I think it is the other way around. He keeps trying to automate everything which just isn't possible at the moment.
Beginning of the end for Tesla & Musk ?
- Thread starter Minusorange
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We already did that with the Apollo program.
Hydrogen cells are not a new thing at all.
Theres not more money swishing about but its due to the birth of finacial products that allow you to buy cars at relatively low fix monthly payments i.e PCP and leases
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SPOT ON!
Capitalism can't exist other than by encouraging consumerism and enslaving people with "loans".
PCP, Subscription schemes, hiring this month's iPhone, etc., etc. are shining examples of this truism.
Where do you think hydrogen comes from?
Extracted from natural gas?
Yup it's mostly from fossil fuels, and uses plenty of energy to manufacture to boot. It's certainly no cleaner than electricity.
Given that modern battery cell technology has already put cars on the road that have sufficient range for most people, it's not a surprise that hydrogen cells aren't really a priority....although they no doubt will appear at some point to satisfy the edge cases that aren't served by batteries.
AFAIK the reason for the big tent in the car park is because the robots/automation etc.. he heavily invested in in the main factory kept breaking down.
Not true.
There is already a water splitter that can run 24\7 on the cheap to make Hydrogen.
And it runs at 82% efficiency. https://news.stanford.edu/news/2015/june/water-splitter-catalyst-062315.html
Soldato
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Honestly he should just sell Tesla to another firm that can actually mass produce it and drive costs down.
His efforts really need to be in Space-X
His efforts really need to be in Space-X
Caporegime
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Why? If they are both passion projects.
Soldato
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because one is losing him money and the other is actually working?
Even if you offset one with the other its clear Tesla has some deep rooted issues that I doubt will ever be solved under Elon's lead and the competition in the car industry is catching up fast.
Even if you offset one with the other its clear Tesla has some deep rooted issues that I doubt will ever be solved under Elon's lead and the competition in the car industry is catching up fast.
Caporegime
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Musk is 'rich' but he's not that rich. He needed massive investment to get both his major companies off the ground. Without massive investment he wouldn't have gotten anywhere with cars or with rockets. If one fails then investment in new ventures dry up. When a tech leading guy's ventures start failing badly then people stop believing and stop investing. So Tesla failing would be a huge blow to every future venture he has.
In terms of electric cars not being the be all and end all, there are some seriously incorrect statements being made.
First of all electricity produced in power stations is drastically more efficient than energy produced in each car. Second, even if you 'just moved the pollution out of cities'... you'd save millions of lives while improving the health and quality of life of billions of people. City pollution has an effect on everyone's health and reduces lifespan anywhere between a small amount to everyone and actual cancers and lung conditions causing the deaths of many.
Electric cars means cleaner, quieter, healthier cities, that is monumental on it's own.
Third, petrol cars idle a lot, there is a huge amount of waste particularly in cities and lots of additional traffic in cities with huge awkward fuel trucks all of which can be eliminated. electric cars are drastically more efficient and less pollution producing in cities.
Electric in in the trucking industry will also be huge. Lack of noise from electric delivery trucks combined with self driving so there are less issues scheduling deliveries means we can more easily shift most trucks to delivering at night where there is less traffic.
For instance right now you have lets say a 30 hour drive from somewhere in europe to London, as they have to stop every 8 hours then they can't waste time and if they arrive in London at midday for rush hour that's when they arrive. With self driving trucks, no large gaps between driving stints suddenly the trip takes half as long and you can have them wait 5 hours outside London and all come in after rush hours with no huge noise to wake everyone up. IT will alleviate traffic massively. Having fleets of loud petrol trucks rolling in through the night wouldn't be possible, electric will make that possible. That means for the millions of petrol cars that already exist, less traffic, less idling, less pollution.
Electric vehicles will have a monumental effect on our lives, traffic in cities and pollution where the majority of people actually live allowing us far far higher air quality in most cities in the world.
Lastly on hydrogen, meh, there isn't much stopping us getting to the point where we have hydrogen capturing stations around the country sitting next to nuclear or massive wind or solar farms. Produce the hydrogen when you have excess energy and use hydrogen power cells as storage. THis can be split between both hydrogen cells for cars and simply using hydrogen cells as a battery. When the grid needs more juice you can use the hydrogen cells to top up the grid.
