Elon Musk dropped by Springfield Sunday as a guest star of this week’s episode of The Simpsons.

Musk, who himself has said to be a long time fan of the show, arrives in Springfield during the episode to help local utilities tycoon Montgomery Burns modernize the city’s power grid.

He’s introduced to Burns as the man that’s helping revolutionize the auto industry, to which Burns says “Ah, Henry Ford, good to see you. You’re as healthy and vibrant as Detroit.”

The project expands, and eventually Burns agrees to let Musk build a Hyperloop and other futuristic additions to Springfield’s infrastructure.

Musk, for his part, isn’t shy about making fun of himself. His utopian vision for Springfield ends of being a money loser for Burns, costing him $50 million a quarter.

When asked about the experience by Bloomberg Businessweek Musk said he enjoyed it.

“It’s kind of trippy,” he said.

Check out some of the clips below:

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The U.S. Government Accountability Office dismissed a legal challenge on Monday, January 5 against NASA’s award of $6.8 billion in contracts in September to Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX). The ruling will let the two companies proceed with developing private spacecraft to work as ‘ space taxis ‘ to bring American astronauts to the International Space Station by the end of 2017.

Rival aerospace company Sierra Nevada Corp. (SNC) was upset by NASA’s decision last September not to select the bid of its Dream Chaser system – a space shuttle that can land on a runway like an airplane – to be one of the ‘ space taxis.’ Instead NASA chose the bids of Boeing and SpaceX, which opted to build more traditional capsule-type spacecraft to dock at the space station.

Sierra Nevada’s protest accused NASA of “serious questions and inconsistencies in the source selection process.” However, the GAO – an independent nonpartisan agency that reports to the U.S. Congress – ruled this week that NASA acted reasonably by granting a $4.2 billion contract to Boeing and a $2.6 billion contract to SpaceX, which include test flights to the ISS as well as up to six operational missions apiece.

Despite being surprised by the GAO verdict, Sierra Nevada is unlikely to risk its chance at winning future contracts by appealing the decision. The company as well as Boeing, Orbital Sciences Corp. (NYSE: ORB), and SpaceX are all bidding for cargo delivery contracts to the space station. NASA is expected to award the winners this spring.

These contracts have grown more important since NASA’s last space shuttle retired in 2011 forcing the U.S. government to pay Russia $70 million per American astronaut to reach the space station per trip.

The conflict in Ukraine has also severely strained the U.S. relationship with the Russian government. Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened last year to prevent the US from using Russian rockets to access the ISS after 2020 but cooperation between NASA and Russia’s space agency has not yet been affected.

The deteriorating situation has made the ‘ space taxis ‘ more important. With the first obstacle cleared to their contracts to build the ‘ space taxis,’ Boeing and SpaceX now have an advantage over the other American companies racing to benefit from the opportunities ahead.

The world’s largest aerospace company by sales, Boeing experienced a record-breaking 2014, beating its 2007 peak of net new orders and deliveries last year. The company also gained a major vote of confidence from the GAO release, which said NASA felt its bid to be the strongest “in terms of technical approach, management approach, and past performance, and to offer the crew transportation system with most utility and highest value to the government.”

Meanwhile, the announcement could provide key momentum for Space X. Founded and led by PayPal co-founder and Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk, SpaceX made history as the first private company to successfully recover its spacecraft launched into orbit and the first to send a private spacecraft to the ISS.

Early Friday morning, SpaceX plans to send an unmanned cargo ship on a dual mission. First, its Dragon capsule – the prototype for its eventual manned ‘ space taxis’ – is to resupply the space station. Second, the company will test its ability to land its Falcon 9 rocket on a ship in the Atlantic Ocean 200 miles off the coast of Florida. Although the launch was delayed from December and then aborted a minute before takeoff on January 6, liftoff is scheduled for 5:09 a.m. EST Friday, January 9.

Musk has given the landing only a 50 percent chance of success if it works. If it does, SpaceX will be a step closer to producing a reusable rocket that would prove critical for the ‘space taxis. The aerospace industry will likely follow its success in the development of future ‘space taxis.’ The company is already making its mark in reducing the cost of space flight.

