© Reuters/Patrick T. Fallon
Tesla Motors has so far taken 38,000 reservations for its zero-carbon Powerwall home battery. Such high demand signals that revenue from the company's new battery could soon outstrip that from its electric cars sales.
"There's no way that we can possibly satisfy the demand this year," Musk told Wall Street analysts Thursday during a conference at which he reviewed Tesla's first-quarter earnings.
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We're basically sold out through the middle of next year โ in a week! We can't even respond to them. We have to triage our response to those who want to be a distributor. It's crazy off the hook. It seems to have gone super viral."
Tesla's first quarter revenue rose 51 percent to $939 million, while the company's net loss widened to $154 million as a result of new investments and the effect of the strong dollar. The loss was estimated at $45 million, better than analysts' expectations.
A series of two battery backup products for home and industrial use was presented on May 1. The lithium-ion battery modules can accumulate electricity from solar panels, charging up during non-peak hours of energy use, and then provide energy to a home or facility for up to 3-5 hours. The newly developed systems come under a product line called Tesla Energy.
Homeowners will be able to get a Powerwall battery in 7 and 10 kilowatt-hour modules for $3,000 and $3,500 respectively. Tesla will also offer 100-kilowatt-hour modules for industrial applications at $25,000 each.
Tesla is known as a car producer famous for its electric-powered vehicles such as the Model S sedan, which also operates on lithium-ion batteries.
The company has made a substantial contribution in changing the car business, forcing other major car producers to develop their own e-vehicles. Tesla's Powerwall battery could trigger a similar trend in the home-charging business.
Tesla hopes to reveal a prototype of its next vehicle, the Model 3 sedan, in March 2016. It will cost about half the price of a Model S and is expected to go on sale at the end of 2017.
The funny part is that the only thing this battery tech really offers over conventional batteries is a pretty package.
The $3500 one provides 10,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) of storage.
kWh = Amp hours (Ah) x Voltage (V).
So, a bank of 8 regular AGM (Absorbed Glass Mat) 200 Ah, 12 V batteries used for indoor-safe solar installations would =19,200 kWh, -of which half can be used between charge cycles without putting undue strain on the battery bank. The batteries can be expected to last around 3500 charge cycles before wearing out.
The cost? $4000. -So $500 more expensive than the Tesla, except that you can install them yourself, (the Tesla requires that you hire contractors). -I think this might have to do with the Tesla battery being arranged so that it kicks out almost 400 volts DC. -A fairly strange number for household applications, which suggests that they *literally* just re-packaged their car battery.
In any case, the cost is about equivalent with conventional AGM deep cycle batteries providing the same electrical service.
The only positive difference is that the Tesla battery is prettier and takes up less space. -Though due to inherent chemistry characteristics, lasts for *significantly* fewer charge cycles than AGM lead acid chemistry, (it's the same chemistry as your laptop battery). -Unless they've managed to do something particularly clever and new with Lithium chemistry, which I'm pretty sure we'd have heard about if they had, then the Tesla battery will die *years* earlier than conventional AGM systems. Less than 1000 charge cycles.
With this in mind, it seems the huge sales spike was due to Elon Musk's good (lucky?) sales job. -Not that the Tesla battery isn't a nice-looking and exciting product, but based on sheer numbers, it's not really anything which truly ups the game.
Though as we've seen, (consider any Apple product), its the packaging and 'reality distortion' which changes the world, and not the actual product specs.