -30 for large periods of the year. On top of that, something that's a simple 20 minute car ride can take up to 2 1/2 hours by public transit.

 

A vehicle that carries 30 people has inefficiency to it as well. The last 5 people are going to spend significantly longer getting to where they're going. That equation while on the surface makes sense, in practice it's completely illogical, unless they're all being picked up and dropped off to the same place.

On 2/17/2020 at 4:24 PM, RonnieOP said:

But why does it need to happen? Why are we more worried about getting cars off the road instead of just making it less impactful to make them?

 

If we are talking about solutions that are 40 years away we have no clue what technologies are going to be viable at that time.  I mean if we are making cars that are app based those are going to need to be built/replaced/repaired etc.

 

And the fact that it wont happen anytime soon isnt really because we are all selfish. Its because even this car app solution isnt viable in a lot of areas. And something like a community car introduces a shit load of risks. I honestly cant see it working in the states at all.

There comes a point where you simply can't have that many cars on the road, at which time other options need to come up. It's better to get people used to these options before it has to be forced down their throats.

 

I can't see a lot of things "working" in the US, like a proper healthcare system. It's all about mindset.

On 2/17/2020 at 3:25 PM, Sauron said:

No, it wouldn't... even if all manufacturers decided to go electric tomorrow they'd still use their current factories, they'd just repurpose them.

*snip*

You can't always just re-purpose a factory. It doesn't work like that, as has been shown in Detroit.

On 2/17/2020 at 4:38 PM, Bombastinator said:

Imagine for example a prostitute using a community car as a mobile cat house for an evening and what you might get to sit in later.

 

Or a shooting gallery, or any number of things.  There are ways around it of course but they involve removing the privacy aspect from community cars.

 

I hate using the “tragedy of the commons” example because it’s so often twisted and misused, but it kind of applies here.

A pimp isn't going to pay money for a car when you can use a house without being seen. Chances of these cars not having cameras in them are slim to none.

On 2/17/2020 at 4:38 PM, RonnieOP said:

its only a reduction of consumption of owning a car....in the city.

 

And if you take a huge city like LA with 4 million people in it. Your going to need alot of these cars. So consumption wouldnt even drastically go down.

That's where proper city planning comes in, something LA sorely lacks. I think that's where China really will come out ahead in the next century as their cities will be properly planned out from the beginning, and built at once with these things in mind. I know the GVRD has many regional projects with small communities within a city in mind (housing developments ranging from a few hundred to over 11,000 units, that encompass retail/office as well, beside train lines), not sure if they're planning similar projects there.

On 2/17/2020 at 4:48 PM, Bombastinator said:

Yep.  Except you’re the one that owns your car. You’re the only one who uses it and gets it dirty.  Taken a crap in your car lately?  No?  Me either.  It’s my car.

Kind of an extreme, no? No one's just going to take a crap in the car for the fun of it. If they do, there's this thing called cleaning, which they'll regularly go through.

If you've ever used a public bathroom, you've already been in something that's been guaranteed to have gone through worse.

On 2/17/2020 at 5:11 PM, Phill104 said:

Which is why we need to change our fixed 9-5 attitudes, as well as our insistence on being one person in our own box,

I don't see that happening. It greatly increases costs, and unless everyone takes it on, it's pointless. No one's going to keep their company open when every other company that they need to operate is closed.

On 2/17/2020 at 11:13 PM, maartendc said:

92 hectares is a HUGE area of forest. Why on earth would they need so much space for a single factory?

 

Also, surely they could find some postindustrial sites for this, rather than cutting down a forest. There is no shortage of postindustrial abandoned sites in Europe / Germany, that could be cleaned up in the process.

 

Seems to me like an American company coming in and doing things the American way. The US has way more space and natural resources. (anyone who has driven through the US knows what im talking about, the country is huge). In Europe those are scarce and valuable.

I mean, it's not really that big if you think about it. It's supposed to employ more than 4,000 people. I've lived in towns with that many people.

