French Government Talks EV Economic Incentives With Elon Musk

France is exploring numerous ways to make itself more ecologically friendly, including investing in cycling, increasing its solar infrastructure and banning short-haul flights. That isn’t the only way that it’s looking to embrace green technology, however. If a meeting between French president Emmanuel Macron and Tesla CEO Elon Musk is any indication, the Macron administration is also invested in the idea that France could be a producer as well as a consumer of zero-emissions vehicles.

Bloomberg and Reuters (the latter via Autoblog) reported on the meeting between the two men, which took place as part of this year’s Choose France Summit. This annual event began in 2018, and is now — as per a government website — “the flagship event for France’s economic attractiveness.”

According to Reuters’s reporting, Bruno Le Maire — France’s Finance Minister — is set to discuss possible tax credits with Musk should he open a facility somewhere in the country. At present, Tesla has one gigafactory in Europe, a facility located near Berlin which opened in 2022.

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Tesla isn’t the only EV-related company that Macron is presently courting with economic incentives. Late last week, the Taiwanese battery company Prologium announced that it would build a factory — its first in Europe — in Dunkirk. According to reports, the company plans to invest $5.7 billion between now and 2030. As per Reuters’s reporting, another plant — this one building battery components — was also announced for the same region.