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Tesla Energy
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- TenDecigrams 11y agoI wonder if Elon and the owner of SolarCity will get in touch. Oh wait... ;)
- ignoramous 11y agoHere's the link to live stream: http://www.teslamotors.com/livestream http://www.teslamotors.com/livestream One interesting thing to note is the collaboration with Amazon...
- frakkingcylons 11y agoA notable beta user: AWS will be running a 4.8 megawatt hour pilot program with Tesla's batteries in the us-west-1 AZ (Northern California). Hopefully this allows AWS and other hosting providers to use intermittent, renewable sources of energy more often. EDIT: I'm guessing AWS will be using a cluster of 48 power packs (100 kilowatt hours each).
- GigabyteCoin 11y agoThis might be a reason to move your production environment out of us-west-1 for a few years. I wouldn't want any experiments going on around my main servers.
- M4v3R 11y agoWhile that' one way you can look at it, another is that hopefully this region should now be less prone to power outage related downtimes. I wonder if they are an issue currently though.
- will_hughes 11y agoI imagine that these are on the grid side of their existing UPS/Generator systems, rather than part of it.
- jonknee 11y agoIf you don't want experiments going on around your servers you better host them in your own data center. Amazon is guaranteed to be running many experiments in all of their data centers (and not just with power, with the actual server hardware!).
- ceejayoz 11y agoAWS is one giant set of experiments.
- sidcool 11y ago$3500. Nice!!!
- joezydeco 11y agoThat's the price to the installer. They'll mark it up, and then you have the necessary accessories and installation. This looks more like a $6,000-$8,000 item once it's all up and running. Gonna have to run some math here to figure out the ROI.
- chrisjlee 11y agoYeah this doesn't factor in Solar Panel Costs and the cost to install this power pack.
- markbnj 11y agoI'm intrigued at the backup possibilities, because we live in a forested area of the northeast where outages are common during storms. But at 3Kw a single unit isn't large enough to power our entire home, and I didn't see a figure for how long it can operate at peak load. If I need two then we're getting closer to the cost of a natural gas fired generator. This analysis, of course, is completely ignoring the environmental benefits.
- monkmartinez 11y ago10kWh and the details will be forthcoming I am sure.
- SeoxyS 11y ago3kW is the power, 10kWh is the energy. Your 10kWh battery would discharge in 3h20min at peak power. Or, you could listen to music on your 250W sound system for 40h.
- ericd 11y agoI thought he said the wall unit was 10 kwh? EDIT: Unless you mean it's limited to a 3 kw power draw - looks like it's 3.3 peak and 2 continuous.
- sidcool 11y agoI must say Elon is a brilliant engineer but not the best of orators.
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- clamprecht 11y agoAs an investor, I'll take this anyday.
- sidcool 11y agoIndeed, it seems much more authentic than any crisp marketing mumbo jumbo.
- chrisjlee 11y agoI would agree. He's not very compelling.
- sergiotapia 11y agoI find it endearing. Makes me trust him more and not make him seem like a shyster selling snake oil.
- rio517 11y agoI was thinking the same as I watched it. I was wondering if there were some technical issues to explain the slow start of his speaking part and if he might have been frazzled from whatever happened behind the scenes.
- uberdog 11y agoHe was the same at the Dragon 2 launch. I get the impression that he doesn't rehearse for these events much, probably because he's probably got much more important things to work on.
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- rokhayakebe 11y agoCan someone please share what a single family home can do with 10kWh? If I pay for this do I have to plug this thing into my own electrical grid to keep charging it?
- Turing_Machine 11y agoAccording to http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=97&t=3 http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=97&t=3 the average U.S. home uses 10,908 kWh/year, so this would be enough to keep the home running at full load for about 8.4 hours. Not bad. If you took steps to reduce consumption (avoiding using heavy demand appliances like electric ovens, etc.) it would last a lot longer. With a little care, you could probably run for a couple of days on one of these, particularly if you had LED lights, etc.
- _delirium 11y agoDue to the fairly low peak power draw the battery supports (3 kW) you would have to avoid using those heavy appliances anyway, especially simultaneously.
- Gustomaximus 11y agoFor Australia - 19.5kWh in winter and 16.4kWh in summer. http://energymadeeasy.gov.au/bill-benchmark/results/3660/4 http://energymadeeasy.gov.au/bill-benchmark/results/3660/4 It would be interesting to see what is the daylight vs. nighttime usage. And if you can daisy chain these batteries. Seems like a few would be needed to ensure for high usage days if you wanted to be largely self-sufficient.
- JacobAldridge 11y agoProof, if anyone still needs it, that Tesla is a battery company that builds cars, not a car company that builds batteries.
- adventured 11y agoHow big is their battery business compared to their car business?
- CodeWriter23 11y agoCheck back in 24 months.
- feld 11y agoeffectively zero until their battery factory is built, but their money is being put where their mouth is.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoVery shortly, its going to be as big as the entire world's lithium cell consumption currently.
- njharman 11y ago1/2 or more (by price) of their car business is battery business.
- sidcool 11y agoLive Stream: 0. Tesla will open source its patents for the Gigafactory. 1. Elon thinks all the world's energy needs can be served with 2 billion Tesla GW powepacks. 2. Elon: "This is something we can do, need to do and should do." It's over.
- intrasight 11y agoThe map graphic at the beginning was pretty powerful (please excuse pun)
- agumonkey 11y ago2 billion battery packs, and how many solar panels to feed them ? Did I miss the number ?
- gabeio 11y agoThe solar panel count was not mentioned. Though he did show the blue square and the red dot for the USA.
- agumonkey 11y agoRight, that one pixel was 2B powerpack. Solar Panels are quite larger than powerpacks, but that still looks like a large number to me.
- cmelbye 11y agoA lot of the stuff Tesla is saying about this is quite weird. (In the press kit and in Musk's live stream.) For example, the first sentence of the press kit: > The world currently consumes 20 trillion kWh of energy annually. Enough energy to [...] supply energy to a nuclear power plant for 2,300 years. Am I missing something, or is that an entirely bizarre comparison to make? What does this even mean?
- BinaryIdiot 11y ago> Batteries are not a source of energy. They store energy. (You'd be surprised at how many people don't grasp that.) Talking about how many batteries we need to power the world without talking about where that energy is coming from is silly. I'm not sure why you got such a weird impression. In his talk he clearly states that the power would be coming from solar energy. He even explained how much space you'd need for solar arrays and batteries if you want to provide the entire United States with power day and night (the biggest need for batteries). He also mentioned there is utility for the battery to be used with your powergrid but the big win is using it with solar energy.
- mfringel 11y agoNot a direct reply, but to put some scale around the numbers: 20,000,000,000,000 kWh = 20,000,000,000 MWh = 20,000,000 GWh / 8,760 hours/year ~= 2,283 GW average steady-state generation, globally. A typical utility-scale nuclear reactor produces around 0.5 GW.
- vanadium 11y ago$3,500. That's crazy good for your average household, on par with natural gas backup generators with half the logistics. I might just be ordering sooner rather than later given some of the grid instabilities in my area over the past year, and through the mid-term in preparation for a solar switch here in Chicago. While Elon might not be the best orator, you can easily derive his authenticity and belief in the product by virtue of his delivery. You can't do that with accuracy in the canned and carefully rehearsed.