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In case you haven’t heard, Tesla just confirmed a story originally posted by AutoExpress in the UK that they will be indeed naming the vehicle that follows the Model X by the name Model 3. This is unfortunately a result of the fact that Ford blocked Tesla from naming their next car after the Model X by the name Model E. If that had happened, Tesla would have been able to sell a Line of Model S, Model E and Model X vehicles, also known as the SEX Models of cars when you combine all three letters of the different Tesla models.

The Model 3 still technically allows for that if you use ‘leet speak’ and type SEX out as S3X instead. The guys at AutoExpress had an extensive interview with Tesla’s founder, Elon Musk who gave a lot of details about the new Tesla model as well as the motivations behind the naming and who they were looking to compete against. After all, the new Model 3 will be targeted towards the $35,000 price range of vehicles which puts it squarely in the BMW 3 Series’ court, much like the Model S did with the 5 and 7 series.

In their interview with Elon Musk he said, “The new model is going to be called Model III, we’ll have three bars to represent it and it’ll be S III X!” However S3X looks a lot more like SEX than SIIIX and I think we can all agree that Elon Musk is smart enough to know this. The new Model III or Model 3 will be unveiled in 2016 and should be on sale by 2017 and will likely have an entirely new platform rather than a scaled-down version of what’s currently in the Model S and planned for the Model X. The new technology, according to AutoExpress, will be the brainchild of Tesla’s British engineering chief Chris Porritt, formerly of Aston Martin.

Musk also announced that Tesla was planning to setup an R&D facility in the UK and that it could be operational in time for involvement in the Model 3’s development. The Model 3 is also rumored to be 20% smaller than a Model S and will likely use batteries from Tesla’s planned Gigafactory which has yet to be built. The Gigafab still hasn’t been placed yet in terms of location but there’s a very short list. The new Tesla will also have a range of about 200 miles and still have good performance, like the Model S.

Tesla also announced plans to update the Tesla Roadster, the company’s first car, with a new battery pack that would extend its range from 245 miles to about 400 miles per charge, enabling a Los Angeles to San Francisco trip, non-stop. Personally, I fell in love with Tesla with the Roadster, so if that car can be had with a new battery pack and improved range, it may still be more attractive to many than the Model S, Model X or Model E. Also, they didn’t give many specifics but it appears that they will be offering this upgrade to existing owners of the roadster since they went out of production a few years ago.

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According to FAA documents released, their Record of Decision, basically gives many details of SpaceX’s proposed spaceport located just outside of Brownsville, Texas. The proposed spaceport which was given FAA approval, pending some conditions are met and approved, is located in a small corner of South West Texas. This place, just outside of Brownsville, Texas basically sits between the city of Brownsville, the Gulf of Mexico, the border with Mexico and a small group of bays.

Proposed SpaceX Spaceport Launch Site

As you can see, they are neatly nestled away in that little corner of Texas which is known as the Las Palomas Wildlife Management Area. Obviously, they are going to be limited exactly to what they can and can’t launch there, but they clearly have a pretty well established plan for how much area they are going to need to block off.

This launch site will be in addition to the launch site that SpaceX already has and currently uses on Vandenberg Airforce Base near Lompoc, California. This is a great strategy for SpaceX to have because it will enable them to maintain two launch sites for their rockets if they have to scrub a launch at another based on certain launch windows.

Additionally, having launch sites in two different states means that they aren’t beholden to one location being available based on weather conditions. After all, Brownsville is on the Gulf Coast which means it could be susceptible to hurricanes and other extreme weather, which is why the FAA is requiring they provide a hurricane plan in their follow up documentation.

Overall, this is great news for SpaceX and space travel overall because it will help the company to be able to launch more rockets and more payloads, increasing their overall capability. By doing so, they make themselves more competitive and hopefully more attractive to companies looking to find a good launch partner. We may also see SpaceX eventually launching astronauts from one of their two launch sites, which also makes it much more flexible for their customers (including NASA) to be able to launch from Florida, Texas or California.

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