LNG: TESLARATI

Amid the ongoing public health scare in China sparked by the Coronavirus, Tesla is offering all customers in the Chinese market free Supercharging for an indefinite amount of time to help drivers travel more easily and quickly away from affected areas.

Images shared by Tesla owner @Ray4Tesla show the electric carmaker has issued a notification to its Chinese customers informing them that they will be able to charge their vehicles for free at any of the numerous Superchargers installed across the country.

BREAKING: @teslacn is notifying #Tesla owners across China about first-ever temporary free supercharging during #coronavirus outbreak. @teslacn says it’d like to help owners get thru difficult time in a small way it can. I can’t think of any other OEMs more considerate than Tesla pic.twitter.com/o1mzD8yaCJ

— Ray4️⃣Tesla⚡️🚘☀️🔋 (@ray4tesla) January 28, 2020

“To make it easier for you to travel during the coronavirus outbreak, effective today we will temporarily open all Tesla vehicles to be free to charge at the Supercharging station until the epidemic is resolved,” notified Tesla to its customer across China. “We hope that during this extraordinary period, you will be able to replenish electricity efficiently and use your car smoothly when needed. After the epidemic ceases, we will notify you again before resetting your vehicle to its original configuration. We hope to provide you with a modest effort so you can spend this time smoothly. Tesla reserves the right to make the final decision in this event.”

This is not the first time Tesla has shown a gesture of kindness to customers in crisis. In August last year, for example, Tesla offered free Supercharging to customers in Florida who were fleeing the wrath of Hurricane Dorian. The company also delivered over-the-air updates to unlock more range and provide customers several extra miles. Tesla offered the same free Supercharging services in 2018 to customers who were affected by Hurricane Michael. In 2017, the company issued a software update to select vehicles to provide them with more range as Hurricane Irma drew near.

The deadly coronavirus has raised fears of a pandemic following reports that it has claimed at least 106 lives and infected at least 4,515 others across the globe. The US State Department has issued a travel advisory urging Americans to put off all non-essential travel to China. Meanwhile, the Chinese government has closed off the industrial hub of Wuhan, where the outbreak originated, and nearby cities.

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Elon Musk has big plans for Mars and it’s no secret that the SpaceX founder and CEO envisions a future where humans inhabit more than one planet, but how do we get there?

In a series of tweets, Musk outlined a plan to build a city on Mars by 2050, and fill it with 1 million people.

That may seem a bit outlandish but here’s how it would work.

SpaceX operates a fleet of Falcon 9 rockets that routinely launch and land, depositing satellites, cargo and soon people into space. However, in order to reach Mars, Musk and SpaceX need an even larger, more powerful rocket. That’s where Starship comes in.

In stark contrast to the classic black-and-white paint scheme of the Falcon family of rockets, Starship sports a shiny, stainless steel skin that gives off a futuristic vibe. And in true SpaceX fashion, the 387-foot ship will be reusable.

Starship, which is currently in development for future deep-space travel, will be able to ferry as many as 100 passengers beyond low-Earth orbit. The way to achieving that goal is by reducing the cost of spaceflight. He would like for anyone who wants to go to Mars, to be able to.

“Needs to be such that anyone can go if they want, with loans available for those who don’t have money,” Musk wrote.

To that end, Musk said he wants to build a fleet of at least 1,000 Starships—and launch at least three of them every day.

The Starship system is the latest in SpaceX’s troupe of increasingly larger rockets. In 2018, the California-based aerospace company launched and landed its Falcon Heavy rocket for the first time, generating 5 million pounds of thrust from the rocket’s 27 engines. But even that’s not powerful enough for Mars-based missions.

“Megatons per year to orbit are needed for life to become multi-planetary,”  Musk tweeted on Thursday.

To date, the heaviest payload to successfully land on Mars was the Curiosity rover, which touched down on the red planet in 2012. That rover weighed in at 1 metric ton (2,200 lbs.). Much heavier payloads will be required if a city is to build on Mars. NASA, SpaceX and others around the world are currently working on ways to land even larger payloads.

Starship is one method currently in development. Combined with its Super Heavy booster would be powered by 41 next-generation Raptor engines, making it the most powerful launch system ever created—even more powerful than the Saturn V moon rocket. Each launch would pack enough thrust to send more than 100 tons (equivalent to seven fully loaded school buses’ worth of mass) and 100 people into orbit at a time.

But the ship would also be able to navigate the tenuous Martian atmosphere and land safely on the red planet’s surface.

