In the course of the development of civilization, humanity has repeatedly encountered complex problems, sometimes of planetary nature. However, still, this was distant prehistory, a kind of incubation period of modern global problems. They became fully apparent in the second half and especially in the last quarter of the twentieth century. A complex of reasons that caused such problems manifested in this period.
Environmental degradation, depletion of natural resources, terrorism, and uncontrolled population growth pose a severe threat to the entire world, not individual nations. Moreover, if these issues remain unresolved, they may cause regression in human development and put its survival in question. The only way to prevent this is for all countries to join forces. One of the major global problems is climate change and global warming. According to the UN report, human activity is the main factor in raising the Earth’s average temperature (Cai & Liu, 2020).
Because of industrial growth, deforestation, mining, and automobile emissions, more and more greenhouse gases are released into the air, destroying the ozone layer and leading to global warming. Even a slight increase in the Earth’s average temperature, according to the UN, can lead to catastrophe (Cai & Liu, 2020). Melting glaciers raise the level of the world’s oceans, flooding coastal areas. Many permafrost cities may be cut off from the world. Some areas become arid, unfit for agriculture, and in some cases, uninhabitable. This would lead to the reduction of flora and fauna and the frequency of natural disasters.
If the current trend continues, by 2100, there may be no land left on the planet suitable for cultivation, and all life will be threatened with extinction (Bullock et al., 2017). In this paper, I would like to discuss how the world’s businesses can make a difference in the climate. I will use the example of Tesla, a company that has been fighting for years to preserve the environment.
A $100 million grant from Elon Musk shows that he is genuinely committed to fighting climate change. Even though his main business – Tesla – was able to report four consecutive profitable quarters only after 17 years, the billionaire has not stopped investing in electric cars and solar energy development (Hyeonjoo, 2020). Overall, the entire electric car business can be classified as environmentally friendly and sustainable.
As of the end of 2019, the company had sold more than 550,000 electric cars, which had driven approximately 16 billion kilometers. In total, Tesla electric car drivers have reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 4 million tons, equivalent to saving emissions from 500,000 cars with internal combustion engines (Agnihotri & Bhattacharya, 2019). The question of where to get electricity to recharge the cars remains unresolved.
Critics of Elon Musk and Tesla point out that electricity is often generated by coal and gas plants, which cannot be called environmentally friendly. For this reason, Elon Musk bought SolarCity, a company that produces solar panels. His goal was to develop renewable energy. “People think of Tesla as an electric car company, but the goal of the company is to accelerate the emergence of sustainable energy,” Elon Musk said at the SolarCity and Tesla merger event (Hyeonjoo, 2020). In 2016, Tesla announced that it had almost wholly converted islands in American Samoa to solar power. It took more than 5,300 solar panels and 60 Tesla batteries (Hyeonjoo, 2020).
The company is also in the business of making solar-powered charging stations for electric cars. The company’s goal is to convert all of its plants to renewable energy, make them waste-free, and reduce its use of resources. The Tesla plant in Tilburg in the Netherlands assembles cars for the European market. The company has almost completely switched to solar energy.
The plant in Fremont, California, uses LED lighting and other energy-saving technologies. In five years, the company has been able to save more than 10 GWh of electricity. In 2016, the Fremont plant achieved “zero waste” status (Hyeonjoo, 2020). The plant sends 93 percent of its waste for recycling or incineration with energy recovery. The company has a recycling center, which produces a variety of goods from recycled materials. The plant in Buffalo, N.Y., recycles all of the usable wood that comes into the facility. The auto plant reuses 90 percent of the plastic pallets from suppliers or sends them for recycling (Hyeonjoo, 2020). To save water, Tesla uses a waterless method to wash its cars. First, a special cleaner is applied, and then it is enough to wipe the body.
The Fremont plant uses a closed water cycle – treated wastewater is returned to production. In one year, the plant has been able to reduce its water consumption by 9% (Perkins & Murmann, 2018). An essential aspect of the green production of electric cars is the batteries, and car manufacturers receive the most criticism for it. It is possible to take back used Tesla batteries through official representatives of the company worldwide.
