Tesla has been moving forward in ramping up production of its 4680 battery cells since 2020, and just two short months ago, it could have been described as slow.
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The 4680 battery cell technology is an advancement on the 2170 technology that was being manufactured at Giga Nevada under an agreement with Panasonic. You see, while Tesla owns the giant facility just east of Reno, it is Panasonic, that leases space and owns and operates the battery-making machines. Panasonic then sells the 2170 batteries to Tesla for use in its EVs.

For Tesla, getting through the learning curve of the battery cell production at its plant in Fremont, California, is vital for the company to eventually mass produce the batteries at Giga Texas, thus shortening its supply chain.

During the company's 2022 Q3 conference call, it was revealed that 4680 cell production tripled during the quarter, with Musk stating the company is, “finally gaining rapid traction on the 4680 cell.”

Just two months later, that traction would seem to be firm as the company congratulated its workforce at the Fremont factory for having reached a significant milestone. An early morning holiday tweet indicated the facility had produced 868,000 4680 cylindrical lithium-ion battery cells over the last seven days.

Currently only used in Texas-made Tesla Model Y AWD cars, that quantity of 4680-type battery cells would outfit 1,000 electric cars.

"Congrats to the 4680 cell team on achieving 868k cells built in the last 7 days—equal to 1k+ cars!", was the quote in a tweet that included two pictures of the gathered workforce.

If one were to relate that tweet with one dated December 19, 2022, where the company congratulated its Giga Texas workforce for having built 3,000 Model Y's in a week for the very first time, it would equate to just one-third of the AWD Model Y cars having the 4680 battery cell. The goal is for the company to reach the 5,000-vehicle-per-week mark sometime in 2023.

Two versions of the Model Y roll out of the Giga Texas on parallel assembly lines.

The Tesla Model Y is equipped with the 4680-type battery cell and structural pack with a range of 279 miles (449 km) of EPA range on 19-inch (48.26 cm) wheels or 269 miles (443 km) on 20-inch (50.8 cm) wheels.

The Tesla Model Y Long Range AWD with 2170-type cells delivers 330 miles (531 km) of EPA range with 19" wheels (48.26 cm) or 318 miles (512 km) with 20" (50.8 cm) wheels.

Totally unimpressed. That’s how I felt after watching Tesla’s Full Self-Driving system in action on heavily snowed roads somewhere in Canada. It is like watching a rookie driver taking their first outing in cold and slippery conditions: the thing seems unsure of itself, makes mistakes, gives up at times and hands over controls, and it overall looks like a menace to itself and others around it.
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But first, some background. North America is still experiencing a hell of a winter storm these days, with about 40 inches (over one meter) of snow coming down in some areas, people getting trapped in their cars, and power outages and casualties reported in several areas across America and Canada.

On a separate note, Tesla is fresh from releasing its annual 2022 Holiday Update, which brought with it several novelties, including Apple Music, Mahjong, Steam, and an improved Light Show. Oh, and the Full Self-Driving (FSD) system has been tweaked a bit as well.

So, what happens when mother nature and the most recent variant of the Tesla automated systems meet? Nothing impressive, let me tell you.

Somewhere over in snow-covered Canada, some guy with an eerie Arnold Schwarzenegger-like accent (check the video attached below and you’ll instantly know what I mean) decided this week to take the FSD out for a spin and film it all. And the results are, as said, horrible, although not entirely unexpected.

First of all, we all know driving in the snow is not easy. We get poor visibility and slippery roads, and that seems to make any car feel like it’s got a mind of its own. And things are not easy for vehicles that actually do have a mind of their own either, like FSD-equipped Teslas.

The clip you’re about to watch is some 12 minutes long, but it’s worth every second, not because it has any kind of cinematographic value (not even on account of Arnie’s shadow dangling over it), but because it might teach others, including the ones that trust FSD with pretty much everything, how unreliable the system is in certain conditions.

