(Uncanny?) Parallel: Media Cycle, Climate Circle, and Tesla Models

The public interests for Tesla, its founder Elon Musk, and another of Musk’s ventures--SpaceX, are as intertwined with each other as they are sensitive to news events. According to the chart below generated with google search trends, we can perhaps mark a few historic points of interests for Tesla:

April 2016: Tesla announced release for Model 3, & Receiving 10 Billion in pre-order

February 2018: SpaceX sent a Tesla car into space. The day after, Musk announced one of its largest quarterly loss.

May 2020: SpaceX launched two NASA astronauts into space.

It is interesting to note, there is an annual cyclical trend for the search term “energy,” lower in summer seasons, and higher in winter seasons. This pattern would compare with the fluctuations on the CO2 variations as observed at Mauna Loa.

The geo-spatial data yields tremendous consistencies between environmental attitudes and Tesla’s presence. According to Yale’s interactive Climate Opinion Map (2020), all metropolitan areas in the U.S. think global warming is indeed happening. Yet where people hold a firmer opinion that global warming is happening, within these metropolitan regions, tend to overlap with those who think citizens should do more to address global warming. This is measured by the degrees of difference from the U.S. national average. Regions such as Seattle, the Bay Area, the Tri-state Area, and Washinton D.C. are noticeably pronounced in their environmental concerns for global warming.

Comparatively, Tesla’s presence mimics a similar pattern that covers major metropolitan areas. As measured by its stores and super-charger sites, Tesla has a most prominent residency in Seattle, the Bay Area, the Tri-state Area, and Washinton D.C., among other regions. Within California, the google search trend also points to a strong interest for Tesla, particularly in the Bay Area.

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P.S. In my preliminary search, I also tried to put in data relation to the environment (e.g., “Climate Change,” “Wildfire,” etc.,) and politics (e.g. “The Green New Deal,” “Jerry Brown,” “Gavin Newsom”-California’s previous and incumbent governors with ambitious climate goals). The results were either incomparable or did not demonstrate any correlation. (Tesla’s search relevance seemed to overshadow all others, as "Climate Change" would make "Tesla" appear insignificant.)