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- vanadium 11y agoPlaying the margins in my home would probably save $25/mo against a $100/mo charge, I'm spitballing. Our local utility here in Chicago, ComEd, is starting to roll out to the population what flux in energy usage actually means on a granular basis (hourly, daily, monthly, seasonally) while offering incentives to change their consumption patterns.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoI too have ComED (Schaumburg). From midnight to 5am daily, I can get power for 1 cent/kwh. If I were to shift all of my consumption to that time period, its effectively free.
- joezydeco 11y agoI've been on ComEd RRTP for 6 years now and I've been wanting a nicer way to shift load or arbitrage price drops. The Telsa device, as others have mentioned, seems like a rebranded solar storage device. I suppose the intelligence would be in the inverter/grid cutout mechanism anyway. This system would run my home for about 8 hours in the winter and 4 in the summer before emptying, so I would need a lot more smarts in the box to try and anticipate price spikes without running out.
- amaterasu 11y agoAny news on international orders? I live in Australia, and would love to integrate this as a full off-grid solution.
- chrisjlee 11y agoThis would all make more sense if they made solar panels to go with the powerpack. Otherwise, it's just a huge battery.
- geerlingguy 11y agoSolarCity is another startup that Elon chairs... The idea is that the batteries and the energy generation process/supplier don't have to be the same.
- bhauer 11y agoI have four rack-mount uninterruptible power supplies that provide battery backup to my workstations and servers in my house. My curiosity here is whether this Tesla battery pack will obviate those UPSs, providing automatic and immediate in-line switching to battery whenever there is an interruption. That alone would be compelling at this price. Edit: Incidentally, when I submit the reservation form, there is no confirmation.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoThat would be determined by the inverter, not the batteries. And yes, almost all grid-tie inverters will serve your load with a switching time fast enough that computer equipment would continue running.
- kondro 11y agoDoesn't include inverter or installer markup and can only provide 2kW output. It will get expensive by the time you actually have all the bits you need inside your house. How is this better than deep-cycle batteries (with 20+ year lives) again? Why does it need to be slimline?
- uberdog 11y ago> Why does it need to be slimline? "so you don't need a battery room" - Elon Musk
- kondro 11y ago10kWh of deep-cycle batteries aren't that large. It's not like people in apartments are going to be using this product.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoBut they could now, and most deep cycle lead acid batteries are flooded, not sealed, which means they have to be ventilated to prevent hydrogen explosions hazards. Not so with Tesla's offering.
- kondro 11y agoFine. 4.8kW Li-Ion battery for USD$3,278 1.9kW for USD$1,678. My point is that Tesla isn't really doing anything really unique here. Sure, they're giving it more press than anyone really has before, but the products aren't especially cheap, innovative or special. http://ironedison.com/12-volt-lithium-battery-for-solar http://ironedison.com/12-volt-lithium-battery-for-solar
- laggyluke 11y agoWow, I have a deja vu - it's like reading comments about Apple announcing a new product :)
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- milesf 11y agoToday is a big deal. Open sourcing the patents to build fully solar-powered electrical grids around the will be a paradigm shift in the power structures of the world. I expect from today onward there will be a full-scale attack from those who stand to lose because of the reduced dependency on oil. First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. <--- WE ARE HERE Then you win.
- ridicter 11y agoAs someone who avoided the startuposphere so that I could focus on climate change activism and pricing carbon, seeing Elon Musk implore the world to avoid winning a Darwin Award was so incredibly rewarding and validating. He will most certainly be fought tooth and nail, but he has allies.
- BinaryIdiot 11y ago> I expect from today onward there will be a full-scale attack from those who stand to lose because of the reduced dependency on oil. Maybe. But remember we don't have the technology yet to completely move away from fossil fuels. The biggest issue I know of is making Airplanes electric which so far has not proven really feasible (as far as I can find anyway). This solves a huge chunk of issues but there are still plenty more before we can claim we have the technology to completely transition. I'm excited for the possibility however.
- milesf 11y agoWell, not jets, but propeller craft might be within reach: http://www.electronicsweekly.com/news/design/power/siemens-electric-airplane-motor-2015-04/ http://www.electronicsweekly.com/news/design/power/siemens-e...
- BinaryIdiot 11y agoWhile it's a long way off that's pretty neat! Thanks!
- vonklaus 11y ago
- iandanforth 11y agoI might spend $480 on electricity per year. I can't see this thing having an ROI within its lifespan. I also don't have solar panels, and have a very reliable power grid. Any reason I should consider buying one?
- fowkswe 11y agoI know people who spend $480 per month.
- MichaelGG 11y agoYep. I had electric water heater (60A @ 120v) and still use a small electric AC unit (12A). And I still can't find anything that matches incandescent or halogen lights (I'd pay a lot for real, bright, warm lights, not the ugly yellowish fluorescent, or the weird off-white LED stuff - some LEDs are getting close, but not good enough for residential). Electricity costs were over $480 some months. This is Guatemala, where I don't trust the grid much. I ended up buying ~$1000 worth of portable battery backups (UPS) and plug them in wherever I need it, but they need replacing every couple of years. It'd be much simpler to have a simple battery pack, although I'm not sure this would handle the load.
- ericd 11y agoYeah, anyone in the northeast US with electric heat.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoElectric bills in Hawaii can top $1000/month.
- danans 11y agoIIRC, that's because of the silly way (given Hawaii's abundant solar and geothermal resources) in which most electricity is generated in Hawaii: burning imported fossil fuels. If the local renewables were fully exploited, I can't think of a reason for costs to be so high.
- localhost 11y agoI'm going to install a 9kW solar grid on my roof in the next couple of months - capital cost is ~$40K USD. Without the Power Wall, I'd be selling power back to the utility at around $0.10 / kWh, and buying it back at $0.09 / kWh in the evenings. The Power Wall will also let me endure grid outages as well (you can't run your house on your solar panels directly). I'm really curious about what the end-user cost is going to be for one of these batteries, after distributor markup and utility company rebates. Would be interesting to see if it pays for itself over the 10 year lifespan of the batteries. I just reserved one.
- hayksaakian 11y agoIs it really worth it if it really takes 10 years to break even (and that's the lifespan as you mentioned)? That's like giving someone a 10 year 0% interest loan. Maybe you're better off buying a bunch of Tesla stock with that money if you think they'll stick around that long.
- TaylorAlexander 11y agoIf you're only looking at it from a financial perspective, it may not be "worth it" (I haven't done the math). But if you want to pay a little to be able to have reliable power from unreliable sources, then it could be "worth it". It may save you zero dollars over ten years, but during that time you're provided the service from this system.
- 2muchcoffeeman 11y agoBut even if the life time cost for the energy is the same, if you can afford the initial payment, why wouldn't you do it? Especially if there are other advantages to the newer technology?
- IanCal 11y ago> But even if the life time cost for the energy is the same, if you can afford the initial payment, why wouldn't you do it? Especially if there are other advantages to the newer technology? There's an opportunity cost. You'd have to weigh the lost gains you could make elsewhere to the advantages.
