That's a straw man argument that misrepresents the claim, the claim was, exactly:
"Arianna, If Ive learned anything these last few years launching Model X,being in Production and now being in Service as Model 3 is landing, is that in order to advance the world to sustainable energy, our behavior isn’t irrational, it’s almost an operational requirement."
Tesla EVs are an important step to convert energy production and consumption to sustainable sources: a very large chunk of the planet's carbon footprint comes from vehicles burning fossil fuels and from power plants burning coal and natural gas.
Tesla is working on an all-around sustainable solution to that:
- Tesla solar cell installations to generate electricity for your home,
- Tesla PowerWall to store your solar energy during the day,
- A Tesla car to use that electricity
Such a complete, all-around, sustainable solution replaces all carbon polluting sources I mentioned: the gas burning vehicles, the coal and natural gas burning power plants.
Building Tesla cars is key to that strategy of long term sustainability: the high volume of battery cells manufactured for cars helps ramp up the volume for Tesla Energy products that will transform the whole chain to sustainable. Tesla, in their Q2 conference call, estimated that their Energy business division to generate higher revenue in a couple of years than their automotive segment.
The only thing "ludicrous" about Teslas is their launch mode.