It’s Tesla Investor Day and that means it’s time to talk about Elon Musk’s Master Plan 3.
After teasing it for a while, the plan is being unveiled at Tesla’s Investor Day event. At the event, Musk unveiled Master Plan 3, which focuses on how to turn Earth (yes, the entire planet), into a completely sustainable planet in terms of power generation and usage. It’s a bold plan, perhaps the boldest, but that’s what Tesla is looking at when it comes to a macro level.
Switch all of Earth to sustainable energy
In order to accomplish the switch to sustainable energy for the entire planet, the company says that it will take the following key things to occur:
- Repower the existing grid with renewable energy like solar and wind
- Switch completely to electric vehicles for both consumers and businesses
- Switch to heat pumps in homes, businesses, and industry
- Electrify high temp heat delivery and hydrogen
- Sustainably power both airplanes and boats
The company says that the plan is “entirely feasible” and that the entire world could technically switch to sustainable energy by 2050. The company claims that building all of the wind farms, solar farms, and other ways to generate all of this renewable energy would only take up 0.2% of the world’s land mass and that making the switch would result in less mineral extraction when compared to the fossil fuel industry.
It also says that, based on current technology, the resources exist to make such a switch. The cost to do all of this is estimated to be around $10 trillion. Elon Musk said that not only investors in Tesla, but “investors in Earth,” should contribute to making this happen.
A next-generation car assembly process
Tesla also announced that it is changing the way that it assembles its vehicles. While the current process involves a bunch of parts coming together, being pulled apart, and then bringing them back together again, its new “unboxed process” will only need to handle the assembly of the car one time, instead of multiple times. The company says that this new process will not be used for its current generation vehicles like the Model 3, Model S, and Model Y, but for a “next-gen” car.
The presenters said that they will be talking about this mysterious car “at a later date.” The company also reiterated that the Cybertruck will be launching in 2023, echoing promises that Elon Musk made during Tesla’s last earnings call.
A new drive unit for a “next-gen” vehicle
The company also teased a new drive unit, saying that it will be $1000 cheaper to build, take up less factory space, accept any battery chemistry, and allow the company to scale with an even more affordable vehicle. It also teased a “next generation permanent magnet motor” that will use zero rare earth materials.
While it did not unveil the specifics of this drive unit, it will likely power the next-generation vehicle that Tesla also teased but did not reveal.
Switching all future vehicles to 48 volts
The company says that, with its next-generation vehicles, it plans to control 100% of the supply chain and the design of the controllers going into its cars.
It also announced that, with the Cybertruck and future vehicles, it plans to switch from 12V to 48V, which will reduce AMP usage by a factor of four. It says that 48V is the “future of low voltage” and asked that other automakers join them to make the switch.
Moving to a self-driving fleet
The company also talked about its plans to improve Full Self-Driving so that, in the future, your car can drive around and serve other riders while you aren’t using it. It also talked about future software updates where any Tesla, not just the one that you own, could adjust itself to match your preferences, such as steering wheel position, seat configuration, and more.
Despite the company recently halting installations of its Full Self-Driving Beta due to crash concerns, Tesla claims that users are five to six times safer using its self-driving technology when compared to actual human drivers.
Releasing humanoid robots to the world
Elon Musk also talked about Optimus, Tesla’s upcoming robot. He showed off a video of Optimus basically assembling another Optimus, giving off what could only be described as Skynet vibes. The CEO said that the company is able to use a ton of its other technologies across its products in order to create a robot that will be useful at scale quite quickly.
He also wondered out loud if one humanoid robot will exist for each human much faster than anyone thinks and what an economy will even look like once all of these helpful robots exist. Musk did not say when Optimus will actually be released, but the company is clearly working on bringing it to market.
Charge all of the things!
When it comes to charging, Tesla touched on its plans to open up its charging infrastructure to non-Tesla vehicles. It says that the first ten stations opened up to non-Tesla EV owners in the United States yesterday and that it already offers many more chargers in Asia and Europe.
It also said that it plans to move towards even more sustainable charging by installing more AC chargers at the most common places where drivers need to charge their vehicles. The fourth-generation chargers have longer cables than previous chargers as well.
Tesla, in order to reduce the cost of ownership of its vehicles, is introducing “unlimited overnight home charging” in Texas for $30 a month this July. Tesla can do this because Texas has “a ton of wind, and the wind blows at night.”
Tesla’s Mexico plans confirmed
Finally, during the Q&A portion near the end of the event, Musk announced that Tesla is indeed building a Gigafactory in Mexico, as previous reports suggested.
You can rewatch the Investor Day event on YouTube below:
Today’s announcements come as Tesla began to open up its Supercharger network to non-Tesla EVs in the United States and news that it will open its next Gigafactory in Mexico. It is also dealing with a recall impacting over 300,000 vehicles due to issues with its Full Self-Driving Beta.
