Tesla Inc got an agreement of the U.S. Commerce Department on company’s request of waiving 10 percent levy imposed on import of aluminum from Japan to be used in manufacturing battery cells at its Nevada Gigafactory, consent showed in the government department.
In April, the Palo Alto, California-based company submitted the documents with the Commerce Department requesting it to waive the import tariff on 10,000 tonnes of aluminum annually as the product is produced by the Nippon Light Metal Co Ltd, a Japanese multinational public industrial holding company that through its subsidiaries is mainly engaged in the manufacture and sale of aluminum and chemical products.
In its June 5, 2019 document, recently posted on a government website, Commerce Department considering the non sufficient production and availability of ample amount of aluminum in the United States up to a quality to the satisfaction of the local manufacturers, allowed the waiver which will be effective for a period of one year.
The battery cells assembled in form of packs are the of the significant importance not only for the Model 3 electric cars of Tesla but also for the products used to store energy, as said the company in its request document, adding that the Tesla is the sole manufacturer of such battery cells in the United States, production of which is planned to be exponentially increasing over the next few years.
Tesla’s request for tariff exclusion, to which no objections were filled even by any of the local aluminum manufacturers, also specified not only the different thickness and width of aluminum sheets but also stated that the domestic manufacturers in the United States are not in a position to meet the criterion of product’s thickness or alloy composition as well as are also not able to meet the product’s annual demand.