- daemin 11y agoThe maximum temperature will be an issue here in Australia. In a typical place where it will be mounted, i.e. the garage, the temperatures will readily get over 40, close to 50 during summer. I could see this also being a problem in places like Nevada and Arizona in the USA.
- Miner49er 11y agoI think the minimum temperature will actually be a larger problem for the U.S. There's a lot of states where it easily gets colder than -4 F throughout winter, but the max will be a problem too.
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- sologoub 11y ago110°F is going to be a problem even in SoCal potentially. Though, I guess you could somewhat justify using solar power for cooling the battery when the temperature gets excessive. Presumably you'd be getting peak power at the same time you get peak temps. -4F is definitely not that low, but at the same time when the house is heated, garage is going to get some of that heat as well.
- chrissyb 11y agoIf your garage is getting to 50°C you've got a major insulation problem! Where are you located? In both cases if min and max operating temperature are an issue it may be best to install in an FIP enclosure and use ducting to keep the enclosure and an optimal temperature.
- prostoalex 11y agoThis was offered to SolarCity customers in late 2014, I see that the image here http://www.solarcity.com/residential/backup-power-supply http://www.solarcity.com/residential/backup-power-supply now reflects Tesla branding.
- Qualman 11y agoThing looks like a giant Apple Magic Mouse[1] bolted to your wall. [1]: http://store.storeimages.cdn-apple.com/4572/as-images.apple.com/is/image/AppleInc/aos/published/images/M/B8/MB829/MB829_AV1?wid=1000&hei=1000&fmt=jpeg&qlt=95&op_sharpen=0&resMode=bicub&op_usm=0.5,0.5,0,0&iccEmbed=0&layer=comp&.v=1400971765146 http://store.storeimages.cdn-apple.com/4572/as-images.apple....
- BorisMelnik 11y agoIinteresting how they are branding it as a backup solution, while Tesla is branding it as a complete replacement. "What if we could move the electricity grid off of fossil fuels" (Tesla) vs "Be prepared the next time the power goes out."(Solar City)
- curiouscats 11y ago"Models 10 kWh $3,500 For backup applications 7 kWh $3,000 For daily cycle applications" From http://www.teslamotors.com/powerwall http://www.teslamotors.com/powerwall Maybe Solar City has been using the ones meant for daily cycle - that would make sense.
- davidw 11y ago> 7kWh or 10kWh Can anyone speak to what that could power? Could I run a load of laundry with it? How about dry it afterwards? Here in Italy people mostly take advantage of "solar power" by hanging clothes to dry, but just to get an idea of what the battery could run.
- hayksaakian 11y agothat would be an interesting comparison. could you (eventually) save time and money by using an electric dryer + solar power + battery as opposed to hanging out clothes?
- notatoad 11y agoNot as long as you're connected to the grid, and the energy you're wasting could have otherwise been sold.
- kenrikm 11y agoTo put it in perspective: in Florida, in the summer, using a 4ton very old/inefficient AC in a 2000sqft house in 100 degree summer weather, electric oven, refrigerator, washer/dryer and all other household stuff. I would burn about 3kw / hr in the middle of the day. So in theory the 10kwh would power a extreme case like this for ~3hours, and 9 of them could do it for ~27hrs. So yes you could do everything you would normally do with household electricity with this.
- toomuchtodo 11y agoMoving to geothermal heat pump for the AC would drastically drop your peak power consumption. As a fellow (part-time) Florida resident, I'd encourage you to send a comment in to the Florida Public Service Commission: "The Florida Public Service Commission (FPSC) staff is gathering information regarding enhancing development of solar technologies in Florida. To this end, we encourage individuals, businesses, and utilities to provide input on demand-side and supply-side policies and programs, and any other information that would be useful to the FPSC. Comments should be limited to 20 pages, excluding attachments. The comments are due to Lee Eng Tan via e-mail at LTan@psc.state.fl.us on June 23, 2015 by 5:00 pm. Please note that comments provided to the FPSC will be public record and will be posted to the FPSC’s website." http://www.floridapsc.com/utilities/electricgas/solarenergy/Solar_Comments.pdf http://www.floridapsc.com/utilities/electricgas/solarenergy/...
- colinsidoti 11y agoOne thing that might go overlooked: Load shifting could, in theory, lower electric bills such that there's ROI without solar panels. --- Edit for why: On-demand power is expensive. "Spinning up" additional power during the day is more expensive than having certain types of power generation running all the time. In theory, pumping power into a battery at night during non-peak hours will cost less than consuming directly off the grid during the day. I'm forgetting all the details of energy economics, but IIRC there would also be far less emissions by having consistent load on the grid all day long. Something about the ones we "spin up" also being the worst for the environment.
- kmod 11y agoIf what you say is true, then with better economies of scale and longer investment horizons, utilities would quickly erase any peak-vs-non-peak arbitrage opportunities.
- epistasis 11y agoDifferent entities have different risk profiles, and utilities are extremely conservative. It will probably be profitable to load shift for several years before utilities start to do it on their own. And even then, it may take quite some time before there's enough battery capacity for all the fluctuations to even out.
- gutnor 11y agoUtilities with electricity production are more conservative because they have technical limitation due to the infrastructure they run. However, there is a bunch of companies that buy and sell electricity on the open market, so they have a direct financial interest to play with this arbitrage. In the UK, another reader has calculated the best case scenario was profitability in about 10 years. (his numbers ring true to me, I calculated recently that there was no reason to take an economy 7 contract for my electricity usage using similar data) That's a lot of time even in the utility market. So if batteries not attached to solar panel are going to be profitable (in the UK), that would be a future generation.
- malandrew 11y agoHow well do you think these would work in RVs when paired with the number of solar panels that fit on top of an RV? Would this work well at burning man vs running a generator?
- seanp2k2 11y agoYou'd have to calculate it and your expected power usage. You probably wouldn't be able to run AC on full all day without a massive solar array. Check out how big a 100w solar array is, how many of those can fit on your RV roof, and how much power your AC uses. You'd also need a big (and not 100% efficient) inverter. Also take heat and dust inefficiencies into account. TL;DR you're better off going in on that industrial diesel 3-phase generator rental which comes on its own trailer.
- timmaah 11y agoI doubt they would install one in an RV... but I can dream.
- wtallis 11y agoLikewise for boats. It's high time we stop using lead batteries in vehicles where weight matters, and the pricing on this looks great.
- dzhiurgis 11y agoI thought about boats as well. Do you know the weight and dimensions of this? It looks like it is equivalent to 835 Ah @ 12V. That is 10 lead batteries. You probably can buy more than 3 lead batteries for 300 dollars, but the weight and 10 year warranty does look attractive.
- timmaah 11y agoThose would be crap lead acid batteries at $100. I have 500 Ah in 4 AGM batteries that cost me $1200. If all that 835 is usable I'd have to spend $3600 to come close with the same AGM's I'm using now.
- amirmansour 11y agoImplementation of such technologies is exactly what I worked on in grad school, and now I'm happy that a company like Tesla is actually gonna bring it to the masses. Batteries are essentially the "killer app" for the power-grid, and will accelerate the adoption of renewables with stochastic power outputs such as solar and wind. Thank you Tesla!
