Why Tesla LFP Batteries Are More Environmentally Friendly

Back in August of 2021, we compared NCA (lithium nickel cobalt aluminum oxide) batteries with LFP (lithium iron phosphate) batteries - "Tesla's LFP (iron) batteries compared. Which one should you buy?". NCA batteries had been the standard for all Tesla models in the USA, but Tesla’s plans to switch to LFP in Model 3s and Model Ys prompted that article. Tesla even offered more rapid delivery to customers waiting for the cars they had on order if they decided to get their car with LFP batteries.

A nickel mine in Indonesia

There are trade-offs between these two battery types in terms of weight, range, consequences of carrying a full charge, regenerative braking, and cold weather behavior which are all discussed in the column mentioned above. These are all valid considerations, but working from the assumption that a prime motivation of most people buying an electric car is to promote a healthy environment and a healthier planet (by cutting CO2 emissions), it should also be mentioned that these two battery chemistries have vastly different implications for the environment. Crucially, NCA batteries are built with a lot of nickel (about 18 kg in a Tesla) whereas LFP batteries have none. But high demand for nickel for Teslas (and many other electric vehicle models) is accelerating strip-mining in Indonesia and the Philippines. Mining is one thing, but strip mining is more problematic.

Strip mining on tropical islands in Southeast Asia is especially harmful because these are centers of biodiversity with large numbers of unique species of plants and animals, many of which are endangered - some critically so. Unlike forest clearing, where the land retains some value for agricultural production, strip mining obliterates what is there and it will likely be decades, if not centuries, before such areas are productive again. When not rainforests, this strip mining is destroying agricultural land. Plus, Southeast Asia has high rainfall, so once the land is laid bare, erosion carries large amounts of sediment onto nearby coral reefs.

Details matter, however, and in this case it should be pointed out that nickel is mined from two sources - laterite and sulfide. Laterite deposits (as in Indonesia and the Philippines) are formed by the weathering of ultramafic bedrock in areas of high seasonal rainfall, along ridges and mountain shoulders. Through leaching, nickel accumulates 10-25 m below the surface and the only way to get at it is to clear off the top 10 m and everything living there.

In contrast, sulfide deposits are in the bedrock and nickel is extracted by hard-rock mining, sometimes near the surface, but often far underground. This distinction is important for electric vehicles because sulfide deposits are smelted into the highly pure nickel which is required for batteries. When laterite nickel is smelted, the lower purity nickel primarily goes to other uses, such as stainless steel. However, if laterite nickel is processed by High Pressure Acid Leaching (HPAL), nickel of sufficient purity for batteries is produced, but at present not very much is produced this way. Of the other uses of nickel besides for batteries, some processes also need high purity nickel, but some can use either high or lower purity nickel. Another important point is that there are not likely prospects for increased production of sulfide nickel, whereas there are extensive areas available for mining laterite nickel.

This may all seem convoluted, but what this all means is 1) as consumption of sulfide nickel for batteries grows with the expansion of the electric vehicle market, this will take up more and more of available sulfide supplies; 2) processes which can use either will hence shift to laterite nickel. Thus, while some may point out that electric vehicle batteries, for the most part, do not use laterite nickel and hence are not the cause of the expanding strip-mining occurring in Indonesia and the Philippines (and in a few other places such as Venezuela and Brazil), it is nevertheless true that additional demand for laterite nickel is a consequence of vehicle batteries taking an increasingly large portion of the available sulfide nickel.

Despite much press coverage last year, Tesla's transition to LFP batteries has only made it to the Model 3 Rear Wheel Drive model (in the USA). Other models may get LFP batteries in the future, as they have in Europe. So, buying a Tesla is a great way to contribute to the decarbonization of your personal transportation, but to avoid the harmful impacts of high-nickel battery chemistries, lithium iron phosphate (LFP) is the best, even if you have to be selective as to which model you get.

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Tesla Officially Unveils Bigger, 6-Seater Model Y L

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Tesla has unveiled its 6-seat Model Y variant in China, known as the Model Y L. This new variant of one of the world’s best-selling vehicles comes with a longer wheelbase, adjusted C-pillar design, and most importantly, a six-seat interior layout.

The vehicle’s specifications have been officially listed in a filing with China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), confirming a launch for this fall.

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The addition of a longer wheelbase and a more spacious third row is a fantastic addition for the Model Y’s family utility, and positions this variant as sort of a mini Model X, but let’s compare the sizes to really know how this new Model Y compares to a Model X.

Meet the Model Y L

The defining feature of the new Model Y L is its six-seat configuration. This layout has previously been exclusive to the larger and more expensive Model X. While Tesla has offered the Model Y in a 7-seat configuration before, the third row was much too small to be utilized by anyone but small children.

Comparing Model Y L to the Model X

@xiaoteshushu on X

Let’s compare this upcoming Model Y L to the regular Model Y and the Model X.

The new wheelbase of 3,040mm is a significant stretch from the standard wheelbase, and in fact, is longer than the Model X’s wheelbase of 2,965mm. However, the overall length of the vehicle is 84mm (~3 inches) shorter than the Model X. This means the vehicle sits neatly between the current Model Y and Model X, filling a much-needed gap.