The batteries go to recycling plants, where valuable metals are extracted, and other parts produce new goods (Goldstein, 2021). Tesla’s lithium-ion battery plant in Nevada is working on a method to recover important components – such as lithium and cobalt. Together with recovered copper, steel, and aluminum, it will all go into producing new batteries. This will reduce the extraction of valuable metals, which is always associated with a negative impact on the environment. Analysts predict that soon cobalt may become scarce (Perkins & Murmann, 2018). Also, cobalt mining is associated with the use of child labor, as the leading supplier of this metal is Congo, one of the most corrupt countries in the world.
Although Tesla is fighting climate change worldwide, industry analysts focus on the Chinese market for new energy vehicles. This is not surprising, given China’s environmental problems, the level of air pollution in Chinese cities, and the government’s stated goals of reducing air emissions. China is facing the ambitious goal of eliminating greenhouse gas emissions by 2060 (Goldstein, 2021). This means that the electric transport market will have a very long period of active growth.
There are several objective reasons for Tesla’s dominance in the Chinese market. Firstly, Tesla was one of the first to obtain permission to build its production facilities without local partners, thus protecting its technical solutions and developments from being copied by local manufacturers as much as possible. Second, the strong brand position of the company and its founder played a role, as well as the peculiarity of the Chinese mentality – choosing the best and most expensive brands in their category.
All this gave Tesla a few years’ head start and helped the U.S. company create a quasi-monopoly in the Chinese market. Today Tesla generates about 22% of its revenue in the Chinese market, with sales of American electric cars in volume terms still exceeding the combined sales of local manufacturers by almost half (Maamoun, 2021). Thus, Tesla has a leading position in the Chinese market. Overall, the active development of the electric car market is a good initiative not only for China but also for the rest of the world. However, some skeptics oppose the transition to such cars. The reasons for motorists’ reticence toward electric cars vary. They include the habit of standard cars, the high price of such cars, and the underdeveloped infrastructure of electric charging stations.
Some are also embarrassed by studies that assert that electric cars are even more harmful to the climate than diesel-powered cars. They suggest that greenhouse gas emissions should be considered in the car’s operation and its production, refueling, and disposal. However, most researchers still agree that using electric cars is good for the environment (Williston, 2018). Thus, Tesla is an excellent example of how big businesses can help solve global human problems. Indeed, there are still many challenges in the world that need to be answered. Humanity’s priority problems are peace and disarmament, environmental, demographic, energy, raw materials, and food.
In addition, the problem of using the resources of the world’s oceans, the peaceful development of outer space, and overcoming the backwardness of developing countries are of concern (Hulme, 2021). The world’s foremost companies are directing their efforts to combat them daily. For example, they will give large grants to various research projects that will help make their products more environmentally friendly or humane. To illustrate, companies are shifting to more economical ways of marketing resources to reduce the need to mine them.
To summarize, in today’s world, humanity regularly faces a variety of challenges. The most acute of these are highlighted in a tacit list of the significant global challenges of humankind. Among them are climate change, the problem of overpopulation, the problem of peaceful space exploration, and many others (Churie-Kallhauge, 2017). Since large corporations have a considerable influence on the modern world, they should help humanity cope with our time’s challenges. One such company is Tesla, which is engaged in producing cars that use alternative ways of energy. Such cars are an excellent way to prevent rapid climate change because they do not emit hazardous substances into the atmosphere. Elon Musk, the company’s head, is actively interested in preventing climate change with new developments.
The company is working not only on the cars themselves but also on the production and improvement of high-tech engines for electric cars. The company is paying much attention to the market in China because that country has a high degree of air pollution. China, in turn, is actively promoting the electric car market among its population. I think this is an outstanding practice and should be applied not only in China but also in the rest of the world. Although some people, for various reasons, doubt the need to switch to alternative energy vehicles, we cannot ignore the fact that electric cars can help to slow down climate change on the planet. Thus, Tesla is an excellent example of how big businesses can help humanity cope with global challenges.
References
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Cai, T., & Liu, Z. (2020). Global Studies: Globalization and Globality. Routledge. Web.
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