Back in 2006, Elon Musk noted that Tesla will be co-marketing sustainable energy products from other companies along with the car. They will be offering a modestly sized and priced solar panel from SolarCity, a photovoltaics company. This system can be installed on your roof in an out of the way location, because of its small size, or set up as a carport and will generate about 50 miles per day of electricity
In 2016, Tesla was already aimed at creation a smoothly integrated and beautiful solar-roof-with-battery product that just works, empowering the individual as their own utility, and then scale that throughout the world. One ordering experience, one installation, one service contact, one phone app.
Currently, the world consumes 20 trillion kWh of energy per year.
In 2016, CO2 levels constantly exceeded an alarming threshold of 400 ppm. Many climatologists believe that this level will have a catastrophic effect on the environment.
There are three key components that can help address climate change and have a positive impact on the world: sustainable energy production, batteries and electric cars. These solutions already exist independently, but when combined, they become even more powerful.
Solar Roof is a complete roof that is beautiful, durable and brings renewable electricity production to any home. Solar Roof consists of uniquely designed and extremely durable glass tiles. These new roofs seamlessly supply renewable energy to homes, battery storage systems and back into the grid, creating savings for owners. When paired with Powerwall, Tesla’s home battery, Solar Roof can power an entire home with 100% renewable energy.
Tesla introduced a new version of Solar Roof V3 at a public conference call yesterday - Solarglass
Drew Baglino noted that Teslas trive to improve their product by improving the manufacturability of the tile, as well as its cost and beauty:
- Changing in technology that hides solar cells;
- Changing some materials used;
- Reducing the number of stages of production;
- Increasing tile size;
- A significant reduction in the number of parts and assemblies by more than half (possibly due to large tiles);
- Increasing tile power density;
- Cost reducing.
Due to the increase in tile size and the improvement of technology, the need to create 3 blocks of photovoltaic tiles into photovoltaic modules is eliminated (as was in version 2). This eliminates the seams between each individual tile, which means a more sealedt roof more PV generation from each of the new V3 tiles.
Getting rid of the seams between the panels allows Tesla to produce panels on its Gigafactory 2 in Buffalo. So the new tile gives opportunity to get more solar energy, less points of failure, as well as simpler, faster and cheaper production.
Tesla also plans to open the Solarglass Roof installation for traditional roofing companies to increase its installation capacity.
Most of the problem Tesla sought to solve with V3 of Solarglass Roof was installation time. The ultimate goal is faster installation than a comp shingle roof, which is less than 8 hours.
As we see, over the 16 years of its existence, the Tesla company has achieved amazing results, in achieving the goal of accelerating the transition from a mine-and-burn hydrocarbon economy towards a solar electric economy, and in other points of its secret masterplans.
Of all the companies on the market today, Tesla is one of a kind. This company was able to survive in a fiercely competitive market and in just 16 years of operation has provided a number of high-quality products that are very popular today.