Earlier this year, Elon Musk called for more oil to be extracted, which raised a few eyebrows, but it was in the context of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and how gas prices have skyrocketed: I hate to say it, but we need to increase oil and gas production immediately. Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. Obviously, this would negatively affect Tesla, but sustainable energy solutions simply cannot react instantaneously to compensate for Russian oil and gas exports. At an energy conference in Norway today, Musk brought up the comment in the context of Europe’s current energy crisis. Tesla’s CEO said he thinks the world still needs more oil and gas, and the media is running with the headline: However, many of these articles do not include the full quote, making it clear that Musk has not changed his mind and still believes that renewable energy, especially solar and wind, is the way to go. Musk is often a very literal person and sometimes just states the obvious, which is the case with this comment. The full excerpt shows Musk talking about the fossil fuels currently needed to keep civilization running until we reach sustainability with renewable energy: I want to thank the leaders and people of Norway for their long-standing support. I think we really need more oil and gas to make civilization work. But at the same time we are moving rapidly towards a sustainable energy economy. Musk still believes that solar power and energy storage should dominate the energy market to achieve sustainability, but realizes that fossil fuels are needed until it is achieved. He made similar comments about more nuclear power, but the full quote is about nuclear power making sense: If you have a well-designed nuclear power plant, you shouldn’t shut it down — especially right now. Nuclear power makes environmental sense if it can operate safely and dispose of nuclear waste safely. It does indeed make sense to keep factories that fit this description running, especially in Europe amid the energy crisis following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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I think his comment was over the top. It’s just pointing out a simple fact, but if you want to look at it from a political point of view, it’s important to keep in mind that we need to incentivize new energy production to be renewable and not from fossil fuels, in order to take into account the impact on the environment . Of course, a simple carbon tax would take care of this, but it was difficult to implement in some markets. Either way, solar and wind are becoming the best choices from an economic standpoint, so regardless of policies, I think we’ll see energy markets move toward renewables at an increased rate. FTC: We use affiliate links that automatically earn you income. More. Subscribe to Electrek on YouTube for exclusive videos and subscribe to the podcast.
