"a diamond-shaped factory of outlandish proportions is emerging from the sweat and promises of Tesla CEO Elon Musk"

I can't help being reminded of the Bertolt Brecht poem:

    Who built the seven gates of Thebes?
    The books are filled with names of kings.
    Was it the kings who hauled the craggy blocks of stone?

https://allpoetry.com/A-Worker-Reads-History

>By 2018, the Gigafactory, which is less than a third complete, will double the world’s production capacity for lithium-ion batteries and employ 6,500 full-time Reno-based workers, according to a new hiring forecast from Tesla.

Unless those workers will be putting in thousands of hours per week (impossible, I know), this implies some truly prodigious productivity statistics: that by using the best available manufacturing techniques, they can double the world's battery production on 260,000 hours/week of labor.

The map of the intended extent of the factory is interesting. It's not even halfway completed yet. When people say that this is the largest factory in the world, do they mean that it is currently the largest, or that it will be the largest when fully completed (presumably by 2020)?

And even if Tesla does end up going kaput, the factory shell may very well be a mecca for urban explorers. :)

Where is all that Lithium coming from?

Top producing countries, US is #8:

http://investingnews.com/daily/resource-investing/energy-inv...

Now witness the power of this fully operational Gigafactory :).

Holy crap, this factory is three times the size of K-25, which was used to enrich uranium during WWII (and was the largest building in the world during its time).

Question: How much lithium can we rely on being able to extract for the foreseeable future? Do we not have a shortage of any kind?

Let's say that in the midst of current political climate in the US, if the new administration does succeed in bring back manufacturing jobs (questionable) to the US and take credit for this new momentum, we all should take a step back and give Tesla's Gigafactory its due credit for pioneering this momentum.

Musk will yet again need to kick those nay sayers butt with sheer awesomness. Maybe when we will have a colony on mars will they start believing.. But probably not.

Does Panasonic or anyone else have preliminary/actual part numbers for 21-70 (aka 2170 or 21700) cells?

Another milestone towards the singularity.

>>The start of mass production is a huge milestone in Tesla’s quest to electrify transportation, and it brings to America a manufacturing industry—battery cells—that’s long been dominated by China, Japan, and South Korea.

Anybody wants to guess how long before Trump claims credit for this?

Musk and Tesla are masters of marketing.

Tech in the Gigafactory and probably much more production and process knowledge for running battery production is from Panasonic.

Nevertheless all positive spin is benefiting Tesla.

If it fails, I'm sure Tesla will spin the failure as Panasonic.

Meanwhile, Tesla has missed on vehicle deliveries for the third time this year (out of four quarters). The stock is, obviously, up over 4% on this great news.

http://www.insidermonkey.com/blog/tesla-motors-inc-tsla-miss...