Electric cars alone is huge, combined with self driving will have an even bigger effect.
In terms of electric cars not being the be all and end all, there are some seriously incorrect statements being made.
First of all electricity produced in power stations is drastically more efficient than energy produced in each car. Second, even if you 'just moved the pollution out of cities'... you'd save millions of lives while improving the health and quality of life of billions of people. City pollution has an effect on everyone's health and reduces lifespan anywhere between a small amount to everyone and actual cancers and lung conditions causing the deaths of many.
Electric cars means cleaner, quieter, healthier cities, that is monumental on it's own.
Third, petrol cars idle a lot, there is a huge amount of waste particularly in cities and lots of additional traffic in cities with huge awkward fuel trucks all of which can be eliminated. electric cars are drastically more efficient and less pollution producing in cities.
Electric in in the trucking industry will also be huge. Lack of noise from electric delivery trucks combined with self driving so there are less issues scheduling deliveries means we can more easily shift most trucks to delivering at night where there is less traffic.
For instance right now you have lets say a 30 hour drive from somewhere in europe to London, as they have to stop every 8 hours then they can't waste time and if they arrive in London at midday for rush hour that's when they arrive. With self driving trucks, no large gaps between driving stints suddenly the trip takes half as long and you can have them wait 5 hours outside London and all come in after rush hours with no huge noise to wake everyone up. IT will alleviate traffic massively. Having fleets of loud petrol trucks rolling in through the night wouldn't be possible, electric will make that possible. That means for the millions of petrol cars that already exist, less traffic, less idling, less pollution.
Electric vehicles will have a monumental effect on our lives, traffic in cities and pollution where the majority of people actually live allowing us far far higher air quality in most cities in the world.
Lastly on hydrogen, meh, there isn't much stopping us getting to the point where we have hydrogen capturing stations around the country sitting next to nuclear or massive wind or solar farms. Produce the hydrogen when you have excess energy and use hydrogen power cells as storage. THis can be split between both hydrogen cells for cars and simply using hydrogen cells as a battery. When the grid needs more juice you can use the hydrogen cells to top up the grid.
Electric cars alone is huge, combined with self driving will have an even bigger effect.
Car pooling as well.
I don't own a car any more, but I have a fleet of nice shiny new BMWs, Mercs and Smarts that I can jump in whenever I need one. Plus the electric scooters which are awesome for getting around in summer.
The first thing any other car manufacturer would do is make the company die. None of the current people want to stray from their current ways...it's too big a change for them. Musk wants to change things, he's shaken up the market and forcing change. It's what he always wanted to do.
Soldato
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This is an interesting point, I wonder to what degree investment in a project like SpaceX is down to accurate reporting on the potential bottom line and how much is down to Musk himself. I don't follow his career terribly closely but he's arguably an entrepreneur whose main focus is tech focused disruption which you've got to imagine is a risky business model. However despite the potential risks he's not really had a significant failure in terms of his business interests as far as I can see. When somebody seems to keep finding gold investors tend to follow them around, however, when your investment streams are based primarily on an individual figureheads ability to make money as opposed to more traditional business metrics you're much more open to volatility related to confidence.
It will be interesting to see if Tesla really are in trouble, and how much of an impact that could have on Musks other ventures. If a lot of his investment goodwill is based on a cult of personality he might regret spreading himself so thin.
It's all speculation on my part though and I certainly don't wish him any ill will, in most of the sectors he is involved in he seems to be figuratively dragging entire industries into the future.
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Riding along the side of the railway line yesterday I was imagining how cool it would be to see steam engines again, but instead of coal to create the steam they could have little nuclear reactors
Unfortunately a nuclear reactor in a train wouldn't pass health & safety standards, not to mention where we'd dump the old fuel rods
Only if they manage to reduce the weight of the batteries, I read somewhere that the weight of the battery in the Tesla lorry was around 4.5tonnes (10klbs) which would mean trucks carrying less freight to compensate for heavy batteries