Tesla Inc. halted some development work at its German plant mission after failing to make a safety deposit with native authorities.

Brandenburg’s setting ministry stopped tree removing exercise and the set up of paint-shop equipment on the web site till the funds are acquired, a spokeswoman for the ministry mentioned Friday, declining to remark additional.

Tesla wants to offer a 100 million-euro ($122 million) deposit with native authorities to cowl the price of tearing down the manufacturing unit if the mission doesn’t obtain closing approval, Berlin’s Tagesspiegel newspaper reported earlier. Having missed a Thursday deadline, the U.S. carmaker now has till Jan. 4 to give you the funds, or danger having preliminary approvals revoked, the each day mentioned.

Any main delays could be a blow for Tesla’s bold timetable to have its first European manufacturing unit up and operating by the center of subsequent yr. The corporate plans to ultimately produce as many as 500,000 vehicles yearly on the web site, posing a critical problem to German rivals Volkswagen Group, Daimler and BMW.

Individually, a neighborhood court docket on Friday dominated that Tesla should cut back tree-clearing on the web site, siding partly with environmental teams who had complained the corporate isn’t doing sufficient to guard native wildlife. Any logging close to railroad tracks near the plant would seemingly kill sand lizards hibernating there, the Berlin-Brandenburg OVG court docket mentioned in an emailed assertion.

The court docket mentioned it could not forestall Tesla from resuming work on most different elements of the 205-acre plot as a result of the environmental teams didn’t current adequate proof wildlife habitat is endangered in these areas.