According to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, the company will resume selling its electric vehicles for bitcoins provided that about 50% of the energy used to produce the cryptocurrency is environmentally friendly.
This condition is key for the founder of the electric-car maker as he is highly concerned about climate change. “When there’s confirmation of reasonable (~50%) clean energy usage by miners with positive future trend, Tesla will resume allowing bitcoin transactions,” Musk said in a tweet.
Notably, on March 24, Tesla revealed that the company would accept bitcoin as payment in the United States. The company planned to make this option available to customers outside the US some time later. However, on May 13, Elon Musk suspended vehicle purchases using BTC, citing environmental concerns for a swift reversal in the company’s position on the digital coin.
"Cryptocurrency is a good idea on many levels and we believe it has a promising future," the head of the firm noted. Nevertheless, it is important for the company to mitigate the environmental harm of bitcoin mining. Tesla's management is disturbed by the rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels, especially coal, "which has the worst emissions of any fuel" according to Musk.
