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Sparks

Elon Musk Had a Pretty Great Night

According to Trump, “a star is born.”

Elon Musk.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

As the election odds swung sharply towards Republican Donald Trump as Tuesday evening slid into Wednesday morning, climate-conscious investors, academics, strategists, and other internet personalities were mostly mute. It was a night to stare blankly at the TV, watch the needle slowly tilt to the right, and vaguely wonder about the future of the climate.

That is, unless you were Elon Musk, Trump’s latest, closest campaign confidant, in which case fist-pumping posts abounded. Well before any polls had closed, Musk posted on X about supposedly “record numbers” of men turning out to vote for Trump. While we can’t confirm that’s true, it set a vibe for the evening to come.

For Musk, no display of patriotism is complete without a plug for one of his companies. Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

He spent the rest of the day casting doubt on election security in Pennsylvania and imploring his followers to vote because no less than “the future of the world” was at stake.

Of course, that’s similar to the rhetoric those in climate world use to describe the prospect of a second Trump presidency. As the final polls were closing, University of California, Santa Barbara climate historian Leah Stokes no doubt summed up the feelings of many when she tweeted,

But there was also room for humor. As the electoral map filled in, The Atlantic CEO Nicholas Thompson had some theories on what caused the pro-MAGA, pro-Mars Tesla CEO to lean so hard into Trump’s campaign.

Duncan Campbell, the vice president of Scale Microgrid Solutions and host of the energy podcast DER Task Force, entered the chat with an even more niche joke.

But no one could beat Musk for sheer weirdness. With results beginning to stack up, he shared a tribute to the “Dark MAGA” facet of the Trump coalition set to that Europe classic, “The Final Countdown.”

And as the night’s endgame began to come into focus, he shared a snap from Trump’s watch party at Mar-a-Lago.

Around 2:30 a.m. ET, Trump took the stage at the convention in West Palm Beach where his supporters had gathered and declared victory in the race. By then some, though certainly not all networks had called the election in Trump’s favor. He devoted a verse of his rambling, genial speech to Musk. “A star is born: Elon,” Trump said in his victory speech, praising Musk’s efforts on the campaign trail, his “beautiful” rockets, and Starlink, which Trump apparently hadn’t heard of before Hurricane Helene.

Musk, for his part, seems psyched about the prospect of playing a role in the Trump administration. “The future is gonna be fantastic,” he said, as the electoral votes crept closer to 270. Though climate tech investor Kristin Ellis of Lowercarbon Capital did have one extra bit of perspective to add:

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Sparks

Rhizome Raises $6.5 Million for AI Grid Resilience

The company will use the seed funding to bring on more engineers — and customers.

Power lines.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

As extreme weather becomes the norm, utilities are scrambling to improve the grid’s resilience, aiming to prevent the types of outages and infrastructure damage that often magnify the impact of already disastrous weather events. Those events cost the U.S. $182 billion in damages last year alone.

With the intensity of storms, heat waves, droughts, and wildfires growing every year, some utilities are now turning to artificial intelligence in their quest to adapt to new climate realities. Rhizome, which just announced a $6.5 million seed round, uses AI to help assess and prevent climate change-induced grid infrastructure vulnerabilities. It’s already working with utilities such as Avangrid, Seattle City Light, and Vermont Electric Power Company to do so.

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Sparks

Don’t Look Now, But China Is Importing Less Coal

Add it to the evidence that China’s greenhouse gas emissions may be peaking, if they haven’t already.

A Chinese coal worker.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Exactly where China is in its energy transition remains somewhat fuzzy. Has the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases already hit peak emissions? Will it in 2025? That remains to be seen. But its import data for this year suggests an economy that’s in a rapid transition.

According to government trade data, in the first fourth months of this year, China imported $12.1 billion of coal, $100.4 billion of crude oil, and $18 billion of natural gas. In terms of value, that’s a 27% year over year decline in coal, a 8.5% decline in oil, and a 15.7% decline in natural gas. In terms of volume, it was a 5.3% decline, a slight 0.5% increase, and a 9.2% decline, respectively.

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Sparks

Rewiring America Slashes Staff Due to Trump Funding Freeze

The nonprofit laid off 36 employees, or 28% of its headcount.

Surprised outlets.
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The Trump administration’s funding freeze has hit the leading electrification nonprofit Rewiring America, which announced Thursday that it will be cutting its workforce by 28%, or 36 employees. In a letter to the team, the organization’s cofounder and CEO Ari Matusiak placed the blame squarely on the Trump administration’s attempts to claw back billions in funding allocated through the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund.

“The volatility we face is not something we created: it is being directed at us,” Matusiak wrote in his public letter to employees. Along with a group of four other housing, climate, and community organizations, collectively known as Power Forward Communities, Rewiring America was the recipient of a $2 billion GGRF grant last April to help decarbonize American homes.

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