The three co-founders of Gridless at one of their mining sites in Kenya.
Erik Hersman
ACCRA, GHANA — Up until February, Janet Maingi didn’t think much about bitcoin. Born and raised in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, Maingi had instead spent more than twenty years focused on trying to solve one of Africa’s biggest problems: connectivity. To that end, she spent more than 20 years working in operations in the telecom industry, in companies specializing in internet and wireless networks to cable and satellite television. But earlier this year, the 45-year-old mother decided to take on the continent’s second-biggest issue: Its energy problem.
Africa is a renewable energy mecca. There’s an estimated 10 terawatts of solar capacity, 350 gigawatts of hydro, and another 110 gigawatts of wind, according to data from Energy, Capital & Power, an investment platform focused on Africa’s energy sector.
Some of this renewable energy is being harnessed already, but a lot of it isn’t, because it is expensive to build the kind of specialized infrastructure necessary to capture it. Even though Africa boasts 60% of the best solar resources globally, the continent only has 1% installed solar PV capacity, according to the International Energy Agency.
“When you sit back and look at rural Africa and rural Kenya, one of the things that is very prevalent in the homes — I am talking about the 50% that are not electrified — is children have to do their assignments using either paraffin lamps or candles,” Maingi told CNBC on the sidelines of the Africa Bitcoin Conference in Accra.
“Think of their eyesight, think of their health,” she said.
Gridless
Maingi was frustrated by the divide between generation and capacity, given that 43% of Africa’s population, or 600 million people, lack access to electricity. So in February, she began spitballing creative solutions with two friends, and the three of them landed on a sort-of counterintuitive idea: bitcoin mining.
Mining for the world’s biggest cryptocurrency is a process known as proof-of-work. Miners around the world run high-powered computers that collectively validate transactions and simultaneously create new tokens. The process requires a lot of electricity, and because this is the only variable cost in a low-margin industry, miners tend to seek out the world’s lowest-cost sources of power.
Philip Walton, Gridless co-founder and CFO, setting up a mini grid hydro site to mine with 20 kilowatts of power in Kenya.
Erik Hersman
Bitcoin gets a bad rap for the amount of energy it consumes, but it can also help to unlock these trapped renewable sources of energy. Bitcoin miners are essentially energy buyers, and when they co-locate with renewables, it creates a financial incentive for buildout and improves the core economics of renewable power production. The IEA says that in rural areas “where over 80% of the electricity-deprived live, mini-grids and stand-alone systems, mostly solar based, are the most viable solutions.”
By May, Maingi and her two colleagues decided to try it out. They founded a venture called Gridless to see whether the additional demand of bitcoin miners on these semi-stranded assets could make renewables in Africa economically viable — and crucially, whether the additional source of energy could power communities previously out of reach of microgrids that electrify parts of Africa.
Gridless also has plans to expand into other parts of Africa with the help of a fresh injection of cash.
Jack Dorsey’s digital payments firm Block and Alyse Killeen’s bitcoin-focused venture firm Stillmark, have led a $2 million seed investment into the company, which Gridless says it plans to use to open new mines.
Maingi is the chief operations officer, and her two friends turned co-founders, chief executive Erik Hersman, and chief financial officer Philip Walton, have spent the last several months launching pilots across Kenya in which they work with mini-grid hydro and solar generators to use their excess capacity to mine.
“We had spent years building internet connectivity infrastructure in rural and urban Africa, and realized that you cannot have a 21st-century economy without both power and connectivity together,” Hersman told CNBC.
The new 533 kilowatt site in Kenya where 300 kilowatts will be used for bitcoin mining.
Erik Hersman
“As we looked at the next problem to solve, we realized that bitcoin mining solved a major problem for renewable mini grid energy developers, in that we could be their industrial off-taker for stranded power, no matter where they were located, thereby making them more sustainable and increasing electrification across Africa,” continued Hersman.
Gridless currently has three operational pilot sites in Murang’a, a rural town that’s a 90-minute drive northeast of Nairobi. Each mine runs on hydroelectric power from HydroBox, an energy company based on the continent. Two of the mines have about 50 kilowatts of capacity, and by Thursday, the third mine will expand to 300 kilowatts.
