He's "invested" in solar because it is a scam that makes money for him. The tools who put his panels on their roofs get nothing and don't gain any energy independence. OTOH the power that Musk sells from those panels is sold at full retail price whether it is worth that much or not. It is only worth that much on sunny summer afternoons when it can be fed to nearby A/C units. Otherwise we (rate payers) are vastly overpaying for unreliable and off-peak power. In addition to the rate payer subsidies, Musk picks up taxpayer subsidies.
As for charging electric cars with solar, that is ridiculous. The cars are charged at night using coal power from the grid. If you want to charge cars during the day you get 10 Watts per square foot and you need about 100kWh to charge an 85kWh battery with conversion and charging losses. With 4-5 hours of good sun you get 100kWh from 2000 square feet of panels. Unless the commuting destination is near the rooftop solar installations that is not feasible.
Also the idea that taxpayers ought to subsidize wasteful luxury electric cars is completely insane.
Tesla claims that the hot swap facilities will be co-located with the “Supercharger” fast charging stations. The goal is to have 50 batteries charged and ready to go at each station.
The Supercharger charge (50% charge in 20 minutes) will be free, the battery swap will cost about as much as a tank of gas.
And they are using solar power to operate this system?
I don’t see how that can possibly work.
Eventually, they will have to use grid power to do the charges, and that means the “free” part is gone forever.
It’s a great selling point now, but it won’t last.