My Hero – Elon Musk

MY HERO      

It took me some time to figure out which hero to choose. I looked up a site called 100 people who changed the world. I have thought about Einstein, Franklin Roosevelt and Elvis Presley but finally I have chosen Elon Musk as my hero.  He is very concerned about the environment and the ultimate existence of life on the Earth and is taking actions to improve things. These issues are my concern as well, therefore he is my hero.

I learned that Elon moved from South-Africa to Canada and attended Queen’s University.  He left there in 1992 and went to the University of Pennsylvania. He studied business and physics and got an undergraduate degree in economics (undergraduate programs are more general in nature) and studied another year to get a second bachelor’s degree in physics.  Then Elon went to Stanford University in California. He wanted to pursue a Ph.D. in energy physics. Instead of doing that he left the university already after two days. It was the time of the Internet boom and Elon Musk became a part of it. He developed an online city guide, named Zip2.

He sold Zip2 and became rich. With his money he started Paypal. With PayPal, customers can do easy and secure payment transactions over the Internet. He sold it later and became one of the youngest billionaires in the world. Elon Musk now had such an amount of money that he could start the companies he dreamt about, a space company and a electric car company.

SpaceX stands for Space Exploration Technologies Corporation. Elon Musk founded it in 2002. Their aim is to bring a revolution to space technology and transportation. Their ultimate goal is to enable people to live on other planets. SpaceX focuses on the progress of its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch system and the development of re-usable rocket technology. SpaceX has also works on concepts and designs to realize future heavy-lift and super-heavy lift rockets that are resuable. The goal of SpaceX and its Chief Technology Officer Elon Musk is to send manned flights to Mars in the next twenty years. Therefore they need to have powerful launch vehicles that can send payloads of up to 100 metric tons to Mars.

Falcon 9 began flying in 2010. It is a two-stage rocket for the reliable and safe transport of satellites and the Dragon spacecraft into orbit. An orbit is a regular, repeating path that one object in space takes around another one. Dragon is a free-flying spacecraft. It is designed to deliver cargo and people to orbiting destinations. Since 2012 Dragon delivers cargo to the International Space Station and returns safely cargo to Earth. In agreement with NASA, SpaceX develops now the last things that are needed to fly crew, the Crew Dragon, SpaceX’s next-generation spacecraft designed to carry humans to the International Space Station and other destinations.

Except from SpaceX Elon Musk also started Tesla Motors for developing completely electric cars. Tesla started with a small car to learn about battery technology and power trains. The car was based on the Lotus Elise, a small sports cars. After the Tesla Roadster, Tesla started to design a complete new car, the model S. The model S was a car designed for mass production. This was a luxery sedan that can drive 502 km that is much more than the Tesla roadster.

To charge the new sedan fast, Tesla developed a network of superchargers along the highways to enable drivers for long ranges. These superchargers make it possible to charge the battery whitin half a hour. Tesla made a lot of superchargers stations to make it possible to drive all the way in Europe and North- America.

In order to sell even more cars Tesla needs more batteries. Tesla therefore started to build a huge battery factory, the Gigafactory. Because the Tesla Model 3 will be available in 2017, a car affordable for many people, large amounts of batteries are needed. Tesla  also needs batteries for their power storage solutions. The Giga Factory is now being built in Nevada and will be ready in 2016. This factory has the biggest footprint for a building on the world. The roof of this factory will be filled with solar panels. The factory will produce its own energy completely.

One of the other businesses of Elon Musk is SolarCity, founded by his cousins. SolarCity is America’s largest solar power provider. They make clean energy available to homeowners, businesses, schools, non-profits and government organizations at a lower cost than they pay for energy generated by burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas. Their approach is to install systems to the highest standards while making the switch to clean energy simple for the customers. Customers do not have to pay for the solar planels. SolarCity pays for the panels and sell the energy to the customer for a bit less then the normal rate.

