As Elon Musk threatens to ditch California, is it a feasible idea?

Eccentric and controversial billionaire and Tesla Inc (NASDAQ: TSLA) CEO Elon Musk threatened to move the company’s headquarters out of California but he may find it physically impossible to do so.

‘The final straw’

Musk hoped a small portion of his factory workers would return to assembly lines and resume production of cars last Friday. But he was warned by the county’s government that doing so would be contrary to stay-at-home and sheltering orders.

Musk said in a May 9 Tweet the order to stay closed is “acting contrary to the Governor, the PResident, our Constitutional freedoms & just plain common sense!” He also said the decision to force the electric automaker to keep its doors closed “is the final straw” and Tesla will “now move its HQ and future programs to Texas/Nevada immediately.”

Talking about a 10 million square feet facility

It goes without saying that moving a 10 million square foot manufacturing facility across state borders is not an easy task, former Tesla Board member and California state controller Steve Westly said Monday on CNBC’s “Power Lunch.” Put in perspective, a typical Costco store is a mere 100,000 square feet in size which imply Tesla needs enough empty space to build the equivalent of 100 Costcos “side-by-side-by-side.”

In fact, Tesla’s manufacturing property was built from the ground up to be a one-of-a-kind state of the art facility that no automaker can match. It would be reasonable to assume such an engineering accomplishment would be difficult to recreate from scratch.

California is opening-up

Westly said the state of California is in the process of reopening and “most people” will be able to go back to work at the beginning of June. This begs the question if Musk has some ulterior motives beyond the economic fallout of waiting a few more short weeks to potentially reopen.

Meanwhile, rival automakers in Detroit have been given the green-light to resume their auto production and Musk is “anxious” to join them, The Wall Street Journal’s Tim Higgins also commented on the CNBC segment.

Musk could in theory shift resources to a state like Texas or Nevada over a long-term period. There have been success stories in the past, most notably Toyota relocated from Torrance, California to Plano, Texas in 2014.

Musk can save billions personally

There are no indications of Musk’s desire to move to Texas or Nevada are driven by personal financial motives, according to CNBC’s wealth expert Robert Frank. But, both states are among the few states with no state income tax so Musk can personally save billions of dollars in taxes.

Musk stands to gain more than $55 billion in bonuses and options if Tesla hits a series of targets, Frank wrote. So far, Musk is eligible to receive more than $780 million. If he stays in California, the tax bill on the $780 million bonus would be $104 million. But it drops all the way to zero if he moves to Texas or Nevada.