Tesla and Syrah Extend Graphite Deal Deadline Amid DOE Review

l needs US Department of Energy approval. Meanwhile, Tesla can still exit if the material doesn’t meet technical specs by February 9, keeping pressure on Vidalia’s ramp-up and the project’s funding story. Why should I care? For markets: Execution risk beats the reshoring story. US-made battery inputs sound great, but quality and timing are what move stocks. Syrah fell even as a broader mining sub-index rose, a sign investors see this as company-specific risk rather than a commodity swing. Tesla is also Vidalia’s credibility anchor, so every delay supports hope of future revenue but extends uncertainty over volumes, margins, and financing. The bigger picture: Building non-China battery supply chains takes time. China still dominates anode processing, so Vidalia is meant to be a rare large-scale alternative. That also means it has to prove it can hit top automaker specs reliably and at scale – which is harder than signing an offtake agreement. The repeated extensions, plus the need for DOE sign-off, are a reminder that supply-chain “onshoring” is a multi-year engineering and qualification process, not a quick policy win.