Musk estimates that a fleet of 1,000 Starships, able to tote 100 megatons of stuff to Mars, would be required to build a permanent settlement. That fleet could transport about 100 passengers each, totaling 100,000 people per year.

Musk said a lot of work still needs to be done, especially in regards to propellant production. The Raptor engines Musk plans on using are powered by methane (as opposed to the Kerosene and liquid oxygen that power SpaceX’s Falcon series).

Mars has a generous supply of methane, which Musk hopes could be used to establish refueling depots on the red planet.

There’s a lot of work to do if humanity is to reach Mars. SpaceX is currently working around the clock to build its next prototype of the Starship spacecraft. (The previous mockup exploded during testing, but did prove that the craft could get off the ground.)

If all goes well with this iteration, we may see a Starship prototype fly again soon.

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A new Tesla wireless phone charger with an extended power profile is coming soon based on a product page published by the Wireless Power Consortium (WPC). There are also speculations based on leaked information that this wireless phone charger will be rolled out to the Tesla Model X SUV and its sibling, the Model S sedan.

Aside from saying the upcoming charger has extended power profile, which basically means it can raise its charging power for faster charging, details about the Tesla wireless phone charger are limited. The Tesla-branded wireless phone charger was first noticed by Redditor u/sameerb on WPC, a group of more than 600 companies across the globe working to ensure the worldwide compatibility of wireless charges and power sources based on the Qi Standards.

“Qi-Certified devices and wireless chargers have been thoroughly tested for safety, reliability and compatibility with all other Qi products for a seamless, satisfying wireless charging experience. Qi-Certified products have passed rigorous tests for safety, interoperability, and usability. Only products that pass testing by a WPC-authorized lab can be registered in the Qi-Certified Product Database,” the WPC  backgrounder reads.

New Tesla Wireless Phone Charger (Source: Wireless Power Consortium)

Tesla’s current Model 3 wireless phone charger is sold for $125 and designed to charge two phones at once on its non-slip, silicone surface. There are also popular options from brands such as Jeda and Nomad that sell a similar product for $99, but the market tends to lean toward getting Tesla-branded car accessories.

It is not yet clear whether the new Tesla wireless phone charger will be for the Model 3. It can also be for the Model S, Model X or even for the much-awaited electric crossover Model Y that’s rumored to start delivery next month. Meanwhile, Tesla community member and resident hacker @greentheonly posted his latest findings based on the most recent software update. Green tweeted that new hardware rollout could be imminent for the Model S and Model X. He mentioned an “integrated inductive phone charger (Qi) for S/X cars,” which likely confirms the purpose of the latest wireless phone charger on the site of the WPC.

He also mentions two battery types in several configurations but he was not able to determine the capacity of the battery. This piece of information might be related to what Tesla Motors Club member Chilam experienced when he recently replaced his car’s battery and got an 85kWh/350VDC pack versus the original 400VDC.

New hardware incoming.
Integrated inductive phone charger (Qi) for S/X cars.
Two new S/X battery types in several configs (not yet sure of the capacity – TBD)
new lumbar (so new seats?)
New charge port type.
New suspension version.
I would speculate all these are imminent 1/

— green (@greentheonly) January 25, 2020

Below are the details of the upcoming Tesla wireless phone charger listed on the WPC product page:

H/T to u/sameerb

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Tesla has grown much over the years, as evidenced by the domination of the Model 3 in the premium sedan segment and the rise of factories like Giga Shanghai. Yet, at the same time, the level of Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt (FUD) that the company and its supporters have had to deal with have also intensified over the years. Even today, with TSLA stock at record levels, and with the company overtaking Volkswagen as the second largest automaker in the industry by market cap, anti-Tesla FUD is still at an all-time high. 

At the risk of sounding like a conspiracy theorist, one must acknowledge a rather inconvenient truth. There is a massive misinformation campaign against Tesla, and it has been going on for years. One simply needs to look at a recently leaked recording of a 2018 White House dinner with US President Donald Trump to see proof of this. 

Recently, a 90-minute recording of Trump and several dinner guests was shared with the public by a lawyer for Lev Parnas, a Soviet-born businessman who was reportedly involved in ousting American diplomat Marie Yovanovitch, the US’ ambassador to Ukraine. Several topics were discussed in the recording, one of which was electric vehicles in the United States and Tesla’s chances of survival. 

During a particularly alarming part of the recording, which came at around the 58-minute mark, several individuals in the dinner started talking about electric vehicles. The US President asked how electric cars are doing in the market, and his inquiry was immediately met with a prompt “Not good.” A guest of the dinner then went on a long tirade against Tesla, filled with, unsurprisingly, a ton of FUD. Granted, Tesla was in a far more challenging place at the time when the recording was taken, but the sheer dislike for the company is quite shocking nonetheless. 

