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It’s been a bad week for DOGE. And a really bad week for dogecoin.

The meme coin, which gained popularity in part because Elon Musk once dubbed it “the people’s crypto,” fell about 10% on Thursday and is down 22% over the past week. That drop corresponds with Musk’s official departure from the Trump administration and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which was the centerpiece of his effort to radically downsize the federal government.

Musk and Trump had been sparring in recent days, with Musk slamming the president’s spending bill, and Trump withdrawing the nomination of Jared Isaacman, a Musk ally, as his pick to run NASA.

But the war of words escalated dramatically on Thursday. After Trump said he was “very disappointed” in the Tesla CEO, Musk fired back on X, claiming Trump would have lost the election without his support.

Trump called Musk “CRAZY” and threatened to cancel his government contracts, sending shares of electric vehicle maker Tesla tumbling to close down 14% for the day.

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Dogecoin and Tesla shares drop as Elon Musk beefs with the president.

Musk responded on X, “Go ahead, make my day.” He later said that following Trump’s comment about canceling contracts, his rocket company SpaceX “will begin decommissioning its Dragon spacecraft immediately.” Dragon is the only U.S. option for delivering crew to and from the International Space Station.

The spat wouldn’t necessarily have an impact on the price of dogecoin, which, like most meme coins, has no attached asset or underlying value. But it’s a particularly volatile coin that can move up or down based on consumer sentiment, celebrity hype, internet memes and Musk news.

Musk’s public backing of dogecoin has long been a major driver of its price, making it particularly sensitive to shifts in his political standing. The price jumped more than 15% on a single day in 2022 after Tesla began accepting the cryptocurrency as payment for some merchandise. The next year, dogecoin spiked more than 30% in a day after Musk replaced the blue bird on the Twitter (now X) website with an image of a shiba inu, the digital coin’s logo.

Dogecoin, along with bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, soared after Trump’s election victory in November on optimism that the new administration, which was heavily backed by Musk and the crypto industry, would return the favor with friendly policies and deregulation.

Buyers of the coin are now paying the price for the Musk-Trump breakup.

WATCH: Trump says Elon should have turned against me ‘months ago’

Pres. Trump: Elon should have turned against me 'months ago'

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Tesla Autopilot less safe, Optimus freezes, electric Mustang goes 250,000 miles

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Tesla Autopilot less safe, Optimus freezes, electric Mustang goes 250,000 miles

On today’s road-ready episode of  Quick Charge, Tesla released data hinting that its Autopilot ADAS solution may be less safe to use than before. We’ve also got some news from inside the Tesla diner experience, plus a 250,000 mile Ford Mustang Mach-E that still has more than 90% of its battery capacity left!

We also cover Lucid’s plans to reinvigorate American EV manufacturing WITHOUT help from Washington by forging stronger bonds between automakers, mineral miners, and battery recyclers – plus: Optimus breaks down.

Prefer listening to your podcasts? Audio-only versions of Quick Charge are now available on Apple PodcastsSpotifyTuneIn, and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

New episodes of Quick Charge are recorded, usually, Monday through Thursday (most weeks, anyway). We’ll be posting bonus audio content from time to time as well, so be sure to follow and subscribe so you don’t miss a minute of Electrek’s high-voltage daily news.

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Drop us a line at tips@electrek.co. You can also rate us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, or recommend us in Overcast to help more people discover the show.


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91% of renewables are cheaper than fossil fuels, but Trump just defunded a vital US grid upgrade

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91% of renewables are cheaper than fossil fuels, but Trump just defunded a vital US grid upgrade

Renewables continued to dominate fossil fuels on price in 2024, according to a new report from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). The big takeaway: Clean energy is the cheapest power around – by a wide margin. So it’s pretty bad business that the biggest grid upgrade project in US history just got kneecapped by Trump’s Department of Energy to stop the “green scam.”

On average, solar power was 41% cheaper than the lowest-cost fossil fuel in 2024, and onshore wind was 53% cheaper. Onshore wind held its spot as the most affordable new source of electricity at $0.034 per kilowatt-hour, with solar close behind at $0.043/kWh.