Say you have a parking stall for each staff member, plus 500 in case there's visitors, etc. 4,500 parking stalls takes up 75,000 square meters alone, and that doesn't include driving space and other infrastructure. Now, consider that this is a manufacturing facility for vehicles, and he plans to produce up to 500,000 a year (number seems lofty, so we'll half it). 250,000 vehicles is roughly 21,000 cars a month. Say you need parking for half of that at any given time. That's another 175,000 square meters. So you've taken up over a quarter of the land just in parking.

 

If you want big, take a look at Audi's Ingolstadt facility. It's 274 hectares and employs 44,000 people. If Tesla manages to pump 500,000 cars out of this factory a year, that'll be a seriously impressive feat (Ingolstadt does just under 500,000).

[maartendc]

1 hour ago, dizmo said:

If you want big, take a look at Audi's Ingolstadt facility. It's 274 hectares and employs 44,000 people. If Tesla manages to pump 500,000 cars out of this factory a year, that'll be a seriously impressive feat (Ingolstadt does just under 500,000).

I looked it up, and that 274 ha Audi site is not only a factory, but is their main corporate headquarters, main RnD centers, also includes a museum, customer service center, arthouse cinema, restaurants, etc. It employs 44,000 people. 44,000!!! If this Tesla factory only employs 4000 people, they are using 0,023 ha per employee, versus 0,006 ha per employee for Audi. So in that respect, they are using almost 4 times more space than Audi. I know, this comparison is imperfect, as a factory floor takes more space than an RnD office, but your comparison about number of cars produced on the site is just as imperfect.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audi_Forum_Ingolstadt

https://www.audi-mediacenter.com/en/ingolstadt-headquarters-195

 

 

And my main point was not the exact number of the space, rather that they chose to plan it in a forest. Because it is cheap. It is cheap to cut down a bunch of trees, clear the site and build, rather than actually doing proper planning, looking for a postindustrial site somewhere that would need brownfield cleanup, and then actually do something useful with it. Also, the fact that it is a planted forest is irrelevant. Almost ALL forests in Europe at this point have had some human intervention. So we should just deforest everything?

 

Europe, Germany included, is littered with postindustrial sites from coal mining, steel mills, etc. that have since closed or moved overseas. These are perfectly suited to build a factory. It is just more expensive, because you have to clean the soil / site first.

 

And if you think the government has looked at all the angles and done 'proper planning' together with Tesla, think again. The government is only seeing the jobs, not the impact on the environment. Time and time again, governments, also in Europe, give way too much benefit to large corporations, against the long term public interest. Time and again, projects have been greenlit all the way until someone actually does an environmental assessment, and looks at alternatives. (which supposedly they are doing now). Note that the German government is pausing the project. IF they already did their due diligence on environmental assessment and looking at alternatives, THEN why pause it now?

 

I am fully in favor of delaying this factory until all the alternatives have been assessed. IF it turns out there are no alternatives, I have no objection to building this factory. But the way this is unfolding, shows that they have not done their homework.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, dizmo said:

.

I don't see that happening. It greatly increases costs, and unless everyone takes it on, it's pointless. No one's going to keep their company open when every other company that they need to operate is closed.

 

I am not suggesting it is right for everyone. My job is easy, most people on site work shifts or as developers can work from home or pick their time. I tend to turn in about 10ish to avoid the morning traffic. Small changes make a big difference. Let’s look at a big factory near me that produces vans as another example. The main workforce, and it was the same when the site was 20times the size producing cars too, work a three shift pattern covering the whole 24hrs. As it stands, one shift starts at 9 causing a lot of traffic in the area., same when that shift finishes. It would not be hard at all to adjust those times, start the shift at 11 and roll the three shifts from there. Factory is still open 24/7, still producing in exactly the same way but a large amount of traffic is taken out of the normal rush hour. If companies in an area can work together the daily commute could be made a lot easier resulting in a happier and probably more productive workforce as a result. It can happen, and has already in some industries. Take Amazon as an example, they operate all sorts of shifts in their warehouses which results in a big spread of traffic rather than it all hitting at one point. 