To put those numbers into perspective, 30 kilowatts would power about 500 households. 50 kilowatts is closer to 800 households.
In January, Gridless plans to launch another 50-kilowatt hydromine in Malawi and its first solar-powered site in West Africa that will have a 30 kilowatt capacity.
Lowering energy costs
So far, the economics make a lot of sense for everyone involved. Gridless serves as a sort of anchor tenant. The company finances construction and manages the operation of data centers in rural communities where traditional industrial or commercial customers are not available, according to a company statement released Tuesday.
Gridless launching a new solar-powered mine in January 2023 in West Africa.
Erik Hersman
Because the power supplier benefits from selling energy that previously had been discarded, the energy plants will sometimes lower costs for the end user. At one of their pilot sites in Kenya, for example, the hydro plant dropped the price of power from 35 cents per kilowatt hour to 25 cents.
The buildout of capacity is also electrifying households. Gridless says they’ve already seen this translate to containerized cold storage for local farmers, battery charging stations for electric motorcycles and public WiFi points.
Once those types of needs are met, Gridless said in a statement that the remaining electricity capacity is used to power the bitcoin mine.
“Bitcoin and mining is really the tool. We’re not doing bitcoin for bitcoin,” said the lead for bitcoin mining and wallet at Block, Thomas Templeton. “The whole objective is really to empower these villages. Bitcoin is a means to that end.”
Block previously announced in April it would be teaming up with Blockstream to break ground on a solar- and battery-powered bitcoin mine in Texas that uses solar and storage technology from Tesla.
Block is also working on a project to make bitcoin mining more distributed and efficient.
Making the mining process more accessible has to do with more than just creating new bitcoin, according to Templeton. Instead, he says the company sees it as a long-term need for a future that is fully decentralized and permissionless.
The company is solving one major barrier to entry: Mining rigs are hard to find, expensive and delivery can be unpredictable. Block says it is looking into making a new ASIC, which is the specialized gear used to mine bitcoin.
Democratizing access to the mining process is big for Block. Right now, Africa accounts for around 0.2% of the global bitcoin hashrate (an industry term used to describe the collective computing power of the entire network),according to the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance. The bulk sum of the hashpower shifted from China to the U.S. over the last 18 months after Beijing banned crypto mining. Many in the industry tell CNBC that this kind of centralization is a problem.
“Decentralized mining is essential for the resiliency of bitcoin,” said Templeton, who added that Block kicked off its mining initiative to make mining more accessible, user-friendly and reliable, so that more people can mine.
It was a sentiment echoed by Dorsey in Accra on Tuesday morning. The Block CEO, who said he still plans to move to Africa for six months, added that Block wants to partner with other companies on the continent to make it easier to onboard people into bitcoin.
“We’re working on a hardware miner to make it more, hopefully, accessible and more efficient for people around the world and especially on the continent to participate in securing the network and making it even more resilient in the form of something that’s also useful for other things, not just mining.”
Supporting the rise of bitcoin mining across Africa also translates to another big goal for Block: Helping to accelerate global renewable hashrate.
“Gridless represents a close strategic alignment with our vision of ensuring the bitcoin network increasingly leverages clean energy, in combination with bitcoin computational centers around the world,” said Templeton.
Over the next two years, homebuilder Lennar is outfitting more than 1,500 new Colorado homes with Dandelion Energy’s geothermal systems in one of the largest residential geothermal rollouts in the US.
The big draw for homeowners is lower energy bills and cleaner heating and cooling. Dandelion claims Lennar homeowners with geothermal systems will collectively save around $30 million over the next 20 years compared to using air-source heat pumps. Geothermal heat pumps don’t need outdoor AC units or conventional heating systems, either.
Geothermal systems use the sustained temperature of the ground to heat or cool a home. A ground loop system absorbs heat energy (BTUs) from the earth so that it can be transferred to a heat pump and efficiently converted into warmth for a home. Dandelion says its ground loop systems are built to last for over 50 years and should require no maintenance.