- stevewepay 11y agoI wonder how many years this battery will last before requiring replacing? Storing power over the course of the day is an intriguing idea, because the house is generally empty then. Instead of selling back to the power companies, I would rather have it power this battery so that my night time use is "free".
- marze 11y agoThis is much more groundbreaking than it may appear. The innovation is entirely in the price. At $3500, you can put in two and be entirely off grid. Solar panels are cheap enough you only need batteries to last one night, as you can size the array to operate your loads even on cloudy days.
- kondro 11y ago2 is not enough. 4kW seems to be the maximum potential drain from the battery. That wouldn't power an oven… let alone anything else at the same time. 4kW inverters seem to be around the $1000 mark… but they don't seem to increase linearly (10kW inverter $4000 for example). Of course you could go totally off-grid, but the cost isn't going to be just $7k… it's likely to be at least $15-20k by the time you get everything you need and installed. At that price, you could've bought a larger capacity deep-cycle storage solution already readily available on the market with batteries that will last 20+ years.
- marze 11y agoObviously there is a lot more than just the batteries. In solar systems, $7k is not a big amount compared to all the other expenses. I'm assuming you'd minimize your loads, it is silly to size your solar system for a business-as-usual set of loads.
- kondro 11y agoYou definitely could, but that will increase costs even further. You're potentially replacing all your lighting, climate-control, water heating, cleaning (dishes/clothes), cooking & fridge/s to be more energy efficient also. Actual power storage is a reasonably small cost (probably < 20%) in even the solar, power equipment (inverter, switches, controllers, etc), power-storage equation anyway if you want to go completely off-grid. So why does this product make anyone more likely to switch than the existing options?
- marze 11y ago
- dz512 11y agoThe AWS roll-out also seems like big news. Last I checked, data centers accounted for 2-3% of domestic energy spend, and they typically feature backup batteries and generators. Tesla may have entered the (enormous) data center market the moment it broke ground in Nevada.
- spiritplumber 11y agoFunny that something called Tesla Energy brings back direct current to the home. I wonder how many people will catch that.
- tokenadult 11y agoLess funny when you consider that the Tesla press release submitted here for discussion says, "The Powerwall consists of Tesla’s lithium-ion battery pack, liquid thermal control system and software that receives dispatch commands from a solar inverter." The inverter, of course, converts battery DC current to household AC current so that people can continue to enjoy AC power in their homes. http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/gadgets/automotive/dc-ac-power-inverter.htm http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/gadgets/automotive/dc-a...
- ph0rque 11y agoThat raises a question: if one were to build a new house with solar and battery integration present from the start, would it make sense to run DC appliances?
- freehunter 11y agoWell obviously. Everything runs off AC, no one would buy this battery pack if it didn't have an inverter.
- tokenadult 11y agoThat didn't look at all obvious when I replied above, because I was replying to a comment that said, in so many words, "Funny that something called Tesla Energy brings back direct current to the home." No, Tesla Energy is not bringing back direct current to the home. It is providing battery backup for continuing provision of alternating current to the home, which is strictly necessary in a world of appliances that run on AC current. I took the trouble to read the fine article before replying the first time, after first reading the previously posted comments. (My late dad was an industrial engineer for a company that manufactured electric generators, so this issue immediately jumped into my mind when I saw the comment I replied to. The difference between AC power and DC power was dinner-table conversation in my home when I was growing up.) Does anyone think that my comment above was in any way harmful to the community or to the discussion here?
- rio517 11y agoI actually really wanted him to put his "blue square" in context. Would have been interesting compared to land area dedicated to rooftops, parking lots or something.
- ryanmarsh 11y agoThe max temperature basically makes it a no-go in much of the so-called "sun belt" where solar power conditions are optimal.
- lockes5hadow 11y agoIn those areas I guess you just install it inside the home somewhere, which is the whole point of making it look decent.
- aerovistae 11y agoHey, for fun let's use this to do a rough math check on Tesla's future plans. The battery is $3500 for 10kWh. Model S with a 270kWh battery is advertised with a range of 240mi. Model 3 aims for a minimum range of 200mi, or 5/6, a.k.a. 225kWh battery. 225 is 22.5 * 10. 22.5 * $3500 = $78,750. Model 3 is supposed to be $35,000. I believe in Elon Musk completely and I want nothing more than to see him succeed and I have been blown away by what Tesla Motors and SpaceX accomplish at every turn. But even so, I will be amazed again if the Gigafactory can truly make the price point feasible. I really believe they'll do it, I just don't see how. Can the factory's massive gains in efficiency really change things by such a huge factor in 2 years? (Model 3 targets 2017, doubtful.)
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- breser 11y agoYour battery sizes for the cars is way off. The Model S has come with a 60 (no longer available), 70 and 85 kWh battery. The 240 mile vehicle is the newer 70 kWh battery. 70 is 7 * 10. 7 * $3500 = $24,500.
- aerovistae 11y agoYeah I have no idea how I managed to add 200kWh in there. Thanks for pointing that out. Wow.
- vonklaus 11y agoI am not really sure what you are calculating here. That being said I am pretty sure that the model s has a 270mi RANGE, not a 270kWh battery. It has a few options, like 85kWh or 70kWh. It has been published that the model 3 will have a smaller battery, and be a smaller car. Being more efficient at the vehicle level, coupled with cost savings of vertical integration, will allow use of a smaller and cheaper battery.
- aerovistae 11y agoHey, for fun let's use this to do a rough math check on Tesla's future plans. The battery is $3500 for 10kWh. Model S with a 270kWh battery is advertised with a range of 240mi. Model 3 aims for a minimum range of 200mi, or 5/6, a.k.a. 225kWh battery. 225 is 22.5 * 10. 22.5 * $3500 = $78,750. Model 3 is supposed to be $35,000. I believe in Elon Musk completely and I want nothing more than to see him succeed and I have been blown away by what Tesla Motors and SpaceX accomplish at every turn. But even so, I will be amazed again if the Gigafactory can truly make the price point feasible. I really believe they'll do it, I just don't see how. Can the factory's massive gains in efficiency really change things by such a huge factor in 2 years? (Model 3 targets 2017, doubtful.)
- digitalzombie 11y agoHow hacker friendly is this? I'm not crazy enough to do anything fancy. But I would like to build some metric system to see the data and usages. If I can some how hack it so that it keep track of which devices uses the Tesla battery the most.
- mryan 11y agoI highly doubt that will be possible. Actually I think it is entirely impossible, but I'm trying to future-proof my statement :-) The battery system will just know how much power is currently being used. It will have no way to identify which devices are currently drawing power. For that, you'd need something like this on each outlet: http://www.amazon.com/P3-P4400-Electricity-Usage-Monitor/dp/B00009MDBU http://www.amazon.com/P3-P4400-Electricity-Usage-Monitor/dp/... Maybe future smart homes will have the Kill A Watt built-in to electrical outlets for monitoring purposes. I imagine you will be able to get metrics on current usage, peak usage periods et cetera.
- doublerebel 11y agoIt may be possible to use non-intrusive load monitoring to determine the devices. However, I'm not aware of any products on the market using this tech. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonintrusive_load_monitoring http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonintrusive_load_monitoring
- frik 11y agoI would like to buy one. Can we use it in Western Europe? Will it be certified for the EU power grid network? How long will the battery last (expected battery life)? About 7-8 years would be the minimum, but is that the lifespan of lithium batteries?
