Elon Musk Donated $1 Million Aiding YouTuber Initiative To Plant 20 Million Trees

By Mayukh Saha / Truth Theory

Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla, has donated a massive $1 million towards an ambitious project to plant 20 million trees throughout the globe. Musk committed to the princely sum after he found the teamtrees project ‘legit.’

The project was initiated by YouTubers Mark Rober and Jimmy Donaldson (Mr. Beast) after a tweet telling the Donaldson should plant at least 20M trees after reaching the same number of YouTube subscribers. The duo, along with several other bloggers, came together to realize this ambitious project. They plan to raise at least $20 million for Arbor Day.

Also read: To Fight Climate Change Ireland Plans To Plant 440 Million Trees In 20 Years

Several big names have contributed to the cause including Jack Dorsey of Twitter, Alan Walker, musician, and Donaldson himself. They plan to raise $20 million by 2020 and plant the trees by 2022. The funds stand close to $8,000,000 at present.

The donation from Musk was the biggest surprise as nobody had expected the Tesla and SpaceX CEO to donate such a large amount. 

Ok, sounds legit, will donate 1M trees

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 29, 2019

Musk first showed interest when he tweeted that he found the project cool. He wanted to know the kind of trees that were being planted and their location. Marques Brownlee tweeted that it went to the Arbor Day Foundation to plant a tree where there is a high need anywhere on earth. Musk found the project ‘legit’ and donated for 1 million trees.

The donation showed on the website of  #teamtrees as the single largest donation.

It sounds unbelievable that he could donate for 1 million trees. It is obvious that his money is going for a worthy cause. Elon Musk has joked that the reason he donated for planting trees is Treebeard, the talking tree in The Lord of the Rings, who is the oldest being that walks the Middle-Earth beneath the Sun.

Also read: Followers Of This Religion Aims To Plant One Million Trees To Save The Planet

The target of 20 million trees can be met though they are yet to reach the halfway mark. YouTube has pledged to equal the next $1 million donated using the button for donation on YouTube platform.

Donaldson wants to prove that YouTube is more than a ‘drama fest’ and can actually make a real change. Planting trees does have a great benefit for the ecosystem and somewhat reverses the damage caused by man.

IMAGE CREDIT1: Wikimedia

IMAGE CREDIT2: subbotina