You’re about the experience a Tesla that often picks the wrong lane (and that’s understandable, given how not much of the road is visible), tends to turn left or right when there’s no need to (as it tries to again pick the wrong lane) and has some of its features disabled from time to time. The car misses turns, goes into curbs too fast for comfort, and even loses track of its destination. More than once, the driver has to step in and disengage the FSD as he tries to mitigate the dangerous situations the car gets itself into.

For reference, we’ll tell you the Tesla is running FSD Beta 10.69.25 and has the full Holiday Update installed.

Tesla is frequently praised for having the world's most reliable and extensive fast-charging network. Not long ago, it was also cherished by its service level, comparable at the time to that offered by Lexus, BMW, and other premium brands. When sales volumes increased, service quality vanished. The same is happening with the Supercharging network, which sounds a critical alarm for all EV advocates.


Reports of jammed Supercharging stations first emerged in the U.S. after Thanksgiving in 2019. Either Tesla has solved that with more stations, or its customers just got used to the queues and gave up complaining. Another possibility is that they decided never to travel further on a single day than the full range of their cars would allow – at least during holidays. Stopping somewhere with a regular charger and waiting until the following day could be a way to try to prevent such issues. Eventually, that will also not be enough – at least if we are talking about hotels. Chargers in these places will eventually not suffice either.

As far as I know, Australia and the United Kingdom have never faced massive queues at Superchargers before, so they were not prepared to deal with that. The sad note is that it was predictable: when Teslas get more popular anywhere, Service Centers are the first evidence that the infrastructure to deal with them is insufficient. Superchargers are the second one, which becomes obvious on national holidays.

In these situations, there are just too many cars for the few fast chargers available. To make matters worse, each Supercharger may take (on average) around 40 minutes to deliver 80% of the charge (the recommended one). Anything above that limit will take a lot more time and may stress the battery pack beyond what the fast charging process already imposes.

According to The Telegraph, drivers were facing queues of around three hours (180 minutes) on Christmas in several spots in the UK. The British newspaper mentioned Cumbria, Hertfordshire, Telford, and Westmorland. Metro added Manchester to the list.

The Telegraph checked the “Tesla Owners Club UK” Facebook group and discovered plenty of people furious at the EV maker. One of the members wrote they were at the Tebay Southbound Supercharger in Cumbria for one hour. With 15 cars ahead, this person estimated waiting two more hours at the very least. Another one complained about having their family in the car for two hours. Comparing the situation to a bedlam, Jamie Waters said on Twitter he had to wait two hours and thirty minutes to fast charge his car. He said it was the worst journey he had ever had since buying the EV and took a picture to show the 40 cars waiting for juice.

In Australia, the local edition of the Daily Mail said there were long lines to use Superchargers in Wodonga, on the border of Victoria and New South Wales (NSW). Phil Williams shared the situation on Twitter. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s (ABC) chief foreign correspondent said the stalls were “overwhelmed with wait times around 90 mins.” His post and video led another Twitter user to demonstrate how things were the same in Coffs Harbour, NSW. JohnW shared two pictures of the long line of cars waiting for a fast charge there.

ABC’s chief correspondent took that as an example that “basic EV infrastructure (is) failing to keep pace with demand.” He then wrote that it is “time for some serious investment for the future.” Whether he knows that Tesla owns the Supercharging network or not is not clear, but this specific request for an infrastructure improvement is directed more at the EV maker and other private businesses than at the Australian government.

All fast-charging networks I’m aware of were created by companies: Electrify America (EA), EVgo, ChargePoint, Ionity… You name it. Governments may create low-speed public charging networks, but they are not convenient for road trips. Besides, they will never be enough even for those accepting long charging times: taxpayers’ money has more urgent applications.

Tesla cars adopt CCS2 chargers in Australia and the UK – like most other EVs. Although these drivers could go anywhere to get fast charging, they preferred to use the Supercharging network. American Tesla customers can only go to different fast chargers with adapters. That makes the queues seen in both countries even more concerning than those in the U.S. for electric car owners in general. Summing up, all Tesla owners in Australia and the UK have the option to charge elsewhere. Only a few in the U.S. can do the same. And that will get worse.

