The “Vulkan Group”, classified as left-wing extremist, has committed itself to an “attack on the power supply” near the Tesla factory near Berlin as a protest against the US car manufacturer. “We sabotaged Tesla today,” the group said in a letter. Tesla and the Brandenburg police are currently assuming arson, and the State Security Office of the State Criminal Police Office has started the investigation.
The power outage caused a production stop at Tesla, and numerous households in the region were also affected. The “volcano group” was already suspected of carrying out an arson attack on the power supply at the Tesla construction site in 2021. At the time, she accused the company on the radical left-wing website Indymedia.org of saying that Tesla was neither green, ecological nor social. The Brandenburg Office for the Protection of the Constitution wrote about the confession letter in its 2021 report. It also said: “In recent years, left-wing extremists have carried out arson attacks in Berlin as ‘volcano groups’ several times.”
Production at the Tesla factory in Brandenburg is at a standstill after a power outage, a spokeswoman for the German Press Agency said. According to police, the cause is a burning electricity pole. The Interior Minister of Brandenburg, Michael Stübgen (CDU), spoke of a “perfidious attack on our electricity infrastructure”, the initial findings should be confirmed. “The constitutional state will react to such an act of sabotage with the utmost severity.”
The power outage apparently affects a larger area. According to the police, it was triggered by a burning electricity pylon that is standing freely in a field and is not fenced in. At around 5:15 a.m., the fire department was called to the fire in the Gosen-Neu Zittau area (Oder-Spree district) and began extinguishing the fire. Gosen-Neu Zittau borders Grünheide in close proximity to the so-called Tesla Gigafactory.
A Tesla spokeswoman said the factory was evacuated as a result of the power outage. After consultation with the provider Edis, it is not assumed that production can start up again quickly. The factory is the group’s only one in Europe.
The authorities have not yet commented on a possible connection with protests around the Tesla factory site. Around 80 to 100 environmental activists have been occupying part of the state forest in Brandenburg near the plant since Thursday; The company wants to have this cleared if its site is expanded. The activists have built around ten tree houses several meters high and have announced that they want to hold out for as long as possible.
Two weeks ago, almost two thirds of the citizens of Grünheide spoke out in a resident survey against a development plan to expand the plant. The local council is expected to decide on this in May. The citizens’ vote is not legally binding, but is considered an important signal.