Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tesla Energy

teslamotors.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 590 posts

Re: Tesla Energy

#131

Post by curiouscats »

BorisMelnik wrote: post #123
prostoalex wrote: post #47

This was offered to SolarCity customers in late 2014, I see that the image here http://www.solarcity.com/residential/backup-power-supply now reflects Tesla branding.

Iinteresting 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)

"Models

10 kWh $3,500 For backup applications

7 kWh $3,000 For daily cycle applications"

From http://www.teslamotors.com/powerwall

Maybe Solar City has been using the ones meant for daily cycle - that would make sense.

Re: Tesla Energy

#133

Post by URSpider94 »

colinsidoti wrote: post #51

One 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 direct…

I could do this today. With my current time-of-use electric rate, I pay an average of $0.25/kWh more for peak power than I do for off-peak [the differential is larger in the summer, smaller in the winter]. If I shift 8kWh per day, then I would generate positive ROI in less than five years.

Your edit is spot-on. Utilities typically use natural gas "peaker" plants to meet mid-day spikes in demand, while nuclear plants are better suited to running at a steady state.

Re: Tesla Energy

#134

Post by thewarrior »

Wow

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.

Re: Tesla Energy

#135

Post by kondro »

frik wrote: post #122
kondro wrote: post #119

So 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

What 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.

You 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.

Re: Tesla Energy

#136

Post by pkaye »

josephagoss wrote: post #105
iandanforth wrote: post #39

I 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?

We spend over $2,000 per year and it's just me and my girlfriend. From the sounds of it you have either very good rates or perhaps a frugal lifestyle? Either way it's impressive.

I think it depends on local weather. We spend about $600 on electricity and $600 is gas per year for 4 people in the Bay Area. And this is with an older water heater and furnace in an old house with moderate insulation. We would replace the heater, furnace and improve the insulation before even considering solar ourselves.

Re: Tesla Energy

#137

Post by kondro »

marze wrote: post #129
kondro wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You 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 complet…

Going off grid isn't something one does lightly.

Which was my point :).

You seemed to be suggesting you could just buy 2x $3500 batteries and go completely off the grid.

Re: Tesla Energy

#138

Post by ChuckMcM »

Nice, 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

Re: Tesla Energy

#139

Post by guelo »

The 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.

Re: Tesla Energy

#140

Post by mryan »

digitalzombie wrote: post #112

How 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.

I 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/...

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.

Post reply on HN