[leadeater]

11 hours ago, Sauron said:

If you plant a crop and harvest some grain every year you can do it virtually forever - if you just swallow the whole plant it will only last you one season.

That isn't how it works like at all, unless it's something like a fruit orchard you aren't getting produce off a plant multiple times. As I mentioned I do actually grow my own so I have direct experience, additionally my mother has multiple Masters in horticulture, I live in a farming area and my entire country is very farming focused. This isn't a thread to teach you about how farming to feed a populous works so I'll just not do it, but that just is so utterly wrong.

 

But your entire sustainability points fall apart because you are ignoring population growth, something that is sustainable now will not hold true for an ever increasing population. Unless we have infinite land, infinite fertility, infinite fresh water you cannot feed an ever increasing population, you will hit a critical point where it is required that technology or process improvements happen to counter it.

 

Some things just simply do not scale, what works now won't forever. Sustainability is not a fixed constant it's always proportional to something, I mean you literally said it yourself.

11 hours ago, Sauron said:

only in the last couple of centuries have we started harvesting resources at a rate that isn't sustainable by our planet

 

 

This applies to everything, food, transportation and housing being the big three. Take for example the TV programs and other media about sustainable housing that people like to tout, it's actually not. Those sustainable housing/village projects are not sustainable for positive birth rate and land usage wise is inefficient compared to what is considered unsustainable practices (which are too). And that is where the problem really lies, population.   

[Bombastinator]

2 hours ago, dizmo said:

You can certainly build hydrogen infrastructure. It just takes time and investment, just like any other kind of infrastructure. Saying it's not possible is simply incorrect.

You can't use public transportation as a replacement everywhere, in some cities it simply won't work. I live in a city with 1,000,000 people, however the city is spread over 684 square kilometers.

I watched something on this and I believe it was public disapproval of nuclear energy that brought that on, not some decision made by the government by choice; nuclear is clearly a better solution than coal. They also tried using wind, however it's significantly worse than nuclear and their emissions actually went up when they switched to it.

Ok, so let's say they build it elsewhere, where every employee has to travel by car to get to work, they have to import their materials farther, etc etc. Not only does that cost more, that will have an impact on the environment that could be far greater than tearing down trees meant for the production of cardboard. It's not like we're talking about tearing down old growth forest. There is a difference.

 

The city I live in is incapable of providing sufficient public transportation. There are areas of the city you simply can't get to by bus, because there aren't any routes, and walking isn't a possibility, as it's -30 for large periods of the year. On top of that, something that's a simple 20 minute car ride can take up to 2 1/2 hours by public transit.

 

A vehicle that carries 30 people has inefficiency to it as well. The last 5 people are going to spend significantly longer getting to where they're going. That equation while on the surface makes sense, in practice it's completely illogical, unless they're all being picked up and dropped off to the same place.

There comes a point where you simply can't have that many cars on the road, at which time other options need to come up. It's better to get people used to these options before it has to be forced down their throats.

 

I can't see a lot of things "working" in the US, like a proper healthcare system. It's all about mindset.

You can't always just re-purpose a factory. It doesn't work like that, as has been shown in Detroit.

A pimp isn't going to pay money for a car when you can use a house without being seen. Chances of these cars not having cameras in them are slim to none.

That's where proper city planning comes in, something LA sorely lacks. I think that's where China really will come out ahead in the next century as their cities will be properly planned out from the beginning, and built at once with these things in mind. I know the GVRD has many regional projects with small communities within a city in mind (housing developments ranging from a few hundred to over 11,000 units, that encompass retail/office as well, beside train lines), not sure if they're planning similar projects there.

Kind of an extreme, no? No one's just going to take a crap in the car for the fun of it. If they do, there's this thing called cleaning, which they'll regularly go through.

If you've ever used a public bathroom, you've already been in something that's been guaranteed to have gone through worse.

I don't see that happening. It greatly increases costs, and unless everyone takes it on, it's pointless. No one's going to keep their company open when every other company that they need to operate is closed.

