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Former Tesla engineer Christina Balan, who was fired in 2014, said in an interview that her entire team was threatened with deportation for taking her side when she brought up a brake safety issue directly to Elon Musk. She’s now succeeded in throwing out Tesla’s arbitration case against her, and hopes to meet Tesla directly in open court in a case that could influence corporate policy nationwide.

Christina Balan is a Romanian-born engineer who formerly worked for Tesla on the Model S. Her contributions were significant enough that her initials appeared on the Model S’ battery pack.

But in 2014, she brought up what she considered a safety issue directly with Elon Musk. She thought that the Model S’ floor mats could cause a brake safety issue, similar to a situation that Toyota had recently gone through (though that also led to a media firestorm that blew the issue out of proportion). She said that Tesla had chosen suppliers based on friendships, not quality.

And she brought it up directly to Musk because… he told her to. Famously, in 2013, Musk sent out an email to the entire company stating:

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Anyone at Tesla can and should email/talk to anyone else according to what they think is the fastest way to solve a problem for the benefit of the whole company.  You can talk to your manager’s manager without his permission, you can talk directly to a VP in another dept, you can talk to me, you can talk to anyone without anyone else’s permission. Moreover, you should consider yourself obligated to do so until the right thing happens.

-Elon Musk, email to all Tesla employees, March 21, 2013

A few days after sending that email, Balan said she was offered a meeting with Musk, but that when she showed up to the meeting, it was instead attended by a lawyer and some large men in uniforms, and with Tesla forcing her to resign her position.

During that meeting, Balan says that Tesla’s lawyer threatened to deport many members of her team, who were currently waiting on green card applications, if she didn’t sign the resignation, seemingly in response to her team backing her up in raising these concerns. She ended up signing the resignation in protest, writing on it that “I’m resigning for the position that I was put in a month ago bc I dare to speak up to the Sr management, also bc people that had the chance to speak up were threatened…”

Balan’s initials, “CB,” on a Model S battery pack

When Balan’s case got coverage in Huffington Post in 2017, Tesla sent a statement that Balan had stolen company resources to work on a “secret” personal project (Tesla emails show that Balan was told to work on this project by leadership). After this, Balan says she faced difficulty in finding work as companies feared ending up on Musk’s blacklist.

Balan filed a defamation suit over the press statement, but Tesla forced her case into arbitration and got the defamation suit thrown out. Forced arbitration is widely used by companies in America to find faster and more corporate-friendly rulings, an approach that has only become more common after endorsement by the “Supreme” Court.

Balan then appealed that decision, and after many delays (some related to her fight against breast cancer, which is now in remission), she finally succeeded in getting the arbitration thrown out on Monday – even though she represented herself, pro se, for most of the proceedings.

Her win could be significant for corporate policy nationwide, as it could serve to chill the overuse of arbitration which is seen by most observers as giving disproportionate power to companies in labor disputes. However, given the nature of the court’s recent finding, which was found to be a jurisdictional issue, this decision may not be directly applicable to many other arbitration cases.

Now, Balan wants to face Tesla in open court with her case, and hopes to bring more of her story to the public – which she says Musk has tried to stop her from doing, despite his claims of being a “free speech absolutist.”

She said so in an interview this weekend with The Times UK, a media organization owned by climate denier Rupert Murdoch, who is also the father of James Murdoch, a Tesla boardmember.

In the interview, Balan describes working conditions under Musk, and that he was a mostly-absent CEO who only showed up to the office twice a month, would threaten or retaliate against those who tried to fix problems. She says that she wants to take her case to open court “to prove how vindictive this monster is. He’s pure evil… he’s enjoying hurting people… and you don’t know about them because he’s forcing everybody to give up their freedom of speech and their right to sue.”

You can watch the whole interview below:

Electrek’s Take

We haven’t written about Balan’s case before because it’s been such a long time coming, and filled with various arcane legal wranglings. There will likely be more steps to come, many of which are boring legal maneuvers, but perhaps this case will now have a chance to go more public now that the arbitration decision has been thrown out.

And, frankly, I think the initial complaint over floor mats was probably not all that significant of a blockbuster. At the time, floor mats were getting a lot of focus due to the high-profile nature of the Toyota case (which was also overstated), so I think Balan’s team was probably more wary than usual. And we didn’t go on to see a slate of floor mat problems with the Model S in the time since.

However, Tesla’s response to bringing up the safety issue is still unacceptable (to say the least). Not only were all employees told to take steps like this to get problems solved by the CEO himself, but the strong-arm nature of a quick firing in response, and then threatening her team with deportation is beyond the pale.

While we only have Balan’s words as evidence for the deportation threat, we have since seen Musk take vindictive actions against entire teams, and seen his anti-immigrant attitudes including the desire to deport people illegally.

Recently Musk fired the entire supercharger team, in what was probably the dumbest business decision Tesla has ever made, reportedly because Rebecca Tinucci, a star of the auto industry and the head of the most successful team in Tesla, refused to fire more people.