“Tesla’s broke. 100%. They can’t produce them. The auto companies have caught up to him. He’s never generated anywhere close to positive cash flow. He’s subsidized by 25,000 per vehicle. It’s over.  The other thing people forget about it it’s great to have an electric vehicle, but you gotta plug it in and get a charge somewhere. 

“And, the carbon footprint of this phone is the same as a refrigerator running. You need to generate the power. And generating it with wind and solar, wind and solar only generates 3.5% of our power usage today. You would take 50 years to get up to 5% at the rate we’re growing. It is still fossil k generating power. You have to have nuclear, you have to have oil and gas, and you have to have coal,” the guest said.

This statement, of course, is rife with misinformation. Since the time when the recording was taken, Tesla had only reported negative cash flow two times. The company posted positive cash flow four times. The alleged $25,000 subsidy that Teslas receive is also a complete fabrication, as the electric car maker’s federal credits only topped around $7,500. Of course, the comparison between the carbon footprint of a smartphone being comparable to the footprint of a running fridge is equally false. 

The conversation only gets stranger from this point, and even with US President Donald Trump bringing up the topic of Tesla’s stock price, the attendees of the dinner were dismissive of the company. A guest even threw some shade at Elon Musk, stating that the CEO is “a little off socially.” 

Fortunately for Tesla, the company appears to have reached a point where its results already speak for itself. Even with the FUD being thrown at Tesla’s efforts in China, for example, the company started MIC Model 3 deliveries before the facility’s construction hit the one-year mark. Despite all the alleged demand problems for the Model 3, the all-electric sedan has also maintained its momentum in regions such as Europe, driving down the point that there is a genuine demand for Tesla’s electric cars. 

Watch US President Donald Trump and his dinner guests discuss electric vehicles, Tesla, and Elon Musk in the video below.

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Roads near the build site of Tesla’s Giga Berlin will be closed at specific times Sunday as clearing teams detonate World War II bombs found in the area.

Environmental Minister Axel Vogel announced that certain roads on a 600-meter portion of the Berliner Ring will be closed to traffic in 15 to 30 segments between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. local time to give way to the blasting of about 187 pounds of vintage bombs unearthed in the industrial property where Tesla’s first car factory in Europe will be built, reported the German publication Berliner Morgen Post.

According to local authorities, the Federal Highway 10 between Freienbrink and Erkner will be blocked as needed, as well as Landstrasse 38 in Grunheide.

Earlier this week, the Interior Ministry of Brandenburg reported that seven vintage bombs were recovered from almost 60 hectares of land that have been explored by the clearing team. Unexploded bombs are often discovered in different German cities. In fact, a 500 kg WWII bomb was discovered in Cologne last week. Experts in the country are well-trained in defusing unexploded ordnance and evacuate locals as necessary to ensure safety and avoid any unwanted incident.

09:30 EST #GigaBerlin
Controlled blasting of the aircraft Unexploded ordnance.💣
All access roads to Tesla Forest closed, police, fire department on site, no closer approach,🤔

» being watched by the police «😯 pic.twitter.com/eceRgZoVoT

— @GF4Tesla…..#GigaBerlin. (@Gf4Tesla) January 26, 2020

Meanwhile, protests against the building of Tesla’s Giga Berlin lost momentum this weekend as groups demonstrating against the construction project upon discovering that right-wing leaning group. Locals do not want to be exploited and want to focus on the environmental impact concerns that they have been raising in the past weeks.

We won 🥳🥳🥳, the opponents broke up and the Anti-Tesla demonstration didn’t take place https://t.co/FU2n7podoq

— Emil Senkel (@EmilSenkel) January 25, 2020

The Giga Berlin build site has been declared off-limits recently to make sure teams can focus on the operations, avoid unwanted incidents, and avoid further delays. Tesla is on a tight schedule and wants to begin construction by mid-March. The electric carmaker is building access roads to make logistics easier while concurrently clearing trees, moving animals living in the forest, and scanning for vintage bombs.

The board of directors approved the purchase agreement for the man-made forest where Giga Berlin will be built. The initial deal is for 40.91 million euros or about $45 million, but there is a provision that will allow adjustment of the price of the property following a second appraisal by an independent party.

The Giga Berlin is set to begin production by next year with a goal to produce about 150,000 Model Ys during its initial phase and up that number to 500,000 units per year in the future. The car factory is also expected to generate around 8,000 jobs for locals and workers from neighboring countries.

