Toyota Chief Scientist and Toyota Research CEO Gill Pratt recently shared his thoughts about the climate crisis, as well as the need to reduce carbon emissions in the transportation sector. The executive is quite knowledgeable about sustainable vehicles, as evidenced by the three cars he currently owns: a Toyota Sienna Hybrid, a RAV4 Prime Plug-In Hybrid (PHEV), and an all-electric Tesla Model X.
In a post on Medium, Pratt urged readers to follow the science and acknowledge that a diversified approach to battling climate change is more preferable than a transition to pure electric cars like his Model X. The executive cited the cost of battery production, the need for natural resources, and the emissions of battery manufacturing as reasons for his stance. He also noted that while he loves his 300-mile Model X, his vehicle’s large battery is pretty much wasted on an everyday basis since its range is usually not utilized fully.
“I love my Tesla Model X BEV. But commuting 30 miles in it every day — the average US commute — and recharging it every night is wasteful of the carbon reducing potential of most of its over 300 mile range battery. Sometimes we take the Tesla on long trips. But most of the time, 90% of its battery cells aren’t doing any good, and would reduce carbon much more if they were harder at work in other types of electrified vehicles, including HEVs or PHEVs,” the Toyota Research CEO wrote.
With this in mind, Pratt argued that it would be more efficient if batteries are distributed to more “right-sized” electrified vehicles instead, including hybrids and PHEVs. The cells that could go on one Tesla, for example, could instead be used for several electrified cars. “We hardly ever put gas into our RAV4 Prime PHEV, which has a battery ⅙ as large as our Model X BEV. For the same investment in batteries as our single Model X, five other RAV4 Prime customers could reduce their carbon footprint too,” Pratt explained.
The Toyota executive did note that he is a proponent for increased battery production, the lowering of the carbon footprint of electric power plants, and the expansion of rapid charging stations. However, Patt also argued that in many countries, a lot of the easier carbon reduction of electric power plants had already been achieved by converting them to natural gas, effectively lowering their carbon output by half. Replacing the plants with new nuclear, wind, and solar facilities would be more difficult and more costly, added the Toyota Research CEO.
Ultimately, Pratt noted that he and Toyota believe that the transition to pure electric vehicles, such as those planned in Europe and areas like China, is not the right way to battle climate change. He then noted that in the fight for sustainability, carbon should be seen as the enemy, not the internal combustion engine, as PHEVs and hybrids would, in some parts of the world, generate comparable or even less emissions than pure electric cars.
“I believe, as does Toyota, that it would be a tremendous mistake for governments around the world to prescribe narrow solutions like insisting that all vehicles be BEVs. Instead, the better solution is to allow manufacturers to innovate across a diversity of drivetrains and drivers to choose the low-carbon drivetrain that suits their circumstances best,” he wrote.
While the Toyota Research CEO’s points are notable, the scientist did neglect to mention several developments that are currently ongoing in the battery sector. Battery production costs are going down at a rapid pace, with EVs closing in on price parity with their internal combustion-powered counterparts. The emissions of battery production are expected to be improved over time too, as companies like Tesla innovate and adopt more sustainable technologies such as cobalt-free batteries. Large batteries such as those used in the Toyota executive’s Model X are likely not wasted either despite not being used for their maximum range every day. Battery recycling technologies such as those being developed by Redwood Materials, which is aimed at creating a closed-loop battery supply chain, play a role in making batteries more sustainable as well.
Toyota Research CEO Gill Pratt’s points could be read here.
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Elon Musk
SpaceX Starship just nailed something it’s never done before
SpaceX’s Starship flew successfully Friday, landing both stages and deploying its first Starlink V3 satellites.
Starship’s thirteenth test flight delivered exactly what SpaceX needed with a clean liftoff, two successful stage recoveries, and the first real payload the vehicle has ever carried to space. Booster 20 and Ship 40 lifted off at 5:51 p.m. CT from Starbase, and by the time the mission wrapped roughly an hour later, both halves of the rocket had done exactly what they were supposed to do.
Booster 20 separated from Ship 40 a few minutes into the flight and stuck a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico about six minutes after liftoff. That is a meaningful turnaround from Flight 12 in May, when the booster lost several engines during its boostback burn before a hard water landing attempt.
Starship as seen from Starlink satellites pic.twitter.com/e2hvfmnewh
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 25, 2026
Starship 40’s performance was arguably the bigger win. The vehicle deployed the first 20 operational Starlink V3 satellites Starship has ever carried, then flew a suborbital arc to a landing in the Indian Ocean that SpaceX commentator Dan Huot called the company’s softest splashdown yet. “This is a dream scenario for this team that’s trying to get this heat shield data,” Huot said on the live broadcast, according to Space.com’s live coverage. “I’m a little over the moon right now. Wow. Lucky number 13.”