- kondro 11y agoSo why not solar power (1kW), storage (3.6kWh) with 25+ year life, inverter (2.8kW) and other electrical systems for just USD$8,702. The batteries are only USD$2,910 of that. http://ironedison.com/edison-power-plus-system http://ironedison.com/edison-power-plus-system
- BorisMelnik 11y agoYou are probably right, and from a quick technical comparison it looks like a much better deal. Definitely not an expert in this field. At the end of the day Tesla is generating mounds of press, and as a result will probably sell (or in this case reserve) more units.
- frik 11y agoWhat if one has already dozens of photovoltaic solar panels, and just need a good energy storage solution that lasts many years? I trust Tesla more than some others companies that they can deliver it.
- kondro 11y agoYou shouldn't. Tesla have a much shorter track record than someone like Iron Edison. Also… if you read my comment, you'll see the batteries are cheaper than Tesla's… and if you look online, you can see they come in various configurations… rather than predefined 10kWh bricks with 2kW output.
- diminoten 11y agoYou're all over this thread, shitting on Tesla. Why? No, I don't want to hear what you're already thinking about typing. I want you to ask yourself why. I don't actually care (you're some stranger, we'll probably never talk again) -- but you should.
- TorKlingberg 11y agoThat attack was really uncalled for. I'm a Tesla fan, but it gets tiring how only enthusiastic comments are allowed in certain threads on HN.
- ljk 11y agoit sounds so awesome, are there any reasons why I shouldn't get this?
- orsenthil 11y agoAs the picture shows, can this evolve into a battery station residing within the garage? Experts please share your opinion.
- thewarrior 11y agoWow This thing could sell like crazy in places like India. 10 kwH is enough to power an Indian home for more than a day and at 3500 dollars most middle class people would consider buying it seeing how frequent power cuts here are.
- morekozhambu 11y ago10 kWh is good spec. But $3500 is around Rs. 2.1 lakhs. That's a way too costly UPS(inverters) considering a 1kWh one costs within Rs. 25k and bumping it two more car batteries.
- latch 11y agoReally? According to wiki, India's middle-class makes anywhere from $10 to $50 per day. When you factor in that this will cost a lot more than $3500, would these really sell like crazy?
- diminoten 11y agoFor a small percentage (just enough to match inflation), I'd gladly loan an Indian middle-class family the money.
- Bud 11y agoGreat idea. I can't afford to loan this amount, but I do make micro-loans regularly on kiva.org. Would love to see some loans appear there for these kinds of power systems.
- meric 11y agoThey can afford scooters, which cost one quarter that much. On $50 a day, it could be saved for in less than a year even if it costs $5000. Relative to their income, Indians have a lot of savings, due to their high savings rate (30%+). India's accumulated household wealth per adult is $5500. If you have two pairs of parents and one pair of grand-parents in one house, that is 6 * $5500 = $33000. Could be worth it, IMO it depends what is the lifetime of one such installation. EDIT: Thanks for the correction on scooter pricing.
- ChuckMcM 11y agoNice, that came in lower than I was expecting. I was thinking $5K for the 7kWh unit. Of course that is the "installers" price so who knows what those folks will consider the 'retail' price. My wife still has her solar installer certification so we could presumably get one that way. It also makes for a really interesting opportunity for grid tied solar inverters. Now you want the inverter to power the house first, then push power to the batteries and only if they are full push it back to the grid. Software update for sure :-) of course it might make more sense to leave it DC for the push into the battery and only have the AC conversion happen post battery, so charge controller between the battery and the DC disconnect. On a safety note I'd also really like to mount this outside, preferably against firebrick rather than my house. I realize the batteries are much safer than they have ever been, but still a cascading lithium battery failure inside my garage is not my idea of a party
- miratrix 11y agoOn the grid tied solar inverter front - the spec sheet says the battery voltage is 350~450 V, so we're looking at 108 lithium ion cells (25 x 18650 cells?) at 400 VDC nominal. This is quite different from typical lead acid battery pack voltage of 12, 24, or 48VDC that's used for battery backup storage, so a lot of existing solar battery storage infrastructure may not even work... this means that people may need to buy a whole new set of supporting hardware to integrate this into the existing solar systems instead of being able to update the software on existing hardware. Lithium Ion also has quite a different (and much less forgiving!) charging cycle that requires much more monitoring of things like temperature, though I'd imagine a lot of that would be built-in as a safety mechanism directly into the Powerwall. What I've heard is that National Electrical Code becomes much more stringent on battery systems greater than 48V, with the line drawn at 48V due to it being used widely in the phone landline system. I'm not sure how true that story is, but I'd imagine extra care is probably warranted. 10kWh is about 9kg of TNT. :-)
- patrickg_zill 11y ago48V is under the threshold at which electrical shocks become dangerous. 48V or less is "low voltage" class. And, 48V is a multiple of both 12V and 1.5V (most individual battery cells are 1.5V), making it much easier to hook up by using a combo of parallel and series connections.
- guelo 11y agoThe main advantage of Lithium Ion is the high energy density which is good for reducing the weight of laptops and electric cars but doesn't seem that useful in a house, especially when you compare it with cheaper and longer lasting battery technologies. This feels more like them trying to find a new business line for their existing technology than coming up with the perfect technology for the home market.
- ZeroGravitas 11y agoThere's been some talk about end-of-life electric car batteries getting recycled into these kind of devices, they may be priming that market too.
- mikeash 11y agoI'm sure it is about finding more uses for their existing technology than coming up with the perfect technology. If you could sum up both SpaceX and Tesla in one phrase, it would probably be "perfect is the enemy of the good." You're much better off taking something that's good enough that you can get right now than you are trying to invent the perfect technology.
- CamperBob2 11y agoEnough energy to power a single family home for 1.8 billion years or supply energy to a nuclear power plant for 2,300 years I think I see the problem...
- curiousDog 11y agoDo these green numbers take into consideration the energy expended on producing the Li-ion batteries? Surely that must be a messy mining operation.
- DigitalSea 11y agoI hope they have taken the safety technology from their Tesla vehicles and put it into their Tesla Energy batteries, because the thought of a 10Kwh lithium-ion battery exploding in my garage does not sound like the kind of mess I would want to be cleaning up. I couldn't see it mentioned anywhere, but presumably these batteries will be available in Australia for the same price? We always get charged more. If I can get one for $3500 AUD, count me in!
- GigabyteCoin 11y agoThey certainly won't be $3,500 AUD. 3,500.00 USD = 4,447.86 AUD according to xe.com right now... That, and the factory is in the USA. I would assume shipping something that large and heavy would add to the cost in Australia.
- eru 11y ago> That, and the factory is in the USA. I would assume shipping something that large and heavy would add to the cost in Australia. Put it on a boat. Shouldn't cost more than shipping inside the US.
- GigabyteCoin 11y agoYou still need to ship it inside the US to the boat dock, and then pay to put it on a boat, and then pay to ship it from the australian dock to the homeowner.
