If you’re a solar homeowner or are worried about rising energy costs, a battery storage system like the Tesla Powerwall might be the best investment you ever make. The Tesla Powerwall minimizes the electricity your home needs to draw from the grid, making your home more self-sufficient.
But they come with quite a hefty price tag, so is the investment worth it? Let’s take a look.
What then is Tesla’s Powerwall?
The PowerWall is a rechargeable home battery system that maximizes your home’s “energy independence.” The system is designed to store electricity for backup power, time-of-use load balancing, and self-consumption of solar energy.
That means backup power, a smaller home carbon footprint, and potential savings on your electricity bill. Powerwall is also, according to Tesla, an intelligent system that can be customized to your energy needs, with the ability to charge from solar or the grid, so energy is always available on demand.
Additionally, Tesla Energy provides larger battery energy storage systems, including the Megapack for use with the electrical grid and the Powerpack for enterprises.
The system offers customers the following benefits:
- It provides a form of backup energy — during a blackout (like a hurricane), solar energy may still run your house and charge your Powerwall, depending on the inverter.
- It gives you a self-powered home — Powerwall can deliver sustainable energy that you produce from solar during the day to your home at night.
- It offers time-based control of our energy — you can use cheaper grid and solar energy you have already generated if your utility provides Time-of-Use rates to avoid paying for electricity during more expensive periods.
- You can also intelligently monitor your energy use — switch between Powerwall features, keep tabs on its energy and power consumption, and get notifications when it enters Backup-Only mode using the Tesla app.
The Powerwall was officially unveiled in 2015 with limited production. Mass production started in early 2017 at Tesla’s Gigafactory in Nevada, USA.
As of May 2021, Tesla has reportedly installed 200,000 Powerwalls.
How does the Powerwall work?
Powerwall works with or without solar and allows you to store energy for later use. Each Powerwall system consists of at least one Powerwall and a Backup Gateway, which manages the system’s energy usage and does energy monitoring.
Like the rest of Tesla’s products, the Backup Gateway gets over-the-air updates and can control up to ten Powerwalls. It also learns from and adjusts to your energy usage over time.
