Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has said many times that he loves humanity. So it’s not surprising that he is concerned about the low birthrate. Eight billion people may seem like a lot but Elon Musk is right in his concerns.
In May 2022, MedCity News published an article on the globally declining birth rate and noted that depopulation is placing a huge burden on a diminishing workforce. It also highlighted technological improvements in egg freezing have been improving pregnancy rates.
The United Nations projects that by 2100 the world will have 11.2 billion people, however, the birthrate was at its lowest in 2021. The good news is that it has been increasing a bit since then. According to the New York Times, the U.S. birthrate has increased by 1%. The increase stopped a steady decline.
Although this is a good thing, I think Elon Musk is right in his concerns. Elon Musk mentioned the 2021 statistic to me when he was on my podcast earlier this month.
Elon Musk Is Raising Awareness About Population Decline
The Tesla CEO has been raising awareness about the decline in population for quite some time. Today on Twitter he shared a few tweets that echoed what he told me in my podcasts a couple of weeks ago. He tweeted that he’s doing his best to help with the crisis and added, “A collapsing birthrate is the biggest danger civilization faces by far.”
Doing my best to help the underpopulation crisis.
A collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces by far.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 7, 2022
His tweets come as the news of him having another set of twins made its way around Twitter. (Congratulations, Elon!) During our conversation, I brought up a reason that I thought was pretty valid and it opened a good debate where I think we both learned a little from one another. I certainly learned from him.
I’ve always thought poverty played a key role, but I could be wrong. I have friends at all income levels who have children. I also have friends at various income levels who don’t and the most common complaint I’ve heard is that ‘children are too expensive.’ I think what Kim Paquette asked Elon was very important.
https://twitter.com/kimpaquette/status/1545050919561093120
Elon Musk’s Thoughts On Population Decline
Elon pointed out to me that there’s another issue playing a major role in the birthrate decline and this makes the most sense.
“Well, the population decline problem, I think, is possibly the biggest risk to civilization. It’s certainly one of the biggest risks. First of all, a lot of people think that there’s too many humans on the planet and the planet can’t sustain this number of humans.”
“This is absolutely not true we could double the population without any meaningful damage to the environment. You can put all the humans on earth in the City of New. York. That’s the cross-sectional area of humans.”
“They literally fit the city of New. York with on one floor you don’t even need high-rises. If you’re on a plane flight and you look down and you say, ‘what percentage of the time, if I were to drop a ball, would that ball would hit a person?’”
“Basically zero. Even in a city like LA which you would think ‘oh that’s a crowded city.’ But looking at it from above, what’s the cross-sectional area of humans relative to the rest of the ground? And it’s much less than one percent in even in LA.”
“If you’re in a big city environment and you see a lot of people you sort of extrapolate that to everywhere. But it’s actually very rare to see a concentration of humans. The earth is very sparsely populated with humans. There’s not enough humans far from being too many.”
“And I think people are still operating on the assumption that the population’s just growing like crazy when in fact the opposite is occurring. And these numbers are easy to look up. I mean, they’re just on the internet. We had the lowest birth rate in recorded history last year.”
Again, I think that Elon Musk is right to raise awareness about the low birthrate. Whether or not you agree with Elon Musk on the topic of population, he’s doing a good thing by raising awareness.
USA birth rate has been below min sustainable levels for ~50 years pic.twitter.com/v5PSLbvEAE
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 24, 2022
TESLARATI Premium Membership
$19.99 USD
Elon Musk put a number on where he thinks SpaceX’s Starship program is headed by 2030, replying on X a day after President Trump signed a memo pushing the country toward 1,000 space launches and reentries a year.
The exchange started when Aaron Burnett, co-founder of propulsion startup Mach 33, posted that “1,000 launches/reentries is the goal,” quoting White House science adviser Michael Kratsios on the newly signed National Space Transportation Policy. Burnett noted that the FAA’s own bull-case forecast reached only 385 annual launches by 2030, while his firm’s conservative model already put SpaceX alone near 940. Musk responded, “We’re aiming to reach 30+ Starship launches/day in 2030, which is ~10k annualized. Still tiny numbers compared to airplane flights!”
We’re aiming to reach 30+ Starship launches/day in 2030, which is ~10k annualized.
Still tiny numbers compared to airplane flights!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 21, 2026
That figure is specific to Starship, the rocket SpaceX is still developing for orbital and lunar missions, not the Falcon 9 fleet that carries most of the company’s current launch volume. Starship has flown twice this year, a slower pace than the four and five flights SpaceX managed in 2024 and 2025. Getting from two flights a year to 30 a day is the scale of jump the new federal policy is meant to clear regulatory room for.
Trump’s memo, signed Thursday, directs agencies to identify new launch and reentry sites on federal land, including a new reentry site within 90 days, and to speed up the permitting and environmental reviews that have long slowed cadence growth. It also sets a goal of returning American astronauts to the moon by 2028 and placing initial lunar base elements by 2030, tying the launch buildout directly to NASA’s Artemis program.