One of the problems with solar enrgy is that the sun only shines half the day. At night you cannot use solar energy to light your house. Energie storage was very expensive and difficult until now. Tesla developed a battery, the Powerwall, for regular houses to store solar energy during the day and use it during the night or use it when the power is down. The solution from Tesla is very compact and cheap and will be available in 2016. For this product Tesla  also needs  batteries.

Because my father likes to store energy of our solar panels we also ordered the Powerwall.

Day 1: My Hero

It took me some time to figure out which hero to choose. I looked up a site called 100 people who changed the world.

I have thought about Einstein, Franklin Roosevelt and Elvis Presley but finally I have chosen Elon Musk as my hero.  He became my hero because my father is a true fan of his and he told me a lot of interesting things Elon invented.  We do have a Tesla Model S at home for example. It is pure electric and we also have solar panels on our roof to produce electricity.

We watched together the presentation about the Power Wall. It is an energy storage for electricity at home. It works like a battery and stores solar power, cheap off-peak electricity and delivers it when it is needed.

I was also impressed about the fact that Elon was one of the youngest billionaires on earth.

Day 2: Elon Musk and Zip2

On day two I wanted to find out more about how Elon Musk became a billionaire at such a young age.

A article gave further information about it. I learned that Elon moved from South-Africa to Canada and attended Queen’s University.  He left there in 1992 and went to the University of Pennsylvania. He studied business and physics and got an undergraduate degree in economics (uundergraduate programs are more general in nature) and studied another year to get a second bachelor’s degree in physics.  Then Elon went to Stanford University in California. He wanted to pursue a Ph.D. in energy physics. Instead of doing that he left the university already after two days. It was the time of the internet boom and Elon Musk became a part of it. He developed an online city guide, named Zip2.

Elon Musk needed investors for his company for further developments. He eventually sold the majority control of Zip2 to investors in exchange for a $3.6 million investments. Elon sold the company later for $307 million in cash and $34 in stock options to a division of Compaq Computer Corporation in 1999. Elon was then 28 years old!

Day 3: PayPal

I was curious what Elon Musk used his money for. So I searched on the internet for information about it. I found out that Elon was a co-founder of X.com in 1999, the same year he earned his first million dollars.

X.com was a company that offered online financial services. X.com bought the company Confinity. Confinity had started to develop a special service: PayPal. At the end it led to the creation of PayPal as it is known today. With PayPal customers can do easy and secure payment transactions over the Internet.

eBay bought PayPal for $1,5 billion in stock in October 2002. Elon Musk had 11% of PayPal stock. After that he did a project called SpaceX I read. On day 4 I wanted to find out more about SpaceX.

Day 4: Space-X

stands for Space Exploration Technologies Corporation. Elon Musk founded it in 2002. Their aim is to bring a revolution to space technology and transportation. Their ultimate goal is to enable people to live on other planets. SpaceX focuses on the progress of its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch system and the development of re-usable rocket technology.

SpaceX has also works on concepts and designs to realize future heavy-lift and super-heavy lift rockets. The goal of SpaceX and its Chief Technology Officer Elon Musk is to send manned flights to Mars in the next twenty years. Therefore they need to have powerful launch vehicles that can send payloads of up to 100 metric tons to Mars.

Because I don’t know anything about the Falcon 9, the Falcon Heavy launch system and re-usable rocket technology I will look for information about it on day 5. 

     

Day 5: Space-X, Falcon and Dragon

On day 5 I watched a SpaceX Falcon 9 v1.1 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral on April 14th 2015. It was the 17th rocket that they launched. It carried a Dragon CRS-6 capsule and reached orbit in 10 minutes. It carried 1,898kg of cargo.

Falcon 9 began flying in 2010. It is a two-stage rocket for the reliable and safe transport of satellites and the Dragon spacecraft into orbit. An orbit is a regular, repeating path that one object in space takes around another one.