I mean, it's not really that big if you think about it. It's supposed to employ more than 4,000 people. I've lived in towns with that many people.

Say you have a parking stall for each staff member, plus 500 in case there's visitors, etc. 4,500 parking stalls takes up 75,000 square meters alone, and that doesn't include driving space and other infrastructure. Now, consider that this is a manufacturing facility for vehicles, and he plans to produce up to 500,000 a year (number seems lofty, so we'll half it). 250,000 vehicles is roughly 21,000 cars a month. Say you need parking for half of that at any given time. That's another 175,000 square meters. So you've taken up over a quarter of the land just in parking.

 

If you want big, take a look at Audi's Ingolstadt facility. It's 274 hectares and employs 44,000 people. If Tesla manages to pump 500,000 cars out of this factory a year, that'll be a seriously impressive feat (Ingolstadt does just under 500,000).

Re: hydrogen.  
“Can’t” would be an effective cant vs. theoretical can’t.   The electrical structure of the  US isn’t very good, but it’s got 100 years of build out on a hydrogen system.  Doing a hydrogen system for cars in the US usually talks about using LG distribution to convert natural gas to hydrogen on site.  It’s not even really a hydrogen distribution system at all.  It’s an LG distribution system with hydrogen conversion.

 

re: public facilities.

Yep.  “Public bathrooms” are pretty rare in the US.  Generally they’re private bathrooms in stores and stuff that are open to the public.  The problem still exists.  A “public car” system would have to work the same way.  Hose em out every night like city busses.

[RonnieOP]

3 hours ago, maartendc said:

I looked it up, and that 274 ha Audi site is not only a factory, but is their main corporate headquarters, main RnD centers, also includes a museum, customer service center, arthouse cinema, restaurants, etc. It employs 44,000 people. 44,000!!! If this Tesla factory only employs 4000 people, they are using 0,023 ha per employee, versus 0,006 ha per employee for Audi. So in that respect, they are using almost 4 times more space than Audi. I know, this comparison is imperfect, as a factory floor takes more space than an RnD office, but your comparison about number of cars produced on the site is just as imperfect.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audi_Forum_Ingolstadt

https://www.audi-mediacenter.com/en/ingolstadt-headquarters-195

 

 

And my main point was not the exact number of the space, rather that they chose to plan it in a forest. Because it is cheap. It is cheap to cut down a bunch of trees, clear the site and build, rather than actually doing proper planning, looking for a postindustrial site somewhere that would need brownfield cleanup, and then actually do something useful with it. Also, the fact that it is a planted forest is irrelevant. Almost ALL forests in Europe at this point have had some human intervention. So we should just deforest everything?

 

Europe, Germany included, is littered with postindustrial sites from coal mining, steel mills, etc. that have since closed or moved overseas. These are perfectly suited to build a factory. It is just more expensive, because you have to clean the soil / site first.

 

And if you think the government has looked at all the angles and done 'proper planning' together with Tesla, think again. The government is only seeing the jobs, not the impact on the environment. Time and time again, governments, also in Europe, give way too much benefit to large corporations, against the long term public interest. Time and again, projects have been greenlit all the way until someone actually does an environmental assessment, and looks at alternatives. (which supposedly they are doing now). Note that the German government is pausing the project. IF they already did their due diligence on environmental assessment and looking at alternatives, THEN why pause it now?

 

I am fully in favor of delaying this factory until all the alternatives have been assessed. IF it turns out there are no alternatives, I have no objection to building this factory. But the way this is unfolding, shows that they have not done their homework.

Why does it matter that they are building on land they own? 

 

The forest is man made with the sole intention of being cut down for card board.

 

The forest is not vital for that area to survive. And they are planting trees nearby.

 

Germany isnt going to suffer from losing the trees. Germany doesnt own the land, doesnt own the trees, etc.

 

So whats the issue?

 

 

[Bombastinator]

20 minutes ago, RonnieOP said:

Why does it matter that they are building on land they own? 

 

The forest is man made with the sole intention of being cut down for card board.