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Tesla CEO Elon Musk was spotted riding shotgun in the futuristic Cybertruck and cruising near SpaceX headquarters while filming a segment for the Emmy Award-winning motoring show Jay Leno’s Garage.

Musk and all-around car guru and comedian Jay Leno were spotted cruising down Hawtorne’s Crenshaw Blvd. in the all-electric Tesla pickup truck late Friday afternoon.

Instagram user gorgeouserika shared a short video of the Cybertruck sighting where Elon Musk is seen waving to her from the passenger side while Jay Leno pilots the monstrous truck past the Boring Company’s Los Angeles test tunnel.

“There you go, Jay Leno and Elon cruising down Crenshaw in this … car,” gorgeouserika was heard saying in the video.

View this post on Instagram

This video is going nuts right now, so many people have been hitting me up for it… HERE U GO….. @teslamotors @elonrmuskk @tmz_tv @nbcjayleno #elonmusk #spacex #tesla #teslamodels #2020vision #2020vision #losangeles #hawthorne #bigtrucks #cybertruck #cyberspace #cyberculture #carswithoutlimits #carspotted #carsdaily #nbcla #cnnviral #teslamotorsclub #teslalife

A post shared by 💋Erika. (@gorgeouserika) on Jan 25, 2020 at 10:40am PST

The Cybertruck sighting video also shows the impressive headroom of the upcoming Cybertruck. The Tesla chief is approximately 6’2” in height and there’s still a good amount of clearance between Musk’s head and the Cybertrucks roof.

This latest Cybertruck sighting corroborates Teslarait’s report that Tesla CEO Elon Musk and the Cybertruck were spotted filming late Friday afternoon for an upcoming segment for Jay Leno’s Garage.

Elon Musk was photographed by a Teslarati source while appearing to inspect the motorized rear tonneau of the truck’s “vault” with Leno’s film crew around him.

Another shot featured the upcoming all-electric utility truck glistening under the California sun and framed near the Tesla Supercharger monolith.

During the said filming for a segment on Jay Leno’s Garage, the Cybertruck was flanked by the black truck of the camera crew and a Model 3. In the shot below the Cybertruck was captured in the same frame with the Space X headquarters and its iconic Falcon 9 rocket booster.

The upcoming Tesla Model Y crossover was also earlier rumored to appear in the same show following an impromptu tour of the vehicle’s interior at the San Luis Obispo Supercharger in the past week,  but it wasn’t caught on camera last Friday.

Teslarati has reached out to the program staff at Jay Leno’s Garage for confirmation of the airing time of the presumed segment. We will provide an update via Twitter and Instagram upon hearing back.

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CEO Elon Musk said that Tesla will start referring to its Gigafactories using the word “Giga” and then adding the mostly understood location name.

The Tesla chief tweeted about the new naming convention Friday night. At the moment, Tesla has three operational Gigafactories and expects to begin construction of a fourth Gigafactory near Berlin soon.

Setting a convention on how Gigafactories will be referred to will help avoid confusion as mainstream media, consumers, and Tesla fans usually refer to these facilities as Giga followed by the number based on the date the factories went online. Others also refer to the factories as Giga followed by either the country or city where the factories are located.

Going with nomenclature of Giga [most widely understood location name] vs Giga #, so Giga Shanghai, Giga Nevada, Giga New York & Giga Berlin

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 25, 2020

The Gigafactory 1 will now be called Giga Nevada. This facility broke ground in June 2014 just outside Sparks, Nevada and is primarily focused on designing and producing batteries for Tesla. In 2018, the said Gigafactory became the highest-volume battery plant in the world with an annualized rate of roughly 20 GWh. Tesla’s battery acquisitions to help produce batteries that will ultimately extend the range of its vehicles are proving to be well worth their costs as they are helping the brand dominate competitors in the future.

The Gigafactory 2 in Buffalo will now be referred to as Giga New York. This 1.2-million sq. ft facility is key for producing the Solar Roof Tiles and the Powerwall. Tesla is stepping on the pedal this year and begins 2020 by offering its solar customers incentives in its latest referral program update.

Meanwhile, its Gigafactory 3 in China will simply be called Giga Shanghai. Tesla’s first car factory outside of the United State has now achieved a run rate of 3,000 units per week according to the company’s most recent updates. The Shanghai factory will be key in conquering the biggest automotive market in the globe and should help the brand in exploring other markets in Asia.