(Incidentally, another longtime Tesla exec who was fired at the same time as the whole Supercharger team, Daniel Ho, had previously praised Balan, saying “without creative engineers like you, this place would be just another car company”)

And Musk is also the largest financial backer of an administration that is currently illegally deporting US citizens to a prison famous for beatings, overcrowding and food deprivation that some have called a place to “dispose of people without formally applying the death penalty.”

He has spent much of his public advocacy in recent years showing racist and anti-immigrant attitudes, including support for German neo-Nazis and agreeing with a defense of Hitler’s actions in the Holocaust. He’s focused more on pushing his white supremacist views than on anything to do with EVs and climate change (which he’s now pushing denial of), thus working against Tesla’s mission.

So, making deportation threats against immigrants does not seem out of character, despite Musk being a formerly “illegal” immigrant himself.

Either way, we look forward to hearing more about this case as it goes on, in the hopes that it can both elucidate more for the public what the real Elon Musk is like, and possibly do something to reduce, ever so slightly, the abuse of the arbitration system by companies.


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Want EV charging at your apartment, as an owner or a renter? Click here (update)

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Want EV charging at your apartment, as an owner or a renter? Click here (update)

EVs are great, and can unlock more transportation convenience with the ease of charging at home. But for apartment-dwellers, this can be a complicated conversation. So a nonprofit called Forth is here to help, through its Charge at Home program.

One of the main benefits of an electric vehicle is in the convenience of owning and charging the car in the place it spends most of its time. Instead of having to go out of your way to fuel it, you just park it at home, in the same place it spends at least 8 hours a day, and you leave the house every day with a full charge.

But this benefit only applies to those with a consistent parking space which they can easily install charging at. When talking about owners who live in apartment buildings, it can sometimes get more complicated.

While certain states have passed “right to charge” laws to give apartment-dwellers a solution for home charging, apartment charging is nevertheless a bit of a patchwork solution so far.

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And as a result of this, EV ownership among apartment renters lags behind that of single-family homeowners. It’s clear that apartments are holding back people from buying EVs, and that’s bad – lots of people live in apartments, and the gas those cars use pollutes the air just as much as any other.

Certain areas where EVs have hit a point of critical mass (namely, the large California cities) have pretty good EV ownership among renters, but it could still be better. And residents are clamoring more and more for easy EV charging in apartment communities.

So, Forth, a nonprofit advocating for equitable access to clean transportation, set up a program called Charge at Home, which is meant to connect renters, apartment building owners or other decisionmakers with resources to help install chargers at multifamily properties.

The site lets you select your situation – a resident or a decisionmaker for a new or existing multifamily development – and then gives you access to tools for your specific situation, whether you be a resident and developer.

The site houses links to help design a multifamily project, find electricians, inform you about right to charge laws or available incentives, and provide case studies, among others.

Charge at Home also hosts roundtable webinars periodically, and includes a library of past webinars with the information you need.

There are a lot of considerations for each of these projects, so it can be helpful to have someone with experience to help you go over it all. Personally, when talking to friends about getting an EV, charging considerations are usually the thing that takes up the bulk of the conversation.

So if the toolkits are still too daunting for you, Charge at Home is offering free charging consultations for multifamily developers, owners, property managers and HOAs.

The charging consultations will last through at least April 2026 – but it wouldn’t hurt to get your requests in soon. Forth may still offer consultations afterwards, but it all depends on funding availability (the program was previously funded by the Department of Energy, which has taken a turn). Regardless, the website will remain up for people to submit questions and find information, whether or not free consultations stick around.

But at the very least, as Forth points out, whether a multifamily development is interested in having EV charging at this moment or not, any developer should think about having the infrastructure, conduit and capacity ready to go for future install of EV chargers, and should consider the needs of current residents who are likely already considering EVs today.

It’s going to be necessary to install this capacity at some point, and doing so earlier can help save money down the line, make your development more attractive to renters today, and allow more renters to make the switch to cleaner transportation which helps air quality and to reduce climate change, both of which harm everyone on the planet.

Head on over to Forth’s Charge at Home site to get access to all the above resources – and to sign up for a consultation before the end of April if you’re a multifamily developer, owner, property manager or HOA.

Update: This article has been updated to account for an extension in program availability.

Electrek’s Take

I’ve long said that the only real problem with EVs is the problem of access to consistent charging for people who don’t have their own garage. Whether this be apartment-dwellers, street-parkers or the like, the electric car charging experience is often less-than-ideal outside of single family homes, at least in North America.

There are workarounds available, like charging at work, or using Superchargers in “third places” where you often spend time, but these still aren’t optimal. The best thing is just to charge your car wherever it spends most of its time, which is your home. When you do that, EVs outshine everything in convenience.

We’ve highlighted some projects before which showed how reasonable it can be to install charging for developments. Every project is going to have its complexities, but when you see projects like this condo complex that managed to install chargers for just $405 per parking spot, all of a sudden it becomes a no-brainer not to have EV charging.

But the fact is, there just aren’t enough apartment complexes out there which have EV charging. So if Forth’s Charge At Home program can help residents or landlords with that, it can go a long way towards solving the only real problem with EVs. Click here to check it out.


