Sign In or Create an Account.

By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy

Electric Vehicles

Why I’ve Finally Lost Faith in Tesla

Superchargers made sense. What is Elon Musk doing?

A Tesla impaled by the Tesla logo.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

When I finally succumbed and opened Threads, Mark Zuckerberg’s algorithm sized up my demographics and fed me two kinds of posts it thought would juice my engagement. First were the people shouting, incorrectly, that IPA is a bad style of beer and framing themselves as too hip to sip something so basic. Second: Posts from the loud, dedicated cadre of Threads users who are actively rooting against Tesla.

I understand the spite. When I bought my Model 3 five years ago, Elon Musk had begun his public heel turn. Some of the signs of what was to come were already there. However, Model 3 was the best reasonably affordable EV on the market, and the Supercharger network made it possible for us (California residents as we are) to own only an electric vehicle. You couldn’t say that for the electric Hyundai Kona.

In the time since then, Musk’s erratic or adolescent behavior has caused a rising tide of people, especially among the very online and the political left, to openly hope for and celebrate Tesla’s failures. I have not been among them. Musk’s brand was the best bet for getting Americans to quit internal combustion, a goal that’s more important to me than the man’s personal failings. Nor did I believe declarations that the company was doomed. No matter what crazy thing Elon Musk devoted his money or his attention to, it seemed like Tesla’s dominance in both the EV market and the stock market could paint over the crazy.

Now, I’m not so sure.

Last month, we covered the big problems with Tesla’s EV lineup. The only new vehicle released since 2020 was the Cybertruck, which is suffering through slow sales and a sudden unintended acceleration crisis. The sub-$30,000 model that would open up Tesla to the masses was sort of canceled, then sort of uncanceled, and now sits in limbo. Whatever that car’s fate, it’s clear that Musk is obsessed with self-driving software and his “robotaxi” at the expense of EVs actually driven by their human occupants.

But if a self-inflicted wound proves fatal, it might be the one Musk created this week by laying off essentially the entire team in charge of Tesla’s Supercharger network. That includes Rebecca Tinucci, his senior director of EV charging, who led the effort starting in 2022 to convince the other automakers to adopt Tesla’s formerly proprietary plug standard as their own.

Tinucci’s achievement was one of the company’s few undisputed success stories during the past several years of chaos. One by one, the other automakers ditched plug standards that were supported by third-party charging companies like EVgo and Electrify America to adopt the Tesla plug, which was christened the North American Charging Standard. Ford and Rivian EVs have begun this year to use a big part of Tesla’s robust Supercharger network. I cannot tell you how many excited, targeted Instagram ads I’ve gotten from Rivian celebrating the new access.

This was a huge deal for American EV adoption. Tesla’s fast-chargers are widespread, simple to use, and far more reliable than the oft-busted charging stations other EVs previously had to rely on. And it was a huge deal for Tesla, which created out of nowhere a huge new customer base ready to pay for its electricity.

And now, at what should be a moment of triumph at winning the charging wars, Musk has pivoted away. He wrote on his social network formerly named Twitter: “Tesla still plans to grow the Supercharger network, just at a slower pace for new locations and more focus on 100% uptime and expansion of existing locations.”

Frankly, this sounds like an attempt to hand-wave away a spectacular self-own. As The Vergereported: “Station installations were up 26% year over year, while the number of connectors was up 27%. It was a rare area of growth for the company, which has seen its sales and profits fall since last year as demand for EVs cools down.” In trying to become lean and innovative, all Musk managed to do was kneecap a part of Tesla that’s actually working.

The company has to keep making money while Musk busies himself with trying to solve AI and autonomous driving. What with its inattention to its EV lineup and shooting itself in the foot over Supercharging, suddenly the winning options are few. Tesla’s other business is in home energy, where it installs solar panels and sells its Powerwall home batteries. This is a lucrative market as energy storage becomes increasingly important to the grid and home of the future — unless Musk decides that, like selling cars, it’s too boring.