Dandelion’s geothermal system uses a vertical ground closed-loop system that is installed using well-boring equipment and trenched back into the house to connect to a heat pump. The pipes circulate a mixture of water and propylene glycol, a food-grade antifreeze, that absorbs the ground’s temperature. A ground source heat pump circulates the liquid through the ground loops and it exchanges its heat energy in the heat pump with liquid refrigerant. The refrigerant is converted to vapor, compressed to increase its temperature, then passed through a heat exchanger to transfer heat to the air, which is circulated through a home’s HVAC ductwork.
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Daniel Yates, Dandelion Energy’s CEO, called the partnership with Lennar a “new benchmark for affordable, energy-efficient, and high-quality home heating and cooling.” By streamlining its installation process, Dandelion is making geothermal systems simpler and cheaper for homebuilders and homeowners to adopt.
This collaboration is happening at a time when Colorado is pushing hard to meet its clean energy targets. Governor Jared Polis is excited about the move, calling it a win for Coloradans’ wallets, air quality, and the state’s leadership on geothermal energy. Will Toor, executive director of the Colorado Energy Office, said that “ensuring affordable access to geothermal heating and cooling is essential to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, and we’re excited to be part of such a huge effort to bring this technology to so many new Colorado homes.”
And it’s not just about cutting emissions – geothermal heat pumps help reduce peak electric demand. Analysis from the Department of Energy found that widespread adoption of these systems could save the US from needing 24,500 miles of new transmission lines. That’s like crossing the continental US eight times.
Colorado is making this transition a lot more attractive through state tax credits and Xcel Energy’s rebate programs. These incentives slash upfront costs for builders like Lennar, making geothermal installations more financially viable. The utility’s Clean Heat Plan and electrification strategy are working to keep energy bills low while meeting climate goals.
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Polestar has removed the Polestar 2 from its US website header in an early sign of how new tariffs will restrict choice and competition for American consumers, thus increasing prices.
The Polestar 2 is Polestar’s first full EV – the original Polestar 1 was a limited-edition plug-in hybrid.
It started production in 2020 in Luqiao, Zhejiang, China, where Polestar and Volvo’s parent corporation, Geely, was founded.
Unfortunately, that interacts with some news that has been getting a lot of play lately: tariffs.
The US has been gradually getting stupider and stupider on the issue of tariffs, apparently determined to increase prices for Americans and decrease the competitiveness of American manufacturing in a time of change for the auto industry.
It is widely acknowledged (by anyone who has given it a few seconds of thought) that tariffs increase prices and that trade barriers tend to reduce competition, leading to less innovation.
It started with 25% tariffs on various products from China, implemented in the 2018-2020 timeframe. Then, in 2024, President Biden implemented a 100% tariff on Chinese EVs, effectively stopping their sale in the US. These tariffs included some exceptions and credits based on Volvo’s other US manufacturing, which Polestar had used to keep the most expensive versions of the 2 on sale in the US, while restricting the lower-priced versions from sale. Nevertheless, they were a bad idea.
Now, in yet another step to make America less competitive and inflate the prices of goods more for Americans, we got more tariff announcements today from a senile ex-reality TV host who wandered into the White House rose garden (which he does not belong in). These tariffs do not include the same exceptions as the previously-announced Biden tariffs.
Apparently this has all been enough for Polestar, as even in advance of today’s tariff announcements, the company suddenly removed its Polestar 2 from its website header today.
The change can be seen at polestar.com/us, where only the Polestar 3 and 4 are listed in the header area. On other sites, like the company’s Norwegian website or British website, the car is still there. The Polestar 2 page is still up on the US website, but it isn’t linked to elsewhere on the site (we’ll see how long it stays up).
We reached out to Polestar for comment, but didn’t hear anything back before publication. We’ll update if we do.
It makes sense that the Polestar 2 would still be for sale elsewhere, as it only started production in 2020. Most car models are available for at least 7 years, so this is an earlier exit than expected.
