Chemical reactions, unlike silicon chips, are unmoved by Moore’s Law. That’s why battery improvement is frustratingly slow. Perhaps Elon Musk’s gigafactory in the Reno desert will move the stubborn arrow somewhat.

The Nevada city has its own reasons for going into business with the Tesla founder. Famous for its boom-or-bust cycles and caught up in the latter end of that bargain since the collapse of the housing market, Reno is hoping to become a Silicon Valley outpost, using taxes to subsidize the factory at the rate of $190,000 per job it will create. It’s yet another gamble in the city’s history of wagers. From Jonathan O’Connell at the Washington Post:

The Tesla deal is one of the nation’s top economic development prizes in a decade. In Nevada, one lawmaker told Reuters, it’s the “biggest thing” going “since at least the Hoover Dam.” Gov. Brian Sandoval (R) and state lawmakers project that over 20 years it will create 20,000 jobs and generate $100 billion for the state, which suffered in the recession.

But the agreement also comes at a time when economists and academics are questioning the wisdom of making big-ticket bets on single companies.

For all the promises of jobs and growth, Tesla’s founder, Elon Musk, says the company isn’t likely to be profitable until 2020, when he hopes to sell 500,000 cars a year. Tesla reported last week that it sold a record 10,030 cars in the first quarter.

The match of America’s buzzy electric carmaker with a town whose best-known industry features weathered casinos would be less stark if Northern Nevada was already a hotbed of engineering or advanced manufacturing.

It is not. …

Reno’s biography is one of booms and busts: silver-mining in the 1850s, divorces a half-century later, casinos beginning in the 1930s and housing during the real estate bubble, fueled by cheap land and easy mortgages.

Nevada was dragged low by the housing crash and recession, leading to an unemployment rate of 13.7 percent late in 2010, four points above the national average. As of January it still had the highest joblessness rate of any state, at 7.1 percent.

The arrival of the stock market darling has created optimism among locals that Reno could be an outpost of Silicon Valley, anchored by Lake Tahoe and the Burning Man festival. The median price of a single-family home is one-third that of the Bay Area. It boasts more than 300 days of sunshine, and locals brag about hitting the slopes nearby 30 minutes after work. Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak recently tweeted about his ride through the mountains to Reno — in a Tesla, of course.•