Unlike the mass simulators SpaceX flew on Flight 12, these were production Starlink V3 satellites, meant to extend solar arrays and antennas and attempt to link with the broader constellation before reentering minutes later. Getting real hardware through a full deploy sequence on only the second flight of the V3 generation keeps Starship on schedule for the payload work NASA is counting on for future Artemis lunar landings.
What an awesome launch, really seems like everything went super well and it was all incredibly smooth.
SpaceX is awesome. Very interested to see how the market will respond on Monday pic.twitter.com/KSHmyBfV55
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 25, 2026
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 25, 2026
The flight also arrives at a moment when SpaceX needed a win. SPCX has traded below its $135 IPO price since mid-July, as Teslarati reported when the mission slipped to Friday, and short interest has climbed to roughly a third of the tradable float. A clean flight will not fix a balance sheet, but it does answer the one question SpaceX absolutely needed answered this week: whether the fixes made after the July 16 abort would hold up under real flight conditions. They did, on both stages, on the first try after the redesign.
SpaceX has not set a target date for Flight 14, though the company has said it wants to push toward an orbital attempt on the next mission. After Friday, that goal looks a lot more within reach.
Tesla’s Supercharger Diner in Los Angeles dominated the company’s global usage rankings after just one year, proving the concept is more than just a one-off novelty location that will fade away.
The performance could incite the company to build more locations, something that CEO Elon Musk has hinted at for some time.
Tesla’s Supercharger Diner delivered 21.2 GWh of energy in its first year of operation, the company’s head of Charging, Max de Zegher, revealed on X. Of the top 10 most utilized Supercharger locations in Tesla’s global infrastructure, the Diner in Los Angeles was the most used by drivers, and it wasn’t particularly close:
Tesla Diner opened exactly 1 year ago. Inspiring that futuristic places like this exist.
It’s our highest usage Supercharger in the world: 21.2 GWh delivered in a year, 1.6k sessions/day.
Top 10 Superchargers by energy delivered: https://t.co/9YvJ8lw696 pic.twitter.com/koB3AUJHws
— Max (@MdeZegher) July 21, 2026
On its launch day one year ago, nobody was too sure what the Tesla Diner would be about. It seemed like an interesting concept, and considering it had been in the works for years, it was a highly anticipated launch that many were looking forward to.
Based on its success, we could see additional Diners with Superchargers built throughout the United States, and potentially beyond. Musk has said on several occasions that the company would be willing to bring the Diner idea to more markets.
Tesla makes major change at Supercharger Diner amid epic demand
Of the markets that Musk has mentioned, both Palo Alto and Austin have come to be perceived as ideal selections. However, there are no concrete plans as of now to build new Supercharger Diners anywhere; the location on Santa Monica Boulevard will remain the exclusive spot to pick up Tesla-inspired eats, at least for the time being.
Tesla short sellers won big following the company’s massive fall on Wall Street after it reported subpar Earnings on Wednesday.
Tesla short sellers collected about $4.12 billion in single-day profits on Thursday, according to Bloomberg. Shares fell as much as 15 percent during Thursday’s session. It closed as one of the worst days for Tesla on Wall Street in the past three years.
Investors sold off the stock after Tesla said it would aggressively direct its spending toward AI and its Optimus robot project. The company had record revenues, which were driven by one of the strongest quarters in terms of vehicle deliveries in company history.
However, it missed EPS estimates by reporting just $0.33, a far cry from the $0.53 analysts expected.
S3 Partners reported that about 3 percent of Tesla’s outstanding stock is sold short. Managing Director at S3, Ihor Dusaniwsky, provided the short seller’s potential profit, as well as another figure: shorts have likely had paper gains of $8.92 billion this year, as Tesla shares are down 30 percent in 2026.
Tesla (TSLA) Q2 2026 earnings results: miss on EPS, beat on revenue
Tesla has burned short sellers many times in the past, but the company’s latest Earnings Call was a chance for those skeptics to taste some payback. Although the company gave some very transparent information regarding future projects, the rollout of Robotaxi, Optimus, and Semi, many investors took their profits on Thursday.
Notable short sellers like Michael Burry have been transparent about their skepticism around Tesla shares. Burry just revealed three weeks ago that he had opened up a new short on the stock, stating he shorted Tesla shares at $416.22. “Happy it jumped back to this level,” he said in a blog post.
At the time of publication, Tesla shares were down about 3 percent and the stock was trading at $309.92.
SpaceX Starship just nailed something it’s never done before
Tesla’s Supercharger Diner probably just secured more locations