 

The forest is not vital for that area to survive. And they are planting trees nearby.

 

Germany isnt going to suffer from losing the trees. Germany doesnt own the land, doesnt own the trees, etc.

 

So whats the issue?

 

 

Was made.  When was it made? By whom?  Who owned it?  What happened politically and socially in Germany between it being planted and now?

This is the same argument you claimed to back away from earlier.

The problem with the definition of sovereignty of land ownership remains.  There seems to be this assumption that there is some sort of sovereign right based on land ownership, but also that there is NO LIMITATION to this sovereign right.  This strikes me a s pure crap.

The problem with it is what one does on a given piece of land can affect those outside of that piece of land.  Classic example was smokestacks.  Industries built infrastructure which dumped large amounts of pollutants into the air and the nearby citizenry complained that they were being harmed.  The companies didn’t change their behavior.  They didn’t actually reduce the damage they were doing. they just built taller smokestacks which sent the pollutants farther before they landed and hurt people.  The result was acid lakes in Canada.  More people were actually hurt but it took years to prove and was much more difficult.  Still happened though.

 

The one I personally experienced in my youth were sugarbeet tailing ponds in North Dakota.  Companies wanted to do the cheapest thing possible with their industrial waste (in this case sugar beet tailings) so they put them in gigantic artificial lakes and simply left them to rot.

 

The smell permeated large sections of the entire state and made gigantic areas far outside the railing ponds nearly unlivable.  They reduced the quality of huge amounts of property the did not own.
 

Germany is a heavily built country, and forests are rare and highly prized.   That the trees were originally planted as a crop rather than as a park may not matter all that much.  They still do a great deal of carbon fixing.  Something Germans consider critical.   
 

Questions that need to be considered:  how will the change in the status of this area (deforestation in this case) affect land or people OUTSIDE of that area?  IF there is an affect how can it be mitigated?
 

 

[maartendc]

42 minutes ago, RonnieOP said:

Why does it matter that they are building on land they own? 

 

The forest is man made with the sole intention of being cut down for card board.

 

The forest is not vital for that area to survive. And they are planting trees nearby.

 

Germany isnt going to suffer from losing the trees. Germany doesnt own the land, doesnt own the trees, etc.

 

So whats the issue?

 

 

You clearly don't understand how zoning, urban planning, building permitting, etc. work. The fact who owns the land is irrelevant.

 

- First off your land needs to be zoned by the government for your intended purpose. For example, if your property is located in an area zoned for housing, you cannot build a glue factory there.

- Secondly, even if zoned correctly, you need to apply for building permits. One of the things that is part of a permitting process is environmental assessment by the government of your intended use for the site. (potential negative impact on the environment).

 

Source: I am an architect and urban planner.

 

Finally, nearly any landscapes in Europe have been man made for centuries, be it forests, fields, cities, ... very little has not been touched by humans in the last hundreds of years. Doesn't mean the current forest is not valuable and worth preserving for a number of reasons. Replanting more trees elsewhere is not the same, as it takes 20+ years for a forest and related ecosystem to establish.

 

 

[RonnieOP]

21 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

Was made.  When was it made? By whom?  Who owned it?  What happened politically and socially in Germany between it being planted and now?

This is the same argument you claimed to back away from earlier.

The problem with the definition of sovereignty of land ownership remains.  There seems to be this assumption that there is some sort of sovereign right based on land ownership, but also that there is NO LIMITATION to this sovereign right.  This strikes me a s pure crap.

The problem with it is what one does on a given piece of land can affect those outside of that piece of land.  Classic example was smokestacks.  Industries built infrastructure which dumped large amounts of pollutants into the air and the nearby citizenry complained that they were being harmed.  The companies didn’t change their behavior.  They didn’t actually reduce the damage they were doing. they just built taller smokestacks which sent the pollutants farther before they landed and hurt people.  The result was acid lakes in Canada.  More people were actually hurt but it took years to prove and was much more difficult.  Still happened though.

