Tesla’s first Gigafactory officially opened on July 29 of this year, but it’s far from finished – only three of the planned total 21 Gigafactory “blocks” were ready to go then, and Tesla has been busy building more of those blocks since, with a target final physical footprint that will dwarf all other buildings in the world once completed.
At full capacity, the Gigafactory should have the ability to produce more lithium-ion batteries per year than were made by all companies combined during 2013, according to Tesla, and it should reach that output capability sometime in 2018.
For now, though, you can check out the progress, with construction currently resulting in a factory that’s around 30 percent of the size that it’ll be when it’s complete, if all proceeds according to plan. Given the size it is now, that’s a pretty mind-boggling proposition.