Dragon is a free-flying spacecraft. It is designed to deliver cargo and people to orbiting destinations. Since 2012 Dragon delivers cargo to the International Space Station and returns safely cargo to Earth. In agreement with NASA, SpaceX develops now the last things that are needed to fly crew, the Crew Dragon, SpaceX’s next-generation spacecraft designed to carry humans to the International Space Station and other destinations.

Day 6: Tesla Roadster

What was Elon Musk’s next project? Tesla motors was founded 2003. They named the company after Nikola Tesla who invented and patented in 1888 the electric motor they used for Tesla motors. Until then electric cars were performing at low speeds over short distances. The Tesla roadster was the first electric car of Tesla. With the car they tried to learn about batteries and electric power train. They did not want to create a complite car. That is why they created the car based on the Lotes Elise. Tesla used the knowledge to develop the Tesla Model S, Model X and Model 3. The Tesla Roadster was able to drive 340 km. The Tesla Roadster was launched in 2008 and  produced and sold in the years 2008-2012.

                   

Day 7: Model S

After the Tesla Roadster, Tesla started to design a complete new car, the model S. The model S was a car designed for mass production.

This was a luxery sedan that could drive 502 km. That is much more than the Tesla Roadster could drive. To charge the new sedan fast. Tesla developed a supercharger. This supercharger makes it posible to charge the battery within half a hour. Tesla built a lot of supercharger stations to make it possible to drive all the way through Europe and North- America.

             

Day 8: Giga Factory

The Giga factory was being built by Tesla to make batteries in mass production. Because of the fact that the Tesla Model 3 will be available in 2017 a large amount of batteries is needed. The Tesla Model 3 is a car that will be affordable for many people. Tesla also needs batteries for their power storage solutions. I will write about that later.

The Giga factory is now being built in Nevada and will be ready in 2016. It will be the world’s largest lithium-ion battery factory. This factory has the biggest footprint for a building on the world. The roof of this factory will be filled with solar panels. The factory will produce its own energy completely.

     

Day 9: Solar City

SolarCity is America’s largest solar power provider. They make clean energy available to homeowners, businesses, schools, non-profits and government organizations at a lower cost than they pay for energy generated by burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas. Their approach is to install systems to the highest standards while making the switch to clean energy simple for the customers.

Customers do not have to pay for the solar planels. Solar City pays for the panels and sell the energy to the customer for a bit less then the normal rate.

    

Day 10: Powerwall

One of the problems with solar enrgy is that the sun only shines half the day. At night you cannot use solar energy to light your house.Energie storage was very expensive and difficult.Tesla developed a battery,the Powerwall, for regular houses to store solar energy during the day and use it during the night or use it when the power is down.

The solution from Tesla is very compact and cheap and will available in 2016. For this product Tesla  also needs  batteries.

Because my father likes to store energy of our solar panels we also ordered the Powerwall.

   

References

http://www.biographyonline.net/people/people-who-changed-world.html

http://inventors.about.com/od/mstartinventions/p/Elon-Musk.htm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKORsrlN-2k

http://spaceflight101.com/spacex-launch-vehicle-concepts-designs/

http://www.teslamotors.com/presskit/teslaenergy

http://www.biography.com/people/elon-musk-20837159  

http://www.biography.com/people/elon-musk-20837159  

http://science.howstuffworks.com/elon-musk1.htm

http://forbexsuccesstories.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/elon-musk-pictures-billionaire-tesla-ironman-entrepreneur-founder-space-x-solar-city-mars-rockets.html

http://www.spacex.com/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujX6CuRELFE

http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/5-8/features/nasa-knows/what-is-orbit-58.html

http://www.spacex.com/

http://www.spacex.com/falcon9

http://spaceflight101.com/spacex-launch-vehicle-concepts-designs/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjSb_b4TtxI

http://my.teslamotors.com/nl_NL/roadster/specs

http://www.teslamotors.com/about

http://www.teslamotors.com/nl_NL/gigafactory

http://www.solarcity.com/