Electric car brand Polestar is drawn to Trollhättan
Welcome to Saab town! The electric car brand Polestar is drawn to Trollhättan. This is not at all surprising as the Chinese Geely Group, to which Polestar belongs, has long used the former Saab test facilities in the Stallbacka. Now the guest performance is becoming a permanent fixture. With test workshop and offices.
Even after Saab left, Trollhättan remained a development location for the automotive industry. A number of manufacturers have offices there, NEVS is and was a service provider for well-known companies. Not only Volvo and Koenigsegg or Jaguar - Land Rover are guests in the Stallbacka. The entire Geely Group is also very active – which is no wonder. Because at Geely, more engineers work with Saab history than at NEVS.
Polestar has now opened a permanent branch in Trollhättan. The innovative electric car brand is a tenant in the Innovatum complex on Göta Älv, within earshot of the Saab Museum. Polestar has now rented 700 square meters of office space and a 500 square meter test workshop. 20 employees, most of whom live in Trollhättan, work there.
Polestar uses the field office for development and testing activities. The Stallbacka with wind tunnel and test facilities is not far, the Saab test track at the factory allows work without being disturbed by strangers. Good news for Trollhättan, because the location will be further strengthened. David Ekholm, who manages the branch office for Polestar, referred to the high automotive competence on site, which lives on after the Saab time and made the choice easy.
Featuring visuals from Polestar
I am pleased for Trollcity that the rooms are still being used in an innovative way.
When you look at the platform made in this way, you realize how much good energy and how many valuable raw materials are being used. When will society and politics notice that everything that doesn't have to be produced with a lot of effort is the real environmental protector?
Cars that are 20 years plus and in top condition should also be promoted! Obviously nobody wants that. Keep producing and consuming happily. Well, if you compare this pointless activity in the Ukraine and consider the amount of energy and material that is wasted there, you can actually still produce thousands of new cars. We humans will probably never figure it out.
Unfortunately that is the truth. We put a lot of effort into producing something new that is a little more effective. But they lose sight of the true costs and effort.
A real rethinking does not generally take place, the word consumption renunciation is a taboo. Instead we worry about growth and our green ministers are buying oil and gas from the people who months ago were taboo to them. It's just crazy.
We humans & the series
platform, ukraine and can we get it fixed? That's an interesting chain of associations...
A few weeks ago I wouldn't have understood a word of it and dismissed your comment as incoherent drivel. But a few weeks ago was a long time ago...
It's true. It's all connected. The war in Ukraine is amazingly effective far beyond the country's borders, revealing global dependencies and how incredibly fragile our economy is.
You quickly get to the big picture – including consumption and the environment. It's completely crazy what's going on in politics (including NGOs), lobbies and the media.
In every crisis there is also an opportunity. And everyone grabs them, drives their favorite sow through the village. Terrible!
And everyone has THE solution - from A, like armament or nuclear energy, to Z, like pie in the sky. Everything from A to Z. Pork, Canola Oil, Beef, Coal, EVs, Tofu, Pinwheels, Conscription, Peas, Beans and Lentils...
Currently you can declare everything possible and impossible as THE solution or THE devil's stuff. And everyone does it and old, sometimes very personal accounts are reopened. For example, when a CDU chairman emphasizes three times in a talk that he was not in the Bundestag when conscription was suspended and had always been against it.
But now I'm rambling and rambling. Yes, your point (valid and correct) was that there are alternatives to this. I feel the same way. For every sow we drive through the village, there are alternatives. And be it a certain renunciation of consumption. Probably not the worst solution for people and the environment.
It is also fascinating how high the standard of living and at the same time self-sufficient we once were. In a country as small (in terms of population) as Sweden, there used to be (almost) everything. Airplanes, cars, radios, stoves, refrigerators, whatever...
But I also know this independence from Germany and my own lifespan. At my grandfather's, I pet rabbits, fed them kitchen waste (e.g. potato skins) and then ate them. The meat was completely CO2-neutral and 101% independent of the world market and world events. And also from the tax office or the Ministry of Economic Affairs. Maybe that's why the model had no future?
Repair and maintenance of technology (e.g. a car) are also undesirable. So much more is possible, fiscally and economically. The new car every few years is the bench mark. And according to current beliefs, a kilo of soy that has to go to a tofu factory around the world emits less CO2 than the egg of a hen that feeds on a few worms in its own garden and bypasses customs and the tax office generated added value.
Whoever believes this will be saved....
Thank you Volaab, very well formulated and to the point! I can identify with it 100%, including the rabbits.
Good news for Trollhätten
I'm happy for this likeable city if it remains economically active in the automotive sector and remains attractive as a location. What is still missing is a production...
The good news is good news, but it's also kind of a reminder of what's missing. I therefore read this with mixed feelings – although it is of course good news …
Well, maybe the locks and the canal will someday and somehow be used as intensively as the wind tunnel?
That (troll-) would have something.
Well, maybe someone accidentally relabels the Polestar 1 as Sonett or aerox 😉