IRENA’s report says global renewables added 582 gigawatts (GW) of capacity last year, which avoided about $57 billion in fossil fuel costs. That’s not a small dent. Even more impressive: 91% of all new renewable power projects built in 2024 were cheaper than any new fossil fuel option.

Technological innovation, strong supply chains, and economies of scale are driving the cost advantage. Battery prices are helping too: IRENA says utility-scale battery energy storage systems (BESS) are now 93% cheaper than they were in 2010, with prices averaging $192/kWh in 2024.

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But it’s not all smooth sailing. The report flags short-term cost pressures from trade tensions, material bottlenecks, and rising costs in some regions. North America and Europe feel more squeezed than others due to permitting delays, limited grid capacity, and higher system costs.

Meanwhile, countries in Asia, Africa, and South America could see faster cost drops thanks to stronger learning rates and abundant solar and wind resources.

One big challenge is financing. In developing countries, high interest rates and perceived investor risk inflate the levelized cost of electricity of renewables. For example, wind power generation costs were about the same in Europe and Africa last year ($0.052/kWh), but financing made up a much larger share of project costs in Africa. IRENA estimates the cost of capital was just 3.8% in Europe but 12% in Africa.

And even if projects are affordable to build, many are getting stuck in grid connection queues or stalled by slow permitting. Those “integration costs” are now a major hurdle, especially in fast-growing G20 and emerging markets.

Tech is helping with some of that – hybrid solar-wind-storage setups and AI-powered tools are improving grid performance and project efficiency. But digital infrastructure and grid modernization still lag in many places, holding renewables back.

“Renewables are rising, the fossil fuel age is crumbling,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres. “But leaders must unblock barriers, build confidence, and unleash finance and investment.”

IRENA’s bottom line is that the economics of renewables are stronger than ever, but to keep the momentum going, governments and markets need to reduce risks, streamline permitting, and invest in grids.

Electrek’s Take

Speaking of unblocking barriers and investment, the opposite just happened today in Trump World. The Department of Energy just canceled a $4.9 billion conditional loan commitment for the 800-mile Grain Belt Express Phase 1 transmission project, the biggest transmission line in US history.

It’s a high-voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission line connecting Kansas wind farms across four states. It will connect four grids, improving reliability. It will be able to power 50 data centers and create 5,500 jobs. Phase 1 is due to start next year.

The new grid will also connect all forms of energy, not just renewables, and it’s super pathetic that Invenergy had to stoop to put up a map on the project’s home page today showing how it will transmit fossil fuels, the “existing dispatchable generation source,” and felt it had to leave renewables off the map entirely. Sorry, Kansas wind farms, you get no mention because this administration doesn’t like you.

Chicago-based Invenergy plans to build the 5 GW Grain Belt Express in phases from Kansas to Illinois. The company says the project will save customers $52 billion in energy costs over 15 years. Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) complained to Trump about the project, calling it a “green scam,” and got the government loan canceled based on a lie, claiming it would cost taxpayers “billions.” This was Invenergy’s response on X:

As usual, Trump was swayed by the last person in the room, and Hawley shot an entire region in the foot when an upgraded grid and more renewables are needed more than ever. Hopefully, this project can continue despite the ignorant shortsightedness coming from the Republicans (who ironically released an AI Action Plan today).

It beggars belief that this political party is this isolated from the rest of the world – well, besides our besties Iran, Libya, and Yemen, who aren’t part of the Paris Agreement either – and being that the US is the world’s No 2 polluter, the world will suffer for its arrogance.

Read more: FERC: Solar + wind made up 96% of new US power generating capacity in first third of 2025


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Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.

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Elon Musk with a straight face: Tesla Robotaxi will cover half of US population by end of the year

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Elon Musk with a straight face: Tesla Robotaxi will cover half of US population by end of the year

Elon Musk claims that Tesla Robotaxi will cover half of the US population by the end of the year and we can’t stop laughing.

