Tesla is working on battery-operated houses in LA

Battery operated houses? Yes, that’s possible! Tesla is showing how one can supply 15,000 houses with power for four hours using 396 powerpacks.

Tesla is running a big power storage facility in Ontario, California. The facility has enough power to supply 15,000 houses for four hours with energy. Thereby 80 megawatt hours of electricity are produced with a peak output of 20 megawatts.

Batteries instead of peaker plants

The power storage facility was built to reduce the demand for peaker plants. Peaker plants are electricity generation facilities, which only work when demand is especially high, for example when it’s very hot outside and air conditioners are running full tilt. Therefore, installation and maintenance are extremely expensive, for which reason peaker plants are to be replaced by power storage facilities.

More than 6 million batteries

To set up the giga factory in Nevada, Tesla installed 396 powerpacks, which now build a big and impressive storage facility.

In each powerpack there are 85 batteries. In total, that’s almost 6.5 million batteries for the whole storage facility. An additional interesting fact is that powerpacks can also be used with solar panels.

Big Business?

Stationary energy storage could be a profitable business for Tesla. There are various possible areas of application: Energy storage could be used for big projects, but also on a smaller scale for residences. Additionally it constitutes an alternative to diesel-generator backup systems, which are currently used in industrial buildings. Moreover battery projects of this size are attractive due to their cost efficiency. Tesla CEO Elon Musk is positive regarding the battery business and projects a growth rate that is several times as high as the growth rate of the car business.

More than cars

With setting up SolarCity and with it the entrance in the battery and solar panel business, Tesla is more than just an automobile manufacturer. Its changed business focus is also represented with a change of the name: The company is no longer called Tesla Motors but just Tesla.

Source of title image: iStock via Evernine