While this Model Y L is slightly smaller than the Model X, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s smaller inside. The Model X features a much larger front end than the Model Y, accounting for several inches. When you line up the front wheel base of the Model X with this new Model Y, the vehicles are almost exactly the same length.

Tesla has designed this Model Y to be a bit more compact and efficient than the Model X, and likely much cheaper, while featuring the well-loved design of the new Model Y.

Other Specifications and Price

The MIIT filing also provided a detailed look at some additional specifications. The Model Y L is a dual-motor, AWD variant, so it will likely be more expensive than the current Model Y AWD that’s available in China today. Tesla charges an additional $6,500 USD when upgrading the Model X from a 5-seat configuration to a 6-seat layout, so we may see something similar here.

The extra length has been added behind the C-pillar, resulting in a longer rear profile for the Model Y L. To accompany this, Tesla has added an updated rear spoiler, similar to the one found on Performance variants, but not carbon fiber. There is also a new wheel design to complement the updated look, along with unique Model Y L badging and a new light gold paint option.

In classic Tesla fashion, no Tesla is slow - and the Y L has a 0-100 km/h (0-60mph) time of 5.9s, with a top speed of 217km/h. Alongside an 82.5 kWh LFP battery pack, the Model Y L boasts an impressive CLTC range of 688 km (427 mi).

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Launch & Availability

According to posts from Tesla China on Chinese social media, the new Model Y L is scheduled to launch in the fall of 2025. Its official listing in the MIIT database is essentially the final regulatory step required before sales can begin, which means the launch is really just around the corner. For now, it appears that Tesla intends to launch this vehicle only in China, as no other filings have been made in other regions. However, these could be revealed in the coming months.

The new Model Y L is a huge addition to Tesla’s lineup - one that addresses the Chinese preference for vehicles with longer wheelbases and additional passenger room in a compact SUV package. The question is - will this variant make its way to North America and Europe?

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Tesla’s Dojo 2 Supercomputer Chip Enters Mass Production

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Solving real-world artificial intelligence - whether for autonomous driving, real-world robotics, or advanced reasoning - requires an almost unfathomable amount of computational power. To meet this challenge, Tesla has been developing its own custom AI training hardware while simultaneously purchasing hardware in the open market.

Now, the next-generation Dojo 2 chip has reportedly entered mass production with the world’s largest semiconductor manufacturer, TSMC. While many may consider this a side quest, expanding Tesla’s computing base will be necessary to achieve exascale supercomputing, which will be crucial for all of Tesla’s AI ambitions.

Elon Musk called Dojo 2 “a good computer,” and then followed up with a classic computer performance joke - Dojo 2 can indeed play Crysis at a billion frames per second.

Can play Crysis at a billion frames per second

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 12, 2025

Exascale AI: FSD, Optimus, and More

While Tesla has effectively utilized powerful third-party GPUs to train its models to date, the Dojo supercomputer is a ground-up, application-specific solution designed for a single purpose. It will efficiently process massive amounts of video data for training neural networks. The Dojo 2 chip itself is the key that unlocks this potential.

Dojo 2 will train the vision-based neural nets that FSD relies on, allowing Tesla to process video from its massive global fleet of vehicles even faster. As Tesla continues to improve FSD, one of the biggest challenges has been the intake of video for handling difficult edge cases.

Hundreds of thousands of miles of training data may pass by before an edge case is identified and trained on, but it all needs to be analyzed, labeled, and processed, which is key for Dojo 2. Each new useful piece of training data will help Tesla proceed down the march of 9s, making FSD just that little bit better every time.

This process requires massive amounts of compute and training time - but it is an absolute necessity to improve FSD. Of course, this goes beyond just FSD in vehicles. Tesla’s humanoid robot, Optimus, also runs on FSD to navigate and interact with the physical world. 

While it may be a custom version of FSD, it remains FSD at its core, which means the same neural nets that analyze the environment and build a 3D map of the world for your car perform the same work for Optimus.

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Custom Approach to AI Hardware

Dojo 2’s power doesn’t just come from raw compute; it comes from a series of architectural choices that make it excel at training FSD and differentiate it from general-purpose hardware, or even other AI-specific hardware.

To this end, Tesla is using TSMC’s new Integrated Fan-Out with Silicon-on-Wafer (InFO-SoW) packaging technology. For massive AI workloads, heat and the speed at which data moves between chips are often the biggest bottlenecks.

This new packaging technique allows for high-bandwidth connections directly between processing dies, which lowers latency and dramatically improves heat dissipation, all key to building massive and dense compute clusters.

Unlike general-purpose chips, Dojo 2 is designed with a custom instruction set, specifically built to train FSD. The cores are specifically made to accelerate the exact mathematical operations, like matrix multiples and systolic arrays, which form the backbone of Tesla’s vision-based neural networks.

By building its own hardware, Tesla can then integrate its own software and compilers directly with the silicon, optimizing for specific workloads and avoiding the performance penalties that can result from using third-party software, such as Nvidia’s CUDA.

The start of Dojo 2 may seem like a side quest for some, but it’s actually a key step for Tesla’s AI technologies that give them an advantage over the competition using off-the-shelf hardware. They’ll need to continue investing in custom hardware to improve FSD at a reasonable pace, rather than the current glacial pace we’ve seen over the last few months.

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