Tesla is after government incentives, which is leading it to make Supercharging stations public. Any EV driver will manage to charge their cars at Tesla’s network. If the EV maker’s current customers are already enough to crowd Superchargers, you can imagine how that will be when these stalls can receive vehicles from other companies.

Now think about what will happen when more battery electric cars reach the market or become mainstream because governments want combustion engines to be banned. Those lines will be way worse if the number of fast chargers does not expand exponentially. Even if it does, remember how much time people will take to recharge the battery packs in their cars. It is far from being as quick as a fuel pump or a hydrogen dispenser.

Some will argue that all we need are high-speed chargers, such as the one NIO presented at NIO Day 2022: it can deliver 500 kW. Most EVs are not able to take that much charge, so they will occupy these stalls for longer than a car that can deal with that full charging speed. That will generate conflict between EV owners in a hurry. And I will not even mention the energy demand any station with a few of these chargers would require.

What happens when people return to their routines and do not need so many fast chargers? Who will pay to keep them operating if the demand is not steady? Let’s suppose the number of fast chargers is enough for summer trip demands. What will happen in the winter, when some BEVs may lose half of their regular ranges due to heating needs and other situations related to cold weather? We would need twice as many fast chargers as the necessary ones in the summer. Demand would also drop to half for these stations in hot weather. Would they remain financially viable?

Tesla here is just the first indicator of where the automotive industry is heading for adopting its business model, with vehicles running on massive battery packs and counting on fast charging to be comparable to ICE cars. The EV maker only became profitable after creating the Model 3. Ironically, it is also the vehicle that ruined the company’s reputation for excellent services. Build quality was always poor, but people were more forgiving due to the advantages Tesla offered. These benefits are getting diluted by Tesla’s high production goals: there are not enough Service Centers and enough Superchargers to deal with them.

What will happen when Volkswagen pumps millions of BEVs into the streets? What about Hyundai, Kia, BYD, and several other companies pursuing the same goal? Will there be enough fast chargers for them all to make road trips on holidays or even when EVs are mainstream? Will all new buyers know that rapid charging reduces the battery pack lifespan? Will they accept that?

Once again, we have a perfect example of why it is necessary to ask: “What if we are wrong about EVs?” Combining mass production with vehicles fed by large battery packs will lead to multiple other similar situations that may hurt EV adoption in the long run. Just check the comments related to these reports about jammed Supercharging stations. You will not have to search for long before finding someone asking why we don’t simply keep combustion-engined cars. That is precisely what EV advocates don’t want to happen. They know people have to crave electric vehicles if the idea is to sell them like hotcakes.

Several countries around the world tell a tale that fits this moment of the electric shift quite well. Guerrillas were established to take power and create dictatorships of the proletariat. That threat led to military coups and dictatorships with opposite ideas for decades. They lasted because most of the population supported the military rulers against communists. Surprisingly, the guerrilleros did not care about that.

Their sense of moral superiority kept them fighting because they thought populations did not know what they truly wanted. In other words, the guerrilla was there to enlighten the inhabitants of their countries. Familiar, right?

Carbon neutrality is necessary, and fossil fuels will eventually end. Combustion engines are fascinating, but highly inefficient machines that will generate pollutants even if they burn hydrogen. The deal is retiring them with a model that makes more sense than what they are replacing. Turning EVs into a moral virtue will not work with most car buyers: they just want to go places independently and conveniently. Making them get stuck one hour or more for something as trivial as “refueling” or convincing them it is not a big deal to wait will not help.

Turning EVs into a moral virtue will not work with most car buyers: they just want to go places independently and conveniently. Making them get stuck one hour or more for something as trivial as “refueling” or convincing them it is not a big deal to wait will not help.

Tesla decided to allow its Model S and Model X customers to choose the round steering wheel after over a year of getting the customers' feedback on the stalkless yoke. The carmaker went even further by setting the normal-shaped steering wheel as the default option. If you want the yoke, you’ll have to make sure it is checked before finishing your build.
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If you are planning on buying a new Tesla Model S or Model X, then you might be happy to learn that the yoke is not mandatory anymore. The EV maker kept the curiously shaped steering wheel for around a year as the sole option. After more customer feedback, Tesla may have decided to give those who don’t run a YouTube channel a solution – the round steering wheel. Which, curiously enough, was only available on the Model 3 and Model Y during 2022.