- yen223 11y agoFreight costs are so cheap they're essentially negligible. There's a reason why it's cost-effective to make stuff in China, and ship it all the way across the Pacific to the US, instead of just making them in the US.
- GigabyteCoin 11y agoIt's still $1,000 AUD above what OP was hoping for even at free shipping costs.
- jcfrei 11y agoI can't wait to see the first users proudly cutting their connection to the power grid, claiming they are now energy independent and free from oppressive utility companies...
- mrfusion 11y agoI'm amazed at the price. This actually makes it competitive with whole house generators at least for backup electricity.
- mrfusion 11y agoDo we know the prices they're charging for the utility versions? Does it make it a viable option for a lot of utilities?
- ZoFreX 11y agoThis is a three-pronged stroke of genius: 1) Immediate benefits to just about anyone. If you have your own solar panels, you need this (or something like it). Even if you don't, you can benefit by drawing more power during cheaper off-peak times. 2) If lots of people get in on this, we'll have the storage capacity we need on the grid to be more dependent on renewable energy. Lack of storage capacity is one of the biggest obstacles to increasing renewable generation. 3) If lots of people buy this, the price per unit goes down, and it's the most expensive component of Tesla's main product, their cars - which are effectively batteries on wheels.
- watty 11y agoI don't see how it's immediately beneficial for just about everyone. I currently have a flat rate for kWh and no solar panel... and moving soon. It's not worth the $. In 6 months I'll be renting for a year, still not beneficial. Perhaps in a couple years I can purchase solar, a battery, and an energy system that can automate some demand shedding but we're talking about 1%ers here. In fact, I'd say it's only immediately beneficial to a minority.
- nkohari 11y agoA better way of looking at it is that it's immediately beneficial to anyone who owns real estate.
- jasonkostempski 11y agoIf everyone had these and they were all attempting to "charge during nonpeak hours" wouldn't those hours become the peak hours?
- aqzman 11y agoIf enough people had these in their homes then there would no longer be "peak hours" or "non-peak hours", I would think that this would normalize the grid so that pricing is always fairly consistent.
- mikeash 11y agoWhich is more or less the point, of course. If you can even out the peaks and troughs then you can make all this stuff much more efficient. Of course, that assumes that generation can be consistent. Right now, that is the case. If we took the existing grid and just gave everybody batteries, we could make power consumption flat throughout the day, which would greatly reduce costs. That would be cool! The idea is that in the future, solar dominates. There you inherently have peak and non-peak hours, because you generate more electricity at noon than at midnight. This is completely impractical if you go straight from generation to use, because the times don't match up. But throw in storage to flatten it all out, and it works.
- joelthelion 11y agoHow sustainable is putting a large lithium battery in every home?
- dharma1 11y agoPretty decent pricing, good enough for developing nations with power cuts where people currently use diesel generators.
- ekianjo 11y agoGreat, except that all these nice batteries are produced with extremely toxic processes, involve heavy metals, and consume a whole bunch of fossil fuel during their production. Hardly a good case for the environment when you factor everything together.
- rdl 11y agoLithium-Ion batteries aren't all sweetness and light, but it's not a particularly dirty process compared to Ni-Cd, and certainly you have to factor in benefits of reduced generation.
- ekianjo 11y ago> have to factor in benefits of reduced generation Well the outcome really depends on how long they last before you need to replace them. Plus you have the take in account the recycling cost (for the environment as well).
- makomk 11y agoNi-Cd batteries are so bad for the environment that the EU is forcing companies to phase out their use. Saying that Lithium Ion batteries are better than something that's been banned for most purposes because it's so toxic is not exactly high praise.
- tarmigan 11y ago(Posting from my phone after the event). If you are excited about this and want to work on it then please email me at tcasebolt@teslamotors.com. We are very excited about the technology and future!
- tarmigan 11y ago(Posting from my phone after the event). If you are excited about this and want to work on it then please email me at tcasebolt@teslamotors.com. We are very excited about the technology and future!
- lerouxb 11y agoFeels like we're finally living in the future.
- Animats 11y agoThe wall mount surprised me, but 10KWh at the same density as the Model S battery should be only 155lb. That's not too bad, although you need a solid connection to the building structure. Having it above floor level is a good thing, since it won't be shorted out by minor flooding. If you get a new solar installation, installing one of these seems an obvious win. The solar installation already includes the inverters and control gear. Without solar, it's probably not worth the trouble for residential. The average American house uses 30 KWh per day. If you have daily sun and a low nighttime air conditioning load, 10KWh should get you through the night. Hawaii - perfect. Southern California - looks good. Texas - get two to get you through the night with A/C.
- willholloway 11y agoAs I've learned more about heat pumps I've been wondering why we all use air-source cooling for central A/C. We are cooling our condensers with hot summer time air when the temperature is much lower just four feet under the yard. The energy requirements would drop way down by cooling the condenser with a water ground loop. Ground loops are seen as expensive for installation, but I don't understand why. It's just plastic tubing buried in the yard. I've been wondering if a hole digging robot could lower the price. The carbon and money savings would be huge if we could bring down the cost of ground loop installation.
- chadgeidel 11y agoI'm just spitballing here, but one has to be concerned about how much heat soaking the ground loop can take before its effectiveness goes down significantly. Dirt is a pretty good insulator. How much will the "ambient dirt temp" increase after X hours of running AC? How long does it take for the heat to dissipate?
- willholloway 11y agoThat is why its critical to properly size the system. With the right size loop it works well. Also if you figure an ambient air temperature of 80-100 you can raise the dirt temp a lot before its as warm as the air.
- robmcm 11y agoYou should be able to put this thing on the top of your Tesla (it even looks like a roof box) to double your range!
- fr0sty 11y agoTesla car batteries are between 60kwh and 85kwh. These packs are 7kwh or 10kwh. Not going to get you that much farther with only a 10-15% increase in capacity...
- knivets 11y agoIt would be cool if Tesla could also come up with something to improve batteries used in portable devices, so we can use phones or laptops more than 1-2 days without recharging.
- estefan 11y agoMassive news for doomsday preppers everywhere...
- gadders 11y agoI suppose this must be better than storage heaters. Not sure how big these are outside the UK, but basically they use off-peak electricity to heat bricks that then slowly release the heat the next day. We had them when we were a kid and they were rubbish. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storage_heater http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storage_heater
- emforce 11y agoIs there anyway to model the energy saving costs of these in like a small town? I mean if power stations only had to produce N/kW/h at a constant rate to power every home in the region then would there be any energy savings? Instead of the typical, scale back at night, boost up during the day system? If we could calculate the energy usage of every home down to the Watt then surely there wouldn't be any waste?
- beloch 11y agoQuestions: 1. How is this different from a UPS? (Similar capacities can be obtained for less money.) 2. How many cycles can we expect to get out of these? (One assumes these are designed to be cycled more often than a UPS) 3. What are the risks when temperature is outside the operating range? (If non-negligable, the stated operating range of -20C to +43C limits use in some applications, such as field stations without heating (or AC, depending on locale). 4. Is this technology viable on the scale of an entire powergrid? If it's advantageous for individual users, one would think economy of scale would make this more efficient to implement grid-wide. 5. Do these present an additional hazard in the case of fires, floods, etc.?
