Elon Musk interviewed on NPR Science Friday: SpaceX, SolarCity, and Tesla Motors

FLATOW: Mm-hmm. What about going beyond the space station? Any plans to the moon or to Mars?

MUSK: Well, long term, the goal of SpaceX is to create the technology that's necessary to make life multi-planetary. So Mars is really the only viable candidate for making life multi-planetary, and so that's our focus in the long term. And I - you know, I'm maybe a little too optimistic sometimes or overconfident, but I think we've got a shot of making that happen in 10 to 20 years.

FLATOW: Yeah. Let's talk about some of your other aspirations in the few minutes I have left, because you're into so many things, like tell us about SolarCity. You're making solar-powered electric vehicle charging available across - tell us what that project is. It sounds fascinating.

MUSK: Well, so SolarCity is - well, SolarCity is currently the largest provider of solar-powered systems in the county, providing for rooftop installations. So they have customers like Wal-Mart, Intel, eBay and then do a huge number of residential solar systems. They have a - the best cost structure and the best service, I think, of any solar company. Just did a big deal with Google to provide solar financing for customers. Yeah. They're doing incredibly well. Fortunately(ph) , I don't run the company on a day-to-day basis. That's done by Lyndon and Peter Rive, the co-founders. And so I just show up at board meetings to hear the good news.

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Elon Musk interview

The interview with Elon Musk on Science Friday mentioned earlier is now available (mp3) along with a transcript: SpaceX Craft To Head To Space Station - NPR.

Posted 08/19/11