Now, buyers of the new Model S and Model X can decide what their car will come equipped with. And they can do so at no extra cost! But Tesla still presents yoke steering as the gateway to the “ultimate focus on driving.” And that’s not good news for those who wanted a normal helm for their all-electric vehicles.

The automaker added the round steering wheel but from what its website pictures show, the stalks are not present. This tells us that a couple of important controls like putting the vehicle in Drive will still be done through the main screen or the touch control “PRND” panel found just below the wireless charging area. Similarly, indicating might not be possible through a stalk installed on the left side of the steering column, but by pressing a button or a touch-sensitive area with haptic feedback located on the steering wheel.

However, since the images are not showing all the extra details, we must wait. Maybe Tesla has a brand-new workaround for the classic car-controlling interface. After all, the brand decided to force the yoke on its customers and reverted to this decision only after discovering that not that many are happy about having half a rectangle to drive with.

At the same time, if Tesla is going forward with the stalkless experience, it might apply the same strategy to the upcoming Model 3 and Model Y. The brand’s cheaper models may also lose the physical controls for choosing direction and indicating.

Finally, get ready to have your long beams and flashing shortcut on the steering wheel or, who knows, activatable by voice command. Also, can you imagine telling your car to honk briefly at the person in front of you? This might just become a thing for the automaker that tries to simplify everything through its minimalist in-cabin design approach. But let’s wait and see what the world’s most well-known EV maker has in store for its customers.

We have reported at length recently about how critical the nature of lithium supply is to electric vehicle manufacturing, where the average car requires up to 8 kgs (17.63 lbs.) of the soft yellow metal known as 'yellow gold' for its batteries.
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In fact, back in September, we reported here on autoevolution about how Elon Musk and company were looking to go into the refining of lithium on U.S. soil in response to mandates in the recently passed Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). The mandates address the percentage of raw mineral content within an electric vehicle's battery required to qualify for federal tax incentives for EV buyers.

Now it appears that it is all-systems-go as signs along the roadside of a Corpus Christi, Texas, site have been erected, indicating a large construction project was underway. It appears the application Musk filed back in August seeking permission to construct a battery-grade lithium hydroxide facility with the state of Texas' Comptrollers Office has been approved.

Twitter sleuth @fungineer43/ based in Corpus Christi, visited the proposed site in mid-November of 2022 and saw no sign of construction but did note the land had been cleared of buildings and other debris and appeared to be graded.

In recent days, @fungineer43 returned to the site where Tesla was rumored to be building the first-ever of its kind lithium refining facility on U.S. soil and saw that the dirt road alongside the property had been covered in gravel and most significantly, a sign has now been posted announcing that Tesla will be constructing a lithium refinery on the site.

In November, Tesla begin recruiting for Area Superintendant and Area Construction Manager for the construction of the facility expected to produce materials for use in the production of Tesla's 4680 battery cells. The $375 million facility is expected to be operational by Q4 of 2024.

This may be the most significant news to come along in quite some time with regard to battery production for electric vehicles manufactured in the U.S. Given what has transpired over the last several years in automotive manufacturing, that is a mouthful.

First and foremost, it signifies that the industry can negotiate complicated U.S. Regulatory laws that pertain to the environment and come out on top. One can never count out Musk and company after the group did a major song and dance to be permitted to manufacture EVs in the People's Republic of China and received a plethora of tax breaks as icing on the cake.

Secondly, once it begins producing battery-grade lithium, prices will begin to stabilize (possibly drop), and a shorter supply chain for the vital metal will be established.

A lithium refinery in the U.S. must also be good news for the plethora of automotive and battery companies who have or plan to have battery production facilities on U.S. soil as it means they will possibly have a domestic source of lithium close to home.

If we know anything about Elon Musk, we could very well see him supplying other battery manufactures as another stream of income.