In the same conversation on Twitter, Musk chimed in on the issues hounding the upcoming Gigafactory 4 in Grunheide which will now be referred to as Giga Berlin. The Tesla chief clarified that its first factory in Europe will not be using 372 cubic meters of water per hour as implied by those expressing concerns that Tesla might cause water supply issues in the community, and the carmaker is also trying to shed light on the confusion that it’s clearing a natural forest to build a factory for its green cars.

“Sounds like we need to clear up a few things! Tesla won’t use this much net water on a daily basis. It’s possibly a rare peak usage case, but not an everyday event. Also, this is not a natural forest — it was planted for use as cardboard & only a small part will be used for GF4,” Musk wrote.

“…Giga Berlin will build sustainable energy vehicles using sustainable energy, so net environmental impact will be extremely positive,” he added.

Tesla hopes to begin construction of the Giga Berlin in March. It is expected to create around 8,000 jobs for locals and and interested workers from across the region. The car factory will produce 150,000 vehicles during its initial phase and is expected to up production to 500,000 units in the future.

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Technology and politics don’t usually go together. But in his latest ad campaign titled Right Now, Andrew Yang pushed boundaries by using a Tesla Model X as a real-world example.

The Democratic presidential candidate said the reason Donald Trump won the US presidential elections in 2016 was because millions of people lost their jobs due to automation and the massive changes it brought upon the economy. A huge part of Trump’s campaign revolved around his promise to bring back jobs to the people.

“I’m the only candidate who built a non-profit that’s created thousands of jobs,” Yang said. “To defeat Trump, we need someone with the experience of tackling the economic challenges of our time.”

Yang demonstrated a couple of Tesla’s driver assistance features to illustrate his point. Toward the end of the 30-second ad, he is filmed sitting behind the Model X’s steering wheel while the car cruised on Autopilot down a highway. The video cut to a scene of the all-electric SUV parking itself, presumably in Yang’s driveway, using Summon.

Thank you @elonmusk for all that you do – you lead us all to think bigger about the future. 😀👍🚀 pic.twitter.com/wir3wm3PbR

— Andrew Yang🧢 (@AndrewYang) December 20, 2019

“And if you don’t think automation and the transforming economy is costing jobs, think again because it’s happening right now,” Yang said.

Essentially, Yang used Autopilot and Summon to show that automation is the future. He believes we need someone who understands the technology and the impact it has on the economy to lead the charge toward that kind of future—one where self-driving cars and AI-equipped robots are the norm. He also asserted that he is equipped with the expertise and experience to deal with these new kinds of challenges.

Yang is quickly becoming a favorite with the tech crowd. Among his high-profile supporters is Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who publicly announced over Twitter that he was backing Yang. Yang, for his part, seems to share the same high regard.

He would our first openly goth president. I think this is very important.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 10, 2019

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Rivian will be holding an Open House event in Tesla Country this weekend, where the billion-dollar electric car startup will showcase the highly-anticipated R1T electric pickup truck and R1S Sport Utility Vehicle in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Teslarati obtained a copy of the invitation to the event for Rivian reservation holders. The “Rivian Open House” will take place this weekend, January 25th and 26th from 12 PM to 8 PM PST, at the outdoor enthusiast Proof Lab venue n Mill Valley, California. The event will be open to the public.

Past events have allowed Rivian reservation holders to get a close look at the two all-electric adventure vehicles that the company plans to produce from its massive manufacturing facility in Normal, Illinois.

This weekend’s Bay Area event comes on the heels of Rivian’s North American tour across Georgia, Seattle and its home town of  Normal, Illinois. The events have given reservation holders and Rivian enthusiasts the opportunity to mingle with one another, while interacting with Rivian engineers and company executives, including CEO RJ Scaringe.

Past events have also offered surprises in the form of never-before-seen colors for the quad motor R1T pickup. At the company’s Seattle event, Rivian unveiled a new blue color for the Tank Turn-capable vehicle, bolstering its color-palette of Silver and Green. A white R1T was spotted alongside its silver counterpart at an automotive event in Argentina last year. To our knowledge, the white R1T has never been showcased to the public in North America, making it highly likely that Rivian will surprise this weekend’s event attendees with a formal debut of the white color variant.

Rivian’s decision to hold an event in the San Francisco Bay Area – an area famed for technological innovation and arguably best known as home to Tesla and as the land of electric vehicles – can be seen as a bold statement that the electric carmaker is more than ready to satisfy demands of the consumer market.

With support from e-commerce giant Amazon and legacy automaker Ford, to name a few, Rivian is primed to begin the first production of the R1T pickup truck later this year.

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