A second cargo ship from China is on its way to Canada loaded with Tesla Model 3 and Model Y cars built at Giga Shanghai. The second shipment comes after Tesla recently updated their Design Studio to indicate several variants of each vehicle were going to be imported from China.
Ever since Tesla started delivering cars in Canada they have always come from the automaker’s Fremont factory in California. However, with attractive financial incentives created through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), Tesla has changed their strategy to keep more of their cars made in North America for US customers.
The first sign of this change came last month when Tesla introduced a new Rear-Wheel Drive (RWD) variant of the Model Y in Canada, making it and the Long Range variant eligible for the $5,000 federal rebate. That was followed shortly thereafter with some changes to the specs of the Model Y Performance to also indicate it was going to be coming from China.
Although Tesla hasn’t officially announced it, and CEO Elon Musk even called an earlier report about Giga Shanghai exports coming to Canada soon as false, the first ship with made-in-China Model 3 and Model Y cars arrived in Canada over the weekend. Here is a photo of all of the new cars at a holding lot in Richmond, BC after being offloaded from the cargo ship Caroline.
Now Tesla has loaded up another cargo ship, and it is currently on its way to Vancouver. According to ship manifest records from VesselFinder, the Viking Sea departed from Shanghai on Sunday and is scheduled to arrive in Vancouver on June 3, 2023.
With the first shipment already in Vancouver, and the second ship’s arrival date scheduled for early June in Vancouver, we should expect to see many customers in BC with estimated delivery dates in early June being assigned VINs soon. The cars will also have to be transported by rail to other parts of Canada, meaning customers with mid to late June delivery dates and later east of BC should be seeing updates soon as well.
Do you have a Model 3 RWD, Model Y RWD, or Model Y Performance on order? Let us know when you receive a VIN (Chinese VINs begin with LRW) in the comments below, or reach out to us at tips@driveteslacanada.ca