SpaceX has already been pushing the FAA toward higher numbers on its own. The agency approved up to 44 annual Starship launches from Kennedy Space Center in February, on top of a 2024 review that raised the cap at Starbase in Texas to 25 a year. Those approvals cover a fraction of the 10,000 annual flights Musk is now describing, which shows how far current permitting still sits from the administration’s stated target.
The near-term test of all this is more modest. SpaceX cleared a full-duration, six-engine static fire on its next Starship vehicle this week, the last major hardware checkpoint before Flight 14, which is targeting no earlier than August 28 and is expected to attempt the vehicle’s first full orbital mission. Musk said last week that a tower catch of the upper stage is still probably months away, a reminder that the immediate roadmap remains far more incremental than the daily launch numbers he just posted.
Tesla will resolve its massive recall of nearly three million vehicles in China with stickers and a software update.
On Friday, Chinese regulators filed recall plans against Tesla, Xiaomi, Leapmotor, Xpeng, Chery, Geely, Dongfeng, Arcfox, and FAW to resolve what is essentially a carbon-copy issue throughout each of the companies’ vehicle models: emergency door release latches are simply not visible enough.
Tesla door handle saga gets its latest chapter and a big change is coming
TESLARATI Premium Membership
$19.99 USD
The companies will be required to add things that will make these latches, which will open the door in the event of an emergency, more visible. Of the 7 million vehicles impacted, Tesla accounts for 2,975,910 units. More than 1.9 million of those are Model Y vehicles, with the rest, just over 970,000, being Model 3s.
To resolve the issue, Tesla is going to add warning labels to the emergency latches free of charge, and then utilize an Over-the-Air update to add a post-crash window-lowering strategy, according to CNEVpost.
This massive effort to fix the all-electric Model Y and Model 3’s emergency latch system comes just months after several probes across various markets identified the trouble some had identifying this latch. Those who had gotten involved in car accidents that stripped the vehicle of its power were not aware that every Tesla has emergency door latches.
China’s State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) said that severe crashes that disable a vehicle’s low-voltage system could not only hinder occupants from getting out, but also make it more difficult for emergency response workers to gain entry.
SAMR is starting to tighten the regulations it has on door handles on vehicles. A new mandatory national standard will take effect for all models starting January 1, 2027, and will require all doors to be equipped with mechanical release mechanisms. This will effectively end purely electronic door handles. Models already on sale with type approval have been granted a two-year transition period, which will enable things to change until January 2029.
Tesla has officially confirmed plans to bring its all-electric Semi truck to Europe, with full specifications and market-launch details set for unveiling at the IAA Transportation trade fair in Hannover, Germany.
The event runs September 15–20, with a possible press preview on September 14. The announcement, shared via Tesla’s Semi account, marks a significant expansion beyond North America nearly nine years after the truck’s original 2017 reveal.
🚨 Tesla Semi is coming to Europe!
Sustainable logistics is a huge market internationally, and now Tesla is involved in it outside of the U.S. market! https://t.co/q3hjX6ybMv pic.twitter.com/mxTaVY3UsE
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) August 20, 2026
In the United States, the Semi’s path has been gradual. Limited pilot production and customer deliveries began in late 2022, primarily to fleets such as PepsiCo. After years of refinement, high-volume manufacturing started on April 29, 2026, at a dedicated facility adjacent to Gigafactory Nevada.
The plant targets an annual capacity of 50,000 units, though the ramp is expected to be gradual, with “many thousands” of trucks projected by the end of 2026.
Demand is building, with recent orders including 500 units for Einride (deliveries starting September 2026, serving Amazon and others) and hundreds more from operators such as WattEV. Pricing stands at approximately $260,000 for the Standard Range and $290,000 for the Long Range before incentives.
Tesla Semi pricing revealed after company uncovers trim levels
Earlier in 2026, Tesla finalized production specifications that incorporated substantial updates. In February, the company detailed two variants designed for a full 82,000-pound gross combination weight.
The Standard Range offers about 325 miles of range with a 548 kWh battery and curb weight under 20,000 pounds. The Long Range delivers roughly 500 miles with an 822 kWh pack and a 23,000-pound curb weight. Both use three independent rear-axle motors producing up to 800 kW (about 1,073 horsepower), achieve energy consumption of around 1.7 kWh per mile, and support megawatt-class charging at up to 1.2 MW—recovering about 60 percent of range in 30 minutes through the MCS standard.
Additional refinements include a roughly 1,000-pound weight reduction versus earlier prototypes, improved aerodynamics, a 48-volt electrical architecture, electric power take-off up to 25 kW for refrigerated trailers, and fleet management software with over-the-air updates.
These advances position the Semi as a competitive option against diesel trucks on operating costs and performance. For Europe, adaptations such as lighting, cab configurations (including potential sleeper options), and regulatory compliance are anticipated.
With series production underway in Nevada and major fleet commitments secured, the upcoming IAA reveal will clarify timelines, European-specific specs, and pricing, potentially accelerating electrification of heavy-duty freight on both continents.
SpaceX and a new Trump order that could rewrite the next decade of launches
Tesla will resolve massive China recall with stickers and a software update
