I thought he "cared" about the climate?
As for the actual uses besides beaming power down, providing additional power to spacecraft in deep space, powering lasers for light sails, or maybe as a directed energy weapon.
> providing additional power to spacecraft in deep space
Very likely an extreme niche application or wont happen.
> powering lasers for light sails
Again, an extreme niche or wont happen.
> or maybe as a directed energy weapon.
Same thing.
In a world where Starship exists, you can throw a deep space probe with gigantic amounts of solar panels, that seems cheaper then having a separate space craft.
"Not dealing with climate change" is quite a misleading characterization of Elon Musk, his actions, and his "cares."
If Elon Musk doesn't "care" about climate change just because every actions in his life isn't 100% devoted (monk-like) to maximum action on that issue, then I think you can successfully argue that nobody in human history has ever "cared" about anything. The word becomes meaningless if you redefine it that hard.
Bmitc, while cowering behind a rhetorical question, claimed that Elon Musk doesn't "care" about climate change because his rockets also emit carbon.
However this posits a ridiculous and unattainable purity test (which would only be satisfiable by the aforementioned "monk-like" life) that disingenuously ignores Musk's overwhelmingly net positive work toward carbon reduction via Tesla products.