 

The one I personally experienced in my youth were sugarbeet tailing ponds in North Dakota.  Companies wanted to do the cheapest thing possible with their industrial waste (in this case sugar beet tailings) so they put them in gigantic artificial lakes and simply left them to rot.

 

The smell permeated large sections of the entire state and made gigantic areas far outside the railing ponds nearly unlivable.  They reduced the quality of huge amounts of property the did not own.
 

Germany is a heavily built country, and forests are rare and highly prized.   That the trees were originally planted as a crop rather than as a park may not matter all that much.  They still do a great deal of carbon fixing.  Something Germans consider critical.   
 

Questions that need to be considered:  how will the change in the status of this area (deforestation in this case) affect land or people OUTSIDE of that area?  IF there is an affect how can it be mitigated?
 

 

Forest are not rare in Germany. 33% of Germany is trees. 11.4 million hectares with over 90 billion trees.

 

Thats a shit load of trees for a country whos area is smaller then the state of texas.

 

[RonnieOP]

Just now, maartendc said:

You clearly don't understand how zoning, urban planning, building permitting, etc. work. The fact who owns the land is irrelevant.

 

- First off your land needs to be zoned by the government for your intended purpose. If your property is located in an area zoned for housing, you cannot build a glue factory there.

- Secondly, even if zoned correctly, you need to apply for building permits. One of the things that is part of a permitting process is environmental assessment. (potential negative impact on the environment).

 

Source: I am an architect and urban planner.

 

Finally, nearly any landscapes in Europe have been man made for centuries, be it forests, fields, cities, ... very little has not been touched by humans in the last hundreds of years. Doesn't mean the current forest is not valuable and worth preserving for a number of reasons. Replanting more trees elsewhere is not the same, as it takes 20+ years for a forest and related ecosystem to establish.

 

 

From what ive read all the zoning has already been done. They only paused the tear down in order to hear the concerns of the activists. But the government already gave them the green light to build. 

 

Yes the new trees planted will take years to establish. So? These trees are not vital to the people living in the area. 

 

Germany isnt in short supply of trees. They didnt need this man made forest to begin with. 

[Bombastinator]

33 minutes ago, RonnieOP said:

Forest are not rare in Germany. 33% of Germany is trees. 11.4 million hectares with over 90 billion trees.

 

Thats a shit load of trees for a country whos area is smaller then the state of texas.

 

It’s not what you or I think about it.  It’s what the Germans think about it.  Germany is a small country in area but not population or industry.  The tree number per capita is still much smaller than the US.   The USA has the same percentage of forested area but it’s a much much larger country compared to its population.  Also the percentage of old growth Forrest in the US is vastly larger than in Germany, in so much as we’ve still got some.  Germany had two world wars fought in its confines.  Their last old growth Forrest, the black Forrest of central Germany, started dying out in the 80’s.  Because of industrial pollution outside of the confines of the forested area btw.

 

What I might want to consider if I was Musk, is Who exactly was protesting, exactly why, and what can be done to allay their concerns.

That they can’t be ignored is water under the bridge.  That was dealt with by the court finding.  In order to build the factory he has to find a way to keep the quality of life of the protestors at bare minimum the same.

 

One issue is whether the forested area removed was considered parkland.  If it was it has to be replaced with parkland similarly near the people who were affected by its loss.  If it WASNT only the issue of trees within Germany might need to be fixed.  That would grant greater flexibility.

 

The complaint that the complaint violates Musk’s sovereign right as a rich industrialist to degrade an area according to his personal desires is not one that exists even in America, where such things are given greater weight than almost anywhere else in the world, the almost being truly frightening.   

[maartendc]

30 minutes ago, RonnieOP said:

These trees are not vital to the people living in the area.

Finding this out is exactly why construction was paused.

 

If this is the very best spot in that entire area to build a mega-, sorry giga-factory like this, then they will build it. If not, they won't be allowed to. Simple as that.

 

30 minutes ago, RonnieOP said:

From what ive read all the zoning has already been done.