Today, Tesla released its Q2 2025 financial results.

Earnings are down 23% on falling electric vehicle sales and lower margins, but Tesla’s stock is not crashing because CEO Elon Musk is promising a return to earnings growth through autonomous driving and humanoid robots.

We previously reported on how Tesla’s Robotaxi effort is a major shift in strategy for Tesla, which has been promising unsupervised self-driving in its customer vehicles for years.

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Instead, the Robotaxi service consists of an internal fleet operating within a geo-fenced area, currently only in Austin, Texas, and powered by teleoperation and in-car supervisors with a finger on a kill switch at all times.

“I believe half of the population of the US will be covered by Tesla’s Robotaxi by the end of the year.”

He added that he believes that regulatory approval will be the biggest hurdle, even though Tesla’s current service requires a Tesla employee in each car, which is a major hurdle to scaling.

Musk and Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s head of self-driving, both claimed that the Bay Area will be the first market where Tesla plans to expand its Robotaxi service. However, Elluswamy added that the program will initially have a driver in the driver’s seat.

This makes sense considering we learned last week that Tesla has yet to apply for the proper permits to operate an autonomous ride-hailing service in California.

Electrek’s Take

This is laughable. Who believes that? How can Elon say that with a straight face when Tesla only has a joke of a system that requires supervision at all times?

For context, Tesla currently only operates in a little over half of Austin, Texas. Here’s the list of all the metro areas Tesla would need to launch Robotaxi by the end of the year to cover half of the US population:

Rank Metro Area Population Cumulative Total
1 New York 19.15 M 19.15 M
2 Los Angeles 12.68 M 31.83 M
3 Chicago 9.04 M 40.87 M
4 Houston 6.89 M 47.76 M
5 Dallas–Fort Worth 6.73 M 54.49 M
6 Miami 6.37 M 60.86 M
7 Atlanta 6.27 M 67.13 M
8 Philadelphia 5.86 M 72.99 M
9 Washington, DC 5.60 M 78.59 M
10 Phoenix 4.83 M 83.42 M
11 Boston 4.40 M 87.82 M
12 Seattle 3.58 M 91.40 M
13 Detroit 3.54 M 94.94 M
14 San Diego 3.37 M 98.31 M
15 San Francisco 3.36 M 101.67 M
16 Tampa 3.04 M 104.71 M
17 Minneapolis–St. Paul 2.62 M 107.33 M
18 St. Louis 2.80 M 110.13 M
19 Denver 2.99 M 113.12 M
20 Baltimore 2.83 M 115.95 M
21 Orlando 2.76 M 118.71 M
22 Charlotte 2.75 M 121.46 M
23 San Antonio 2.60 M 124.06 M
24 Austin 2.42 M 126.48 M
25 Pittsburgh 2.43 M 128.91 M
26 Sacramento 2.42 M 131.33 M
27 Las Vegas 2.32 M 133.65 M
28 Cincinnati 2.26 M 135.91 M
29 Kansas City 2.19 M 138.10 M
30 Columbus 2.14 M 140.24 M
31 Cleveland 2.16 M 142.40 M
32 Indianapolis 2.12 M 144.52 M
33 San José 1.99 M 146.51 M
34 Virginia Beach–Norfolk 1.76 M 148.27 M
35 Providence 1.68 M 149.95 M
36 Milwaukee 1.57 M 151.52 M
37 Jacksonville 1.60 M 153.12 M
38 Raleigh–Durham 1.45 M 154.57 M
39 Nashville 1.43 M 156.00 M
40 Oklahoma City 1.42 M 157.42 M
41 Richmond 1.30 M 158.72 M
42 Louisville 1.28 M 160.00 M
43 Salt Lake City 1.26 M 161.26 M
44 New Orleans 1.23 M 162.49 M
45 Hartford 1.20 M 163.69 M
46 Buffalo 1.11 M 164.80 M
47 Birmingham 1.10 M 165.90 M

This is ridiculous. The lies are becoming increasingly larger and more brazen. We know what that means.

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