New tonight at 6 as the country
continues going green with a
focus on renewable energy.
Buffalo was supposed to be at the
forefront with that massive solar
manufacturing plant at Riverbend.
Then Governor Andrew Cuomo pitched
it as a game changer with the
guarantee of more than 1000 jobs
making solar panels and products.
The price tag was pretty
staggering and we've reported on
the many issues along the way.
Our partners at investigative post
have been on this from day one and JL.
Shoemaker has tonight's eye
opening update on what's really
happening inside that plant.
This was literally a dream come true.
10 years ago, Governor Andrew Cuomo
pledged to build a plant in South Buffalo
that would seat a whole new industrial
sector centered on clean energy.
Today, the largest solar manufacturer
in the United States with the best
technology to save the planet.
Jobs at this Tesla factory on South Park Ave.
producing solar panels became
the centerpiece of Cuomo's plan.
The state spent a huge amount of money,
959. Billion dollars to
build and equip the factory.
In exchange, the company promised
1460 jobs good paying, high tech
jobs manufacturing solar panels.
Today, only 300 to 400 of those jobs
involve solar production, and Tesla
shut down its solar work altogether
last year for at least six months.
Those changes raised big questions,
which we wanted to pose to
state and company officials.
Both refused a request for
interviews but documents.
We obtained through the Freedom
of Information law turned up a
report from last February in
which Tesla said it had shut down
solar production at the factory.
A current Tesla employee who spoke to
us anonymously to protect his job said
solar production has started back up,
but it's only a fraction
of what was promised.
Another Tesla employee is speaking out.
I don't believe that the solar
manufacturing that was promised
in New York is being executed
as planned or as promised.
Tesla partnered with.
Panasonic, which produced solar cells
that Tesla used to make solar roofs.
But Tesla CEO Elon Musk promoted
the solar roof design when it
was still in the concept stage.
It took a long time to work the bugs out,
and the company was never able
to produce the roofs at scale.
Another problem?
Two workers told investigative post
that Tesla didn't like the color of
the solar cells produced by Panasonic.
I think the appearance was
a big sticking point.
They wanted these roof tiles
to look uniformly.
Black like you have a black
roof on your house,
and I think the Panasonic cells,
if you look at them,
they kind of have a semi
iridescent bluish greenish color.
Tesla decided to import its solar
components from China rather
than buy them from Panasonic.
With that loss of business,
Panasonic pulled out of Buffalo
in the summer of 2020,
shifting 400 jobs to Malaysia.
Production issues at the factory
prompted the state to jettison
several $100 million in equipment
bought in part with taxpayer dollars.
The state has amended its contract
with Tesla no fewer than a dozen times,
making concessions and lowering
manufacturing job goals.
Those amendments show the state new
Tesla was scaling back its solar work.
Tesla is meeting its job goals
by shifting to work related
to its electric cars.
Some workers make chargers,
others feed data to software used in
the company's self driving vehicles.
They're
strictly desk jobs.
The collapse of Tesla solar operation
means that there's been none of the
spinoff development envisioned by Cuomo
fields. Across the road from the
Tesla plant remained vacant.
So does the office building
built across the street from the
plants entrance. Save of course
for a Tim horton's.
Buffalo definitely got
sold a bill of goods.
It was a sort of waste of its time.
I guess there are.
It's technically say that
there are about 1500 jobs that
might not be there otherwise,
but I'd say that Buffalo probably
could have invested a billion
dollars more effectively.
All of this calls into question
the billion dollar promise.
To the taxpayers of New York,
for Channel 2 News, I'm Jay Dale
Shoemaker with investigative post.
Jay Dale, thank you.
And you can read more about all of this
right now at investigativepost.org.
We have about 3 1/2 minutes of TV time there,
but there is a lot to this story,
so make sure to check that out.