Given its huge lead in EV sales and EV charging, Tesla is forever just a few good decisions away from trending upward again. It’s just getting more difficult each day to imagine the company doing so.

You’re out of free articles.

Subscribe today to experience Heatmap’s expert analysis 
of climate change, clean energy, and sustainability.
To continue reading
Create a free account or sign in to unlock more free articles.
or
Please enter an email address
By continuing, you agree to the Terms of Service and acknowledge our Privacy Policy
Climate

What Started the Fires in Los Angeles?

Plus 3 more outstanding questions about this ongoing emergency.

Los Angeles.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

As Los Angeles continued to battle multiple big blazes ripping through some of the most beloved (and expensive) areas of the city on Thursday, a question lingered in the background: What caused the fires in the first place?

Though fires are less common in California during this time of the year, they aren’t unheard of. In early December 2017, power lines sparked the Thomas Fire near Ventura, California, which burned through to mid-January. At the time it was the largest fire in the state since at least the 1930s. Now it’s the ninth-largest. Although that fire was in a more rural area, it ignited for many of the same reasons we’re seeing fires this week.

Keep reading...Show less
Green
Hotspots

Fox News Goes After a Solar Farm

And more of this week’s top renewable energy fights across the country.

Map of U.S. renewable energy.
Heatmap Illustration

1. Otsego County, Michigan – The Mitten State is proving just how hard it can be to build a solar project in wooded areas. Especially once Fox News gets involved.

  • Last week, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources said it wanted to lease more than 400 acres of undeveloped state-owned forestland for part of a much larger RWE Clean Energy solar project near the northern Michigan town of Gaylord.
  • Officials said they were approached by the company about the land. But the news sparked an immediate outcry, as state elected Republicans – and some Democrats – demanded to know why a forest would be cleared for ‘green’ energy. Some called for government firings.
  • Then came the national news coverage. On Friday, Fox News hosted a full four-minute segment focused on this one solar farm featuring iconoclastic activist Michael Shellenberger.
  • A few days later, RWE told the media it would not develop the project on state lands.
  • “[D]uring the development process, we conducted outreach to all landowners adjacent to the project location, including the Michigan Department of Natural Resources,” the company said in a statement to the Petoskey News-Review, adding it instead decided to move forward with leasing property from two private landowners.

2. Atlantic County, New Jersey – Opponents of offshore wind in Atlantic City are trying to undo an ordinance allowing construction of transmission cables that would connect the Atlantic Shores offshore wind project to the grid.

Keep reading...Show less
Policy Watch

How to Solve a Problem Like a Wind Ban

And more of this week’s top policy news around renewables.

Trump.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

1. Trump’s Big Promise – Our nation’s incoming president is now saying he’ll ban all wind projects on Day 1, an expansion of his previous promise to stop only offshore wind.

  • “They litter our country like paper, like dropping garbage in a field,” Trump said at a press conference Tuesday. “We’re going to try and have a policy where no windmills are built.”
  • Is this possible? It would be quite tricky, as the president only has control over the usage of federal lands and waters. While offshore wind falls entirely under the president’s purview, many onshore wind projects themselves fall entirely on state lands.
  • This is where the whole “wind kills birds” argument becomes important. Nearly all wind projects have at least some federal nexus because of wildlife protection laws, such as the Endangered Species Act and Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
  • Then there are the cables connecting these projects to the grid and interstate transmission projects that may require approval from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
  • I’m personally doubtful he will actually stop all wind in the U.S., though I do think offshore wind in its entirety is at risk (which I’ve written about). Trump has a habit of conflating things, and in classic fashion, he only spoke at the press conference about offshore wind projects. I think he was only referring to offshore wind, though I’m willing to eat my words.

2. The Big Nuclear Lawsuit – Texas and Utah are suing to kill the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s authority to license small modular reactors.

Keep reading...Show less