Tonight’s the Night: Tesla’s Gigafactory 1 Launch Party

Tonight Tesla Motors will unveil its two-years-in-the-making, larger-than-life, 10-million-square-feet Gigafactory at a grand opening party. While the exclusive guest list is limited to Tesla employees, important shareholders, and local government officials, the rest of the world can get a glimpse of the giga-sized spectacle via a live broadcast on tesla.com.

Gigafactory 1 is located in the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center of Storey County, Nevada. The largest industrial structure on earth, the Gigafactory is Tesla’s battery manufacturing plant — in the words of CEO Elon Musk, “the machine that builds the machine.” The factory is expected to deliver its first batch of battery cells by the end of this year, with the goal of creating 100 gigawatt hours of batteries by 2020. To put that in perspective, this volume of battery power is sufficient to power 1.2 milion Model S sedans, helping Tesla Motors meet its goal of producing 500,000 cars annually by 2018.

To power Tesla’ new Model 3 cars, the Gigafactory is also producing a special type of battery called 2017 — the (iconic, Musk hopes) year the Model 3 is scheduled to be delivered.