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The first installations of the Tesla Powerwall 3 are being completed in the United States, where the company is promoting a fully integrated residential system of solar energy plus storage and electric vehicles, with a large reserve energy capacity. While the first Powerwall created a new market segment, the latest iteration enters an oversupplied market.
Shanghais annual SNEC Sun Expo is a grueling affair. Upon returning from the 2015 event, experienced energy storage analyst Sam Wilkinson received a call from a journalist from The Times newspaper. An elusive Wilkinson provided what turned out to be front-page analysis.
The British newspaper wanted to know Wilkinsons opinion on the new Tesla Powerwall, the American electric vehicle manufacturers residential battery. The product had been revealed by Elon Musk, with his characteristic chutzpah, on social media.
“I was literally in a taxi on the way home from Heathrow Airport and the next day they called me to say that somehow the story had made the front page,” explains Wilkinson, head of clean energy technology at S&P Global Commodity. Insight.
“It showed that there was great interest in the idea of ??energy storage. At that time it was something very nascent, niche and technological: having a battery at home. In eight or nine years it has become very common.”
The Times wasnt the only one to get excited about the Powerwall. “Elegant, chic and unmistakably touched by the magic of Elon Musk,” enthused pv magazine as it featured the first iteration of the Tesla Powerwall on its June 2015 cover (see left). The battery was priced much lower than competing products. Musk said the 10 kWh Powerwall would sell for $3,500 and the 7 kWh model would cost $3,000.
“At the time I pointed out that the price of Tesla batteries was significantly cheaper than what we had seen in the market, which would bring competition among other suppliers and put downward pressure on prices,” Wilkinson said. “Which in the end turned out to be relatively true.” By pricing it so aggressively low, Tesla blew open a hitherto nascent market segment.
The next generation
At that time, Tesla embodied the cutting edge of electric vehicles and the coolest thing. Powerwall 3, launched in 2024, will be the most powerful iteration and will offer backup power to even large homes. It was made available to US installers on February 16 and announced on X (formerly Twitter), Musks social network.
The Powerwall 3 was presented in Las Vegas, at the RE+ trade show, on September 12, 2023. Although it has the same storage capacity as the Powerwall 2 - 13.5 kWh -, a key differentiator is that it can provide more than one 50% more energy, with 11.5 kW of continuous power. This is a hybrid battery with the solar inverter and battery fully integrated.
At RE+, Tesla engineers highlighted that the Powerwall 3 offers installers faster installation thanks to a series of innovations. The new battery is smaller and lighter, although slightly deeper. It measures 110cm long, 61cm wide and 19.3cm deep, and its inverter, battery cells and battery management system weigh 130kg.
To lighten the load, Tesla has also worked with partners to develop a “dolly” that helps installers lift the hybrid battery and place it on walls for mounting. It may seem like a minor detail, but it is crucial because it allows a single installer to secure the battery in place.
Priced at $11,500, the Powerwall 3 doesnt aim to shake up the residential market based on price, like its predecessor did. However, the Tesla team at RE+ wanted to make it clear that faster installation will allow installers to do more work, which will reduce their labor costs.
Integrated System
Teslas in-house engineers have developed the Powerwall 3 solar inverter, demonstrating the companys growing technical competence. The product features six maximum power point trackers (MPPT) to optimize rooftop photovoltaic production.
“Its been an evolution of the [energy storage] space in general,” Wilkinson says. “We call them integrated systems, with batteries and inverters combined. Obviously, the integrated product aims to offer a lot of other features and things that are a little more futuristic, like VPP [virtual power plants] and systems that can respond to things like electricity prices.”
The integrated approach excludes retrofit applications in homes with existing roof arrangements, which Tesla says it will continue to serve with the Powerwall 2.
“Its all about the Tesla brand and its unique position as the place to get solar power.” , storage and an electric vehicle, and no one else offers that complete ecosystem,” says Wilkinson.
In the United States, Tesla plans to sell the Powerwall 3 in a tailored offering for homeowners. The companys sales team offers integrated quotes for solar and storage based on the size and energy consumption of the home. For even larger homes, up to four Powerwalls can be installed in series, offering a whopping 40 kW of power.
“In the United States, its not totally unheard of to have three or four Powerwalls,” Wilkinson says. “This is not an economic decision, but purely a support one. And in the US people will pay for backup power, because grid outages are relatively frequent, compared to Europe.”
S&P Global forecasts further growth in residential energy storage in the coming years, with just over 17 GWh of installations worldwide by 2024. |
