Suggestion for Tesla to accelerate their trajectory for reducing carbon emissions

[MitchJi]

Hi,

—————— —————— information not in the email to Tesla starts here —————— ——————
I sent a slightly different version of the information contained in this post, via email to Tesla’s Investor Relations with no response.

Information not contained in the email to Tesla starts here:
The reasons I’m posting this here are:

1. I believe that if Elon/Tesla decide to implement this suggestion that will lead to a huge reduction in carbon emissions.

2. I believe that if Elon/Tesla know about this suggestion there is a good chance that they will decide to do it.

3. I don’t know how to make sure that that Elon/Tesla have received a suggestion from me.

4. The best way to make this happen would be for potential investors to contact Elon/Tesla.

I'm hoping that posting this here will accomplish numbers 3 and 4. If a bunch of responses will help, please do it!

Tesla is currently working on plans to build their second Gigafactory in Europe. Elon Musk says that we need 100 Gigafactories world wide, which at $5-10 billion each is a potential .5-1 trillion dollar investment opportunity. I believe that if Elon had access to the necessary capital he would build as many of the 100 Gigafactories as he can.
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I have a suggestion, that if Tesla decides to implement it wIll greatly accelerate your trajectory for making a positive impact on the environment. I believe that before Tesla decides to do this the suggestion would need to be considered by at least Elon, JB Straubel and Jason Wheeler?

Please let me know if I should continue to contact people and organizations to make sure that the decision makers at Tesla are aware of this idea.


Unless you inform me that in your opinion these are bad ideas, or that it isn't necessary my next steps are going to be to send similar information to people and organizations that could either invest themselves or be able to solicit investors. I will probably post this suggestion (intended as a suggestion for Tesla) on the TMC forums:

Background:
Quotes from the Leonardo Dicaprio’s movie, "Before the Flood":

All that we witnessed on this journey shows us that our world's climate is incredibly interconnected and that it is at an urgent breaking point.

What's incredibly terrifying is that things are happening way ahead of the scientific projections, of 15 or 20 years ago.

And:

According to Musk, it would take just 100 Gigafactories [for the entire world]. But Tesla can’t build them all; Musk called for large companies in China, Europe, and the United States to “do the same thing” and build factories to make the batteries for storing renewable energy.

Elon Musk: If all the big companies do this then we can accelerate the transition and if governments can set the rules in favor of sustainable energy, then we can get there really quickly. But it’s really fundamental: unless they put a price on carbon....

Problems:
It seems clear to me that the strategy of waiting for "all the big companies to do the same thing" and "governments to set the rules in favor of sustainable energy” will work eventually, but given the urgency of the problem not nearly quickly enough.

No other company is committed to doing this, and even if they wanted to tackle this problem nobody else is equipped to do it. The problem is bigger than making a sufficient quantity of batteries. The problem is making a sufficient quantity of compellingly priced high quality batteries. Nobody else is even close to matching Tesla on price and quality. If this is going to be accomplished in time to avoid a series of epic environmental catastrophes I believe that Tesla needs to play a much bigger role than Elon currently envisions.

Tesla Powerwall 2 has no competition – comparison with LG Resu and SonnenBatterie

<snip>
In order to get a better idea of how disruptive the new Powerwall 2 can be, we compared it with some of the other important residential home battery pack solutions.
<snip>
It will be very difficult for anyone to justify buying anything else than the Powerwall when for the same price or less, you can get at least twice the energy capacity.

Similar price advantage with the Powerpack (Tesla Powerpack), sized for utility use (Energy Capacity 210 kWh (AC)).

Suggestion:
I believe that Elon-Tesla could help produce the required changes much more quickly, by providing a compelling way for individual investors, governments and other investors including municipalities and pension funds, to invest in Gigafactories for batteries, vehicle factories, and Solar Panels and Solar Tiles, that would be built and managed by Tesla.

There are a very large number of investors who want to use their investments to help the environment and/or produce jobs and earn a reliable income. Tesla has done an amazingly good job of producing compelling products. I’m sure, that if you set out to accomplish this, you can provide a equally compelling way for investors to participate.

You could start by targeting entities that have divested a total of $5 trillion, (sufficient for 500 10 billion dollar Gigafactories). If you can structure an investment so that there is a good chance of earning something like 10-15% I think you could get a significant number of them to invest. Solarcity probably already has employees who are experts at doing exactly that. If you only obtain commitments for one or a small handful Gigafactories (I believe that you could do much better than that), even that few a number would really accelerate your trajectory for making a huge positive impact on the environment.

"You Are Hurting Future Generations": Mark Ruffalo's Message to People Profiting from Fossil Fuels | Democracy Now!

More than $5 trillion worth of investments are now pledged to be divested from fossil fuels. The analysis, issued Monday, details how nearly 700 institutions and nearly 60,000 individuals from across 76 nations have committed to divest their assets from the fossil fuel industry.

A government might prefer to have you sell batteries and/or solar panels at a discount to it’s citizens or local companies, instead of making a profit. In the documentary film series “Years of Living Dangerously” in the episode with information about India they show a small utility type of a solar site where they are installing solar panels made in the US. I believe that the Indian Government would want to (and Tesla would too!) help the poor gain access to affordable renewable electricity (about 300 million people in India don’t have any electricity). I’m sure that using Tesla's manufacturing techniques at a local factory you could make a profit and substantially reduce their costs.

For backup power in Delhi (averaging about six power outages per day) most large buildings use diesel generators. The movie also showed a small company providing rural micro-grids, charging poor people $2 per day for power that are using Lead batteries! For many small villages a small number of high quality Solar Panels and 1 or 2 Powerwalls would be life changing. Beyond improving the quality of life of millions of people one or more Gigafactories located in India would make a huge beneficial impact on the worlds climate.

Into the Light - Years Of Living Dangerously

David Letterman Goes to India

 

[daniel]

So if I understand your suggestion, it's that Tesla should convince other big companies, and big pension funds, to invest in Tesla for the purpose of building more battery factories, and should convince governments to subsidize solar power for their citizens.

The key word here is "convince."

Also, if I understand you correctly, you believe that such investments will be profitable, and therefore good for the investors.

The problem is that no investment is certain, and best practice is to diversify your investments. In hindsight there are companies which, had you put all your money into them at the start, would have made you rich. But there are far more companies which have failed, and had you put all your money in them you'd have been wiped out. Personally, I own some solar bonds from Solar City. I think they are a good investment. They finance the installation of photovoltaics on the roofs of the houses of people who could not otherwise afford the capital cost. But there's no way I'd put all my money in these bonds because there is always risk.

And that's the problem with your suggestion: Getting investors to hand over their money is a difficult task, because you have to convince them that the investment is both safe and profitable.

OTOH, as renewables become more economical, more people will buy them, and as the market for them increases, more companies will step up to meet that demand. The shift will not happen as fast as we'd like, but it is happening. Maybe it's already too late. If we magically cut carbon emissions to zero, world-wide today, global temperature would continue to rise for the next hundred years, just from the carbon that's already out there now.