- datashovel 11y agoWell done Tesla. Next project? I have an idea. How about standardizing battery packs for robots.
- amai 11y agoThe competition doesn't sleep: http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/sungevity-and-sonnenbatterie-to-undercut-tesla http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/sungevity-and-so... In fact they seem to be ahead. Sonnenbattery offers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_iron_phosphate_battery http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_iron_phosphate_battery since 2011 in Germany. For technical details see http://www.sonnenbattery.com/strom-energie-speicher/sonnenbatterie/technical-data/ http://www.sonnenbattery.com/strom-energie-speicher/sonnenba...
- dazzla 11y agoThe article has been updated as the price is $3,000 and not the predicted $13,000.
- mladenkovacevic 11y agoMy tweet from a few days ago: It would be poignant if Tesla (the company) decentralized power generation & storage considering free energy was Tesla's (the man) dream
- hnnewguy 11y agoEveryone has known what this announcement was going to be for a month.
- mladenkovacevic 11y agoI wasn't implying that I predicted the future. I'm commenting on how this brings their product mission more in line with their company name.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- Thiz 11y agoI predict Venezuela will be the biggest importer of powerwalls to cope with daily outages. Who knew oil-rich but impoverished countries would help fuel innovation.
- saryant 11y agoVenezuela has almost no dollars. They don't have the money to import toilet paper much less multi-thousand-dollar battery installations.
- Thiz 11y agoVenezuela has plenty of money from oil which goes to the hands of the power elites and their cronies and families. So yes, while 29 million people lives in total poverty, there is one million families that would benefit a lot from that invention, and they will get it, believe me.
- wiremine 11y agoWhat I'd love to see is a ROI calculator that: * uses my zip code to figure out what my non-peak costs might be. * allows me to optionally calculate solar energy capture (so I can see what impact having solar would be, given the average sunny days in my area) * takes into account the wear and tear average cold weather would have on the lifetime of the batter and the payback period. For example, I live in Michigan, and I don't know what my off peak cost is off the top of my head. I also have no idea how much sunshine I get, or how 10 degree lows for two months would impact the battery's ability to keep a charge. Anybody know if something like this exists?
- ams6110 11y agoI would guess for most people it would show an ROI number that is not conducive to sales. Also, what is the environmental impact of the manufacture of LI batteries at this scale? Lithium mining, processing, assembly, delivery... we can't just ignore that.
- beat 11y agoThe environmental impact shouldn't be significantly more than any other hunk of metal of the same mass. And that has to be weighed against the fact that cost-efficient battery technology can make solar/wind viable and cost-effective relative to fossil fuel plants.
- danielweber 11y agoThere's about $10,000 worth of work in a battery. It's not just a hunk of metal, it goes through a very complicated and energy intensive creation process. The cost of the raw lithium is about 1% of the cost of the battery. It's engineering it in a very precise way that's expensive.
- voodoomagicman 11y agoThe battery costs $3000 - that is likely a cap on the cost of the work involved in producing it.
- zeristor 11y agoWith the hoped roll out of more electric cars charging them will place an undue load on the grid, if it isn't orchestrated. Tesla plan to be able to control when they discharge to the grid, so this could go some way to reduce stresses on the electric grid when more people want to recharge it. Just a thought.
- TheHeasman 11y agoForget the USA. Imagine what these decreased battery prices are going to do for solar power in LEDCs.
- antaviana 11y agoWhile I think this announcement is great news, there are at least two caveats to keep in mind that can mine the long term value proposition: - If there are many users, the peak/non-peak price differences (arbitrage) will disappear. This is because of supply/demand law. - If solar energy/battery storage takes off, it will be heavily taxed. There is an impending "Sun tax" being implemented in Spain, that aims to make more expensive running a home solar source than taking power from the grid. If necessary, they will tax Lithium. So the Tesla value proposition is in all cases short term.
- omfg 11y agoIf Peak / Non-peak is smoothed out, one could argue prices may fall.
- army 11y agoYour analysis of the arbitrage is faulty - if there's a cost associated with time-shifting energy, then the gap will only narrow to the extent that it's still economically justifiable for people to invest the money in time-shifting energy. What you're describing (no peak/non-peak difference plus people still buying batteries to time-shift energy) isn't a steady state - why would people continue to buy the batteries when they're going to lose money on the deal? You'd actually expect the gap to be the price difference per watt plus some additional amount for the capital and inconvenience. Also, if there's significant arbitrage, it will also reduce peak prices - because of reduced demand, and also because of reduced costs of expensive additional capacity. I.e. it can reduce energy costs for people who don't use it.
- antaviana 11y agoYes, what I meant is that each Tesla battery sold will contribute to reduce the peak price and to increase the non-peak price, effectively reducing the gap that is the basis for the value proposition. Because of this effect, the value proposition for existing Tesla battery owners will lower over time. Ironically, the ones that benefit at long term are the non-owners because their peak time price will be lower.
- Siecje 11y agoI thought Panasonic made batteries for Tesla?
- butwhy 11y agoWith
- IkmoIkmo 11y agoI felt the 'area needed in the US' to be a bit disingenuous. I very much recommend David Mackay's Without the Hot Air, a great talk he did at Harvard on area required can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFosQtEqzSE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFosQtEqzSE Beyond that, very glad to see this happen. It's one of the factors necessary to push a sustainable electrified future forward.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- rexreed 11y agoThis is very clever! They're trying to increase demand for batteries independent of sales of vehicles, thus driving the economics of battery cost down and driving their vehicle prices down as a result. Get more batteries out there in different forms and use that demand to make the rest of their portfolio more affordable. Very rational strategy! Let's see what demand is like for their battery products.
- thomasahle 11y agoAlso given they just built the world's largest battery factories, it makes sense to sell some more batteries.
- elchief 11y agoThis is also Amazon's strategy with AWS (in terms of servers, not batteries)
- arielby 11y ago> The world currently consumes 20 trillion kWh of energy annually. > Enough energy to power a single family home for 1.8 billion years or supply energy to a nuclear power plant for 2,300 years. That's, ..., not the way I would have written it.
- billiam 11y agoI am just going to cut and paste my previous comment on Musk. The Musk M.O: 1. Identify industry with big inefficiencies that depends on huge government subsidies. That's cars, commercial space vehicles, mass transit and now: colonizing another planet with the 0.1%. 2. Convince the media and envious government officials you are Tom Swift, boy inventor. Have these governments fight over how many billions to give you to build your space car factory. 2. Use these taxpayer dollars and gigantic tax breaks to create iconic products and services for the elite class, effectively transferring huge dollars from the poor to the rich. 3. Rinse and repeat. I see no evidence at all that Musk cares any more about technologies to enable several billion of us to live together without slaughtering each other than he does about money. Add the utility business to the growing list of government supported industries Musk wants to "disrupt" by which I mean establish a publicly funded, government subsidized mechanism to siphon off dollars for himself, just like Tony Stark in fact. The electricity generating and distribution system is one of the most provably useful "common goods" in the history of the human race-- why not convince people to spend more than 10 grand to power their house for 24 hours? His reasons: Load Shifting - residences generally have NO economic incentive to ride the demand curve, only businesses do in some cases. It is one of the most important things about the electrical system--these huge monopolies manage that curve collectively for us. Sure, transmission is inefficient, but so is decentralizing that task, while adding the risks of keeping your battery from breaking/catching fire. Increasing self consumption- a battery does not stimulate this at all - the grid needs your power most when the sun is shining. Solar power and an inverter provides that incentive today. Backup - One day of power in the event of a true natural disaster for $10,000 is expensive and not sufficient. I am not a Luddite and I am a libertarian, and certainly our society needs technology visionaries right now, but I find Musk's increasingly cynical ploys and the adulation they receive pretty annoying. They seem designed to distract from the overall failure of his businesses, even if he continues to generate ideas and hype.