So it’s likely that all of the tariff news is what had an effect in killing the Polestar 2.
Then again, this is also just the second day of a new fiscal quarter. Perhaps the timing offers Polestar an opportunity to make a clean break – especially now that the lower-priced version of its Polestar 3 is available.
Despite the lower $67.5k base price of the new Polestar 3 variant, that represents a big increase in price for the brand, which had sold the base model Polestar 2 for around $50k originally, before all of these tariffs.
Update: Polestar got back to us with comment, but understandably, it doesn’t say much:
Polestar is a three-car company and Polestar 2 is available for customers now. There are a select number of Polestar 2s in stock at retailers that can be found on Polestar.com, but Polestar 3 and Polestar 4 will be the priority in the North American market.
Volvo decided to build the car in Belgium and export it to the US, but now that new tariffs apply to the EU as well, maybe that low-priced, awesome, fast, small EV will instead stay in Europe instead of being shipped overseas.
This shows how mercurial tariff fiats from an ignoramus are bad for manufacturing, as they mean that companies can’t make plans – and if they can’t make plans, eventually, they’ll probably just write the country making the random decisions out of their plans so they don’t have to deal with the nonsense.
And we’ve heard this from every businessperson or manufacturer representative we’ve talked to at any level of the automotive industry. Nobody thinks any of this is a good idea, because it objectively is not. All it does is make business harder, make the US less trustworthy, make things more expensive, and overall just harm America.
Yet another way that Americans are getting screwed by this stupid nonsense. 49% of you voted for inflation, and 100% of Americans are now getting it. Happy Inflation Day, everyone.
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Lucid Motors (LCID) has now had six straight quarters with higher deliveries. The delivery record comes just as Lucid prepares to begin delivering its first electric SUV, the Gravity, to customers by the end of this month.
Lucid sets sixth straight delivery record in Q1 2025
Lucid delivered 3,109 vehicles in the first quarter, up 58% from last year and topping its previous record of 3,099 set in Q4 2024.
The company also produced 2,213 vehicles at its Casa Grande, Arizona, plant in the first three months of 2025, an increase of 28% from last year. Another 600 vehicles were in transit to Saudi Arabia, where they will be assembled at its new AMP-2 plant, Lucid’s first international manufacturing facility.
At this pace, Lucid will easily top the roughly 10,200 vehicles it delivered last year in 2025 at around 12,500. Lucid will likely see even more growth this year, with customer deliveries of its first electric SUV starting soon.
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During the Gravity SUV’s “celestial arrival” last week in NYC, Lucid’s interim CEO Marc Winterhoff said the EV maker is “nearly finished building all the vehicles that we wanted to build to put them into our studio and for test drives.”
Q4 2022
Q1 2023
Q2 2023
Q3 2023
Q4 2023
Full-year 2023
Q1 2024
Q2 2024
Q3 2024
Q4 2024
Full-year 2024
Q1 2025
Lucid EV deliveries by quarter
1,932
1,406
1,404
1,457
1,734
6,001
1,967
2,394
2,781
3,099
10,241
3,109
Lucid (LCID) EV deliveries by quarter 2023 to Q1 2025
Winterhoff added, “by the end of April, we will resume customer deliveries of the Gravity.” Lucid delivered the first models in December, but they were for employees, friends, and family.
Lucid calls the Gravity a “no compromise” SUV with a range of up to 450 miles, 120 cubic feet of interior space, advanced technology, and sports car-like performance. The Gravity Grand Touring starts at $94,900, while the Touring model will arrive later this year at $79,900.
Lucid Gravity Grand Touring in Aurora Green (Source: Lucid)
The new delivery record comes after Winterhoff told Fox Business last week that Lucid has seen a “dramatic uptick over the past two months” in orders from former Tesla drivers.
Currently, “50% of all the orders we have are from former Tesla owners,” Lucid’s CEO said. Winterhoff added that many are “looking for an option to not continue having a Tesla.”
Will we see the trend continue? Tesla announced earlier today that it delivered 336,681 vehicles in the first quarter, far less than the 390,000 Wall Street analysts expected.
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