The 2021 Tesla Impact Report
Tesla has just released their 2021 Impact Statement, which breaks down the key areas of Tesla’s growth and the effect they had on the world in the past year. Here are the highlights:
Jobs
Tesla boasts of hitting the milestone of 100,000 jobs created in the last decade, with over 3 millions global applicants just this year. Given their three new Gigafactories, it was a pretty sure thing they’d hit that mark, even with the large-scale automations the company utilises.
To go with this, Tesla shared some of the benefits that Employees enjoy, as well as a policy of freely discussing wages, benefits and safety issues with an external “Integrity Line”.
Environment
This is the really impressive part of the report. Tesla boasts that their customers have avoided 8.4 million metric tonnes of CO2 emissions as just a start. With the IPCC report making it clear in no uncertain terms that the world needs to get off fossil fuels about a decade ago, the points in the Tesla Environmental statement are very encouraging.
To go with all this year’s uptick in Tesla solar and battery tech, the company shows us that its solar panels have produced just a bit more energy than Tesla factories, facilities, and the charging of ALL Tesla vehicles combined.
Lifecycle emissions paired with the sheer amount of vehicles sold - shaming even their closest competitors - gives a much better picture of just how Tesla’s emission claims have been measured.
Lastly Tesla points to sustainable design in both their factories and their products, resulting in “less water [use] per vehicle than almost any ICE car manufacturer.”
Supply Chain
A quick check in with the Supply side of things, Tesla shows how their battery cycle - from raw materials to recycling - takes a closed loop approach that’s attempting to keep all processes in-house.
The report goes on to briefly discuss Tesla’s attempts to diversify their battery tech, and caps off by showing their standards on dealing with their mining operations and their impacts on local populations.
Product
This section discusses Tesla’s impact on the entire transport and energy collection ecosystem. Showcasing at first Tesla’s massive - and growing - Supercharger station system across North America, they quickly post a handy graphic about cost of ownership that couples with that whole system.
Coming close to Camry numbers is pretty good considering the uphill climb EV viability still faces in the minds of most folks. To go with those numbers, a quick nod to the overwhelming safety of Tesla vehicles versus the US Average risk of accident (with and without autopilot engaged), and average fire risk really deals with the common critiques of Tesla vehicles.
Finally a graphic showing the viability of Tesla’s energy storage systems points to the company’s claim of an entire energy grid being renewable is a definite possibility. Especially with the expansion of Australia’s virtual power grid, this graph is going to get much more spectacular in time for next year’s Impact Statement.
Tesla has been growing at an extremely rapid pace, and it really is impressive that they’ve been keeping ahead of almost every industry metric, while at the same time addressing climate issues as they go. Elon has made frequent pledges and statements on the importance of getting society as a whole to move away from fossil fuels. It’s very encouraging to show Tesla not only backing those ideals up, but embarrassing the rest of the industry with how easily they seem to be doing it.