- bronz 11y agohis reasons: load shifting, self consumption, backup, (saving the planet from global warming)
- ZeroGravitas 11y ago
- methodin 11y agoI'm curious if local governments will give subsidies to aid in distribution of such devices - many places have issues with the power grid.
- KhalPanda 11y agoFor those interested in investing and finance, I have a question. Why would this news not cause Tesla's share price to go up? It seems generally well-received (well, as much of an indicator as 812 points on HN is). Surely that's a good sign? Or did the announcement not live up to the hype, causing people to dump stock?
- souljaswag 11y agoTesla stock price has been gradually increasing the last week or so in anticipation of the event, so the event has already been "priced in." Further, the FOMC (fed) recently scared the market, because interest rates may be rising some time in the future (September? December? who knows), causing people to switch from investing in equities (stocks) into treasury bills. In short, this information was already anticipated but it also had to fight the FOMC announcement.
- KhalPanda 11y agoThanks. Makes sense.
- butwhy 11y agoBuy on the rumour, sell on the announce. Sharetrading 101.
- drcross 11y agobuy on the rumour, sell on the news.
- nickbauman 11y agoA German company is doing this too. Nice to know it's more like an industrial movement not just one company doing it. There is hope. http://www.asd-sunstorage.com/ http://www.asd-sunstorage.com/
- ddingus 11y agoGermany has implemented so much solar they can overload the EU grid. Batteries are the next thing for them. Many of the comments here aimed at the States make sense. Use cases aren't as broad here for many reasons. But, who says these have to be sold here? Great move, IMHO. Storage is a growing concern. Most all of the renewables suffer from variances in production. Elon is likely thinking globally. Just get storage production moving and boot strapped into self-sufficiency. Doesn't matter who buys it, just that they do. Costs drop, scale improves on things, and he's positioned to take advantage of materials science as it yields better / more diverse options. Think of those aluminum batteries just announced at Stanford. The energy density is lower, but they charge very quickly. If those prove viable, they can be added to the Tesla catalog, and if their life time is high enough, might just be perfect for augmenting things like solar and wind.
- bronz 11y agoTo those who say that this battery doesn't do anything new and lead acid is cheaper, I would like to refer you to this article. http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=iphone http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=iphone
- chrisamiller 11y agoA quick analysis of our local (St Louis) rates for an average (1700 sq ft) suburban house indicate that time shifting to get peak rate savings isn't worth it: Payback time on the 10kWh battery would be around 26 years, and on the 7kWh battery would be 33 years. So, at least in the midwest, I think you'd have to be either using a ton of peak energy or coupling the battery pack with solar to make the investment worth it.
- pkulak 11y agoAnd as long as utilities are forced to buy back electricity at market-or-higher rates, there's zero incentive to every use a battery system with solar.
- ProAm 11y agoIt's perfect for data centers that need UPS and generators for outages.
- bloaf 11y agoIsn't that the idea though? Solar + battery + electric car = no gasoline, electricity, or natural gas bill. If the average car gasoline bill is $3000/year, electricity is $1000/year, and we demand a 5-year payback, we can spend at most $20,000 on a solar+battery+car system over what we would spend on a conventional gasoline-car and grid-house.
- chrisamiller 11y agoYeah, that's the primary use, but there has been speculation here and elsewhere that a battery could be worthwhile just for exploiting the difference between peak and off-peak rates. This indicates that, at least for my area and usage, the answer is no, it's not worth it.
- kbenson 11y agoUnless we actually started taxing carbon emissions, in which case you could see those numbers change very quickly. I'm not saying it's likely, but you can't assume your future payments for specific items will stay consistent years in the future.
- pbreit 11y agoHow is lithium mined and disposed of? Is that much of an issue?
- breischl 11y agoI know they pitched this for solar, but I bet that won't be the most common use, at least initially. My power company (XCel, if it matters) keeps trying to install a "Saver Switch" in everyone's house to shut down their A/C when demand is high. Basically they want to load shed your air conditioner, and they're willing to pay you for the privilege. This is a lot more expensive, but it's also a hell of a lot more versatile. How much would it be worth for them to subsidize installing these with a switch that would let the utility remotely toggle you off the grid at their discretion? Plus it would actually save consumers money in any market with tiered electric rates. Plus it would help them deal with the intermittency of solar power.
- andyrebele 11y agoSee an analysis of whether this makes sense for home, business, and utilities: http://www.purewatercraft.com/thinking-about-energy-storage-using-lithium-ion-batteries/ http://www.purewatercraft.com/thinking-about-energy-storage-...
- g8oz 11y agoI believe the Chinese innovator BYD has a portfolio of similar products already. BYD got some press play in the West when Warren Buffet invested in them. They are making a slow patient push in the U.S with electric buses after flopping with electric cars.
- robot 11y agoI think this is a move that will break the focus rule for a startup. Batteries _and_ cars. There is room for only one.
- DaniFong 11y agoWright brothers: focus on wings or controls or engines! you only have room for one! Apple: focus on hardware or software! Macs or iPods. You only have room for one. Edison: focus on lights or electricity! You only have room for one. Uber: focus on the driver network or the app! You only have room for one. It's not a hard and fast rule. The point of focus is to get you to prioritize what important, but something you need to do multiple things.
- robot 11y agoThe problem with all of your examples is they still only sell one thing. Tesla now sells 2 things. That means sales, marketing team, strategy, support, for 2 things. Like, having 2 companies.
- DaniFong 11y agoAnother example, Standard Oil: don't just sell the oil. Refine it, and sell the kerosene, and the lamps, and also sell the gasoline, and when you're left with paraffins invent paraffin candles and sell those too...
- JoeAltmaier 11y agoHa! The aboriginal Americans have nothing on Standard Oil. They just used every part of the buffalo. Standard Oil invented uses for every part of the oil.
- JoeAltmaier 11y agoGM sells more financial instruments than cars.
- mrtron 11y agoI live in a condo in Toronto, and peak hour electricity is more than double non-peak. How do I install this and have it charge during off hours and use the battery during peak?
- mrtron 11y agoI live in a condo in Toronto, and peak hour electricity is more than double non-peak. How do I install this and have it charge during off hours and use the battery during peak?
- swamp40 11y agoTesla vs Edison, Round 2. Interesting twist that this time around, Tesla is pushing for DC, while Edison is behind AC.
- daveloyall 11y agoYou can buy a used Mitsubishi i-MIEV (early electric car with very short range) for less than $8,000. So, do that. Then strap one of these Tesla home batteries on it. Bam! (NB some experience with heavy-duty DC electricity required.)