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This Maryland county will get its power from a solar farm on landfill

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This Maryland county will get its power from a solar farm on landfill

Baltimore County, Maryland, just brought its first large-scale ground-mounted solar farm online, and it sits on what used to be the Parkton Landfill. The 213-acre site, once a symbol of waste, is now generating clean power that will cut costs, slash emissions, and turn an underused piece of land into a long-term energy asset.

Located north of Baltimore City, Baltimore County is one of Maryland’s largest and most populous counties, and its push toward renewables has major implications for the state’s climate and energy goals.

County Executive Kathy Klausmeier called the project a clear example of innovation meeting sustainability: “We are cutting costs for taxpayers and making investments that benefit our communities for decades.”

The new solar farm will provide around 11% of the Maryland county government’s annual electricity, producing roughly 8.2 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) in its first year. That’s the equivalent of avoiding greenhouse gas emissions from burning over 620,000 gallons of gasoline, powering more than 1,150 homes for a year, or driving 14 million fewer miles in gas cars, according to the EPA.

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The 7 MW system includes four large solar arrays of 15,000 ground-mounted photovoltaic panels. It’s part of a growing trend in the US to repurpose capped landfills for renewable energy, turning dormant properties into productive clean energy sites.

Through a power purchase agreement with TotalEnergies, which owns and operates the system, Baltimore County will lock in reduced electricity rates for 25 years, with options to extend the contract for up to 33 years. That long-term deal protects taxpayers from future electricity price hikes while advancing local climate goals.

“Adding another large source of solar electricity to power our County’s facilities reflects our community’s values of making smart investments that take care of the health of our community and environment,” said Greg Strella, the county’s chief sustainability officer.

TotalEnergies Managing Director Eric Potts called the project a “powerful example of transforming underutilized assets into productive resources,” pointing to the dual benefits of cutting emissions and saving money.

Baltimore County’s next landfill solar project, at Hernwood, is expected to come online by 2028. Once that system is up and running, renewables will supply about 55% of the county government’s electricity use.

Read more: The Trump administration just killed the US’s largest solar project


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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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The Hyundai IONIQ 3 looks just as wild as the concept [Video]

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The Hyundai IONIQ 3 looks just as wild as the concept [Video]

The IONIQ 3 was spotted in public rocking a wild new look, just like the Concept Three Hyundai revealed last month.

The Hyundai IONIQ 3 draws looks from the Concept Three

We got our first look at the IONIQ 3 just over a month ago after Hyundai revealed the Concept Three at the Munich Motor Show.

The concept will arrive as the IONIQ 3 when it launches next year. Production is set to begin in early 2026 at Hyundai’s manufacturing plant in Turkey with the first customer deliveries shortly after.

Hyundai’s Concept Three is a preview of the new EV, set to arrive as a little sibling to the IONIQ 5. Like the concept, the IONIQ 3 is bringing a radical new look to the IONIQ series, which Hyundai said will set the tone for its next wave of vehicles.

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The new design theme, dubbed “Art of Steel,” is inspired by advanced steel technology. It features an Aero Hatch profile that Hyundai calls “a new typology that reimagines the compact EV silhouette.”

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The Hyundai Concept THREE EV, a preview of the IONIQ 3 (Source: Hyundai)

The added lemon-tinted glass that wraps around the vehicle and wheels to match only adds to the electric hatch’s bold new look.

Hyundai kept a few design elements found on other IONIQ models, including its signature Parametric Pixel lights.

Hyundai-IONIq-3-looks
The Hyundai Concept THREE EV, a preview of the IONIQ 3 (Source: Hyundai)

With its official debut coming up, the IONIQ 3 was spotted driving in Korea with what appears to be a nearly identical design to the concept.

The video from HealerTV offers a closer look at Hyundai’s new EV from nearly all angles. Although it’s still covered, you can see the front headlights are about the same. The only noticeable difference is that the turn signal lights are now above the headlight.

As the reporter points out, if you look at the headlights, tail lights, and radiator grille, it appears just like the concept.

Like up front, the turn signal is above the rear taillight. It also features a brake assist light similar to the Nexo, Hyundai’s fuel cell electric vehicle (FCEV).

Hyundai-IONIQ-3-looks
The Hyundai Concept Three (Source: Hyundai)

Measuring 4,287 mm in length, 1,940 mm in width, and 1,428 mm in height, with a wheelbase of 2,722 mm, the Concept Three is about the size of the Volkswagen ID.3 and Kia EV3.

It will sit between the Inster EV and Kona Electric in Hyundai’s European lineup. Hyundai has yet to release prices, range, and other specs, but like the Kia EV3, it’s expected to be available with 58.3 kWh and 81.4 kWh battery packs, offering a WLTP range of around 365 miles.

Since the Kona Electric starts at £35,000 ($47,000), the IONIQ 3 will likely be priced closer to £25,000 ($33,700). For those in the US, the IONIQ is not expected to make the trip overseas.

However, Hyundai is still offering one of the most affordable EVs in the US with the 2026 IONIQ 5 starting at under $35,000.

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