Elon Musk, the business magnate and entrepreneur, has made a significant impact on cryptocurrencies. The well-known crypto analyst who goes by "croissant" on Twitter is inspired to dig deeper to understand what Musk's end game is all about.
Musk made the news recently as Tesla, an American electric vehicle and clean energy company, initially accepted Bitcoin (BTC) as a form of payment only for the policy to be reversed completely, citing environmental concerns.
Tesla's Plans with Solar Power
Tesla released a statement saying that the rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels, especially coal, is concerning for BTC mining and transactions. While crypto has a promising future, it cannot come at a great cost to the environment.
This was just a few weeks after Tesla invested over $1 Billion into BTC, and while taking a closer look at Musk's tweets, he had a strong reason to do so. Earlier this year in March, Musk tweeted:
"Tesla is using only internal & open source software & operates Bitcoin nodes directly. Bitcoin paid to Tesla will be retained as Bitcoin, not converted to fiat currency."
Tesla operating their Bitcoin nodes is directly contradictory to their claims of environmental concern from mining BTC unless Tesla is running their nodes using solar energy. This is where the top shareholder of Tesla, Ark Invest, comes into the picture.
Ark published an article detailing Solar battery BTC mining research, pointing at a use case for Tesla regarding energy provision and efficiency, with promising results. Ark states that BTC mining can increase the overall share of a grid and generate more electricity from renewable carbon-free resources.
Monetizing Renewable Energy To Mine BTC
Over 13 states in the US require auto manufacturers to sell a minimum amount of zero-emission vehicles to be allowed to sell any vehicles in their state. The sales of these vehicles give companies environmental credits.
These credits can be sold to other car manufacturers who don't have zero-emission vehicles for sale yet. Chrysler bought billions of dollars worth of these credits, making up to 7% of Tesla's total revenue last year.
This is great in practice, but the profits are expected to decline as companies create their own carbon-free alternatives. As a significant portion of Tesla's revenue will face the ax, it seems like BTC is the company's solution to monetize renewable energy.
Tesla is more than just an electric car company. Tesla's primary business is producing solar panels, solar roofs, and batteries. The excess energy that the company gets from its solar grids could be hypothetically used to mine BTC with a GPU. The excess power is turned into a digital asset, instantly converted to bankable currencies. Croissant claims,
"To me, it looks very possible Tesla may soon announce a renewable way of mining $BTC by using excess energy generated by powerwalls, one which can be used by anyone with Tesla roofs, panels, cars, & more!"
All About Mars?
Musk is currently building an ecosystem that is light years ahead in terms of innovation. SpaceX, an aerospace manufacturer, and space transportation services company, is currently working to create a self-sustainable society on mars.
Musk knows that becoming multi-planetary is the next step in technological advancement for the human race. A self-sustainable colony on Mars has great avenues using BTC as their currency, and it is no coincidence that solar energy is the best energy source on the red planet.
Musk's other project aims to change the internet forever. Starlink, a project by SpaceX, plans to launch 47,000 satellites into space. This will offer internet access worldwide by providing high-speed, low latency broadband internet.
Croissant stitches the final piece of the puzzle together: with Tesla Powerwalls mining cryptocurrency with excess energy being a sure-shot possibility, how will they ensure nodes don't have downtime? A universal satellite internet access for powerwalls. Croissant ends his thread with a kicker and thought-provoker,
"We might see a huge narrative change. This will actually attract people to use renewable energy for $BTC, and potentially bring in hundreds of millions of users."
Disclaimer: This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.
