China is a global lead in renewable energy and electric vehicles，Elon Musk says

“Few seem to realize that China is leading the world in renewable energy generation and electric vehicles. Whatever you may think of China, this is simply a fact,” Elon Musk said in a post on Twitter on Monday. 

Musk made the comment after retweeting a post that showed the top 15 nations by installed wind power capacity, with China ranking first, followed by the U.S. and Germany.

The post was then translated into Chinese and posted on Musk’s official Weibo account. Weibo is a Twitter-like social media platform in China.

This is not the first time Musk has spoken highly of China. In mid-May, the Tesla owner also praised Shanghai Gigafactory workers for their long working hours. 

“There is just a lot of super talented hardworking people in China who strongly believe in the manufacturing,” the billionaire said during the ‘Financial Times Future of the Car’ summit, “They won’t just be burning the midnight oil, they will be burning the 3 am oil, they won’t even leave the factory type of thing, whereas in America people are trying to avoid going to work at all.”

Musk’s comment comes as Tesla’s massive Shanghai Gigafactory pushes its workers to the limit to meet production targets amid an ongoing pandemic lockdown.

Founded in 2018, Tesla’s Shanghai Gigafactory is the first wholly foreign-owned automobile manufacturing plant. It produced 484,000 automobiles in 2021, accounting for 51.7% of total deliveries last year. According to Tesla’s website on May 3, the output of Giga Shanghai was 20% higher than that of Fremont.

Tesla said it plans to expand the factory in Shanghai to make it “the world’s largest auto export center” and to meet demand from Europe.

Tesla’s 2022 environmental assessment shows that the automaker plans to expand its Shanghai factory workforce by developing a “new model” production line, bringing the plant’s total workforce to around 19,000.