Quote

Tesla announced plans for Gigafactory 4 last November, but has not yet been granted official planning permission for the factory itself. However, Germany’s environment ministry told the company it could start preparing the site in advance “at its own risk,”

https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/17/21140666/tesla-gigafactory-4-berlin-gruenheide-environmental-protest-pause

 

Clearly not.

 

The second sentence is baffling to me, and it wouldn't surprise me if the environment ministry will get sued over this, and the responsible people fired, or worse. Generally speaking, you are not allowed to commence ANY work on a site, BEFORE obtaining planning permission. Not felling trees, not digging a hole, NOTHING.

[Bombastinator]

8 minutes ago, maartendc said:

Finding this out is exactly why construction was paused.

 

If this is the very best spot in that entire area to build a mega-, sorry giga-factory like this, then they will build it. If not, they won't be allowed to. Simple as that.

 

https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/17/21140666/tesla-gigafactory-4-berlin-gruenheide-environmental-protest-pause

 

Clearly not.

 

The second sentence is baffling to me, and it wouldn't surprise me if the environment ministry will get sued over this, and the responsible people fired, or worse. Generally speaking, you are not allowed to commence ANY work on a site, BEFORE obtaining planning permission. Not felling trees, not digging a hole, NOTHING.

I’m not familiar with German law.  Things might be slightly different there.  In Britian or the US it is usually that way though.  You may very well be correct.  It’s odd.

[JCBiggs]

this is why we should start teraforming deserts. it wouldnt even really be that hard now that the "global warming" is making the atmosphere more moist. 

[RonnieOP]

1 hour ago, Bombastinator said:

It’s not what you or I think about it.  It’s what the Germans think about it.  Germany is a small country in area but not population or industry.  The tree number per capita is still much smaller than the US.   The USA has the same percentage of forested area but it’s a much much larger country compared to its population.  Also the percentage of old growth Forrest in the US is vastly larger than in Germany, in so much as we’ve still got some.  Germany had two world wars fought in its confines.  Their last old growth Forrest, the black Forrest of central Germany, started dying out in the 80’s.  Because of industrial pollution outside of the confines of the forested area btw.

 

What I might want to consider if I was Musk, is Who exactly was protesting, exactly why, and what can be done to allay their concerns.

That they can’t be ignored is water under the bridge.  That was dealt with by the court finding.  In order to build the factory he has to find a way to keep the quality of life of the protestors at bare minimum the same.

 

One issue is whether the forested area removed was considered parkland.  If it was it has to be replaced with parkland similarly near the people who were affected by its loss.  If it WASNT only the issue of trees within Germany might need to be fixed.  That would grant greater flexibility.

 

The complaint that the complaint violates Musk’s sovereign right as a rich industrialist to degrade an area according to his personal desires is not one that exists even in America, where such things are given greater weight than almost anywhere else in the world, the almost being truly frightening.   

They have 90 billion + trees for 90 million people. And musk is planting more trees then hes tearing down.

 

I dont see how it could be considered parkland. Its commercial land that a company planted trees on to tear down. And from my understanding parkland cannot be sold to anyone for non park usage. But idk German law so it may be different there. 

[RonnieOP]

1 hour ago, maartendc said:

Finding this out is exactly why construction was paused.

 

If this is the very best spot in that entire area to build a mega-, sorry giga-factory like this, then they will build it. If not, they won't be allowed to. Simple as that.

 

https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/17/21140666/tesla-gigafactory-4-berlin-gruenheide-environmental-protest-pause

 

Clearly not.

 

The second sentence is baffling to me, and it wouldn't surprise me if the environment ministry will get sued over this, and the responsible people fired, or worse. Generally speaking, you are not allowed to commence ANY work on a site, BEFORE obtaining planning permission. Not felling trees, not digging a hole, NOTHING.

https://abcnews.go.com/Business/court-asks-tesla-temporarily-stop-cutting-trees-site/story?id=69029497

 

According to this the local environmental government had already given them the go ahead.

 

This isnt the German government stopping Tesla because they want to. They are stopping it because a legal challenge was made. The people who filed the legal claim are not government officials but an activist group.