If you order a Tesla Powerwall 2 home battery system, according to a Tesla spokesperson, you will now have to wait until early next year to have it delivered. This means the supply of Powerwalls for new Australian orders will be halted for at least 7 months. If these turn out to be Tesla months then your guess as to when they will be available is as good as mine.
The good news is Tesla says existing orders will be honored before then. Also, if you really want a Powerwall 2 you may be able to snag one from an installer who currently has them in stock, but I suspect you’ll have to act fast. Make sure you nail down an installation date and don’t let them string you along with promises for the next 7+ months.
It looks like the Powerwall 1 has fallen down the memory hole and the Powerwall 2 is now just called ‘Powerwall the numberless’ by Tesla.
Rumor Versus Official Statement
Two weeks ago ago we here at SolarQuotes Headquarters — which is an immense palace in cyberspace — heard a rumor that Tesla had stopped production of the Powerwall 2. My coworker, Jono, decided to see if there was any truth to the rumor and contacted Tesla who firmly denied it.
So on one hand we had a completely unsubstantiated rumor versus Tesla’s denial on the other. As I’m a cynical bastard, this made me think the odds were 50-50. But at this point I had nothing to write about as, “Company that makes stuff says they’ll continue to make stuff” doesn’t make for an interesting article. But then my boss, Finn, took a different tack and asked a Tesla spokesperson:
“If I ordered a Powerwall 2 today, when can I expect installation?”
He was told:
“Early 2019”
So while Tesla is apparently not stopping their production, no new Powerwall orders will be delivered to Australia for perhaps enough time to have a baby1.
Tesla Needs To Better Inform Their Sales Staff
I called Tesla’s sales department last week and was told that because of the huge number of orders they had and because they were waiting on supply from the United States, if I ordered a Powerwall 2 today it wouldn’t arrive until:
“…towards the end of the year.”
And that would be a:
“…worst case situation.”
I’m going to believe the Tesla spokesperson over the salesperson on this and assume the soonest they will be available is “early next year”. Given my previous experience with Tesla and the dates they give, I’m going to assume that’s a best case scenario. So to me it looks like Tesla needs to update their salespeople on when the Powerwall 2 will be available.
Hopefully They Will Meet Demand Early Next Year
Tesla raised the price of the Powerwall 2 in February2. I would have thought that getting more money would make them more willing to meet demand. But I won’t speculate on why Tesla isn’t producing enough Powerwalls. It’s bad for my brain and my doctor has told me I have to cut back. I just hope that starting early next year people who are willing to pay for a Powerwall 2 will be able to buy one.
Footnotes
- Nine months plus 3 minutes. ↩
- This should have increased its profitability, for while the cost of cobalt soared in February, the battery cells Tesla uses are apparently only 2.8% cobalt by weight. With around 650 battery cells in a Powerwall 2 at 66 grams each there would only be around 2.1 kilograms of cobalt in total. So the increase in cobalt price at the time was only enough to account for around $95 of the $600 increase or 16%. ↩
About Ronald Brakels
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The backlog on PowerWall-2 is nearly a year long now. Orders in early 2018 are barely getting filled.
You can check California’s installations in real-time via (large Excel file) https://www.selfgenca.com/report/public/ . The most recent interconnected install by SolarCity is May 25, 2018. This installation was reserved in June, 2017.
The most recent interconnected install by anybody is June 8, 2018. This installation was reserved May, 2017.
First excuses during early 2018 were PWs were being diverted to Hurricane Maria needs in Puerto Rico. Next, it was because they couldn’t make the batteries fast enough in the same situation problem as the Tesla 3 batteries.
Now who really knows?
Ron being a consumer in a decreasing price market (solar PV cells and HD TV screens) for example, is good obviously for consumers; but conversely being a manufacturer of these decreasing price items is problematic, and particularly where there is little potential to add further value to the product to increase the profit margin.
The irony of this point might be best revealed in a discussion I had 2 weeks ago with the chairman of one of the worlds larger manufacturers of Li cells since 2006 powering much of China’s light truck and bus EV fleet. This company is now vertically integrating to manufacture the very light commercial trucks to add-value to its Li batteries, that it up to now has only supplied (at low cost) to EV manufacturers.
BYD was once a battery manufacturer you would recall! Tesla is not immune from serious commercial realities unfolding as it moves forward, and a good indicator of strategic strength or otherwise, might be revealed in the Tesla Solar Roof product?
Whatever happened to the Tesla BIPV (game changing revolution) anyway? Answer commercial reality hit home. Unannounced to the global market as well as you would recall.
Lawrence Coomber
There is an increasing proliferation of articles that suggest Tesla is a ponzi. I wouldn’t pay a deposit of more than a few hundred that I could afford to lose. This is particularly so where the economics is not compelling which, according to this blog, is most cases in large cities and towns on the grid where the premises are already connected to the grid.
I went through the same conversation with them a week or two back when examining quotes and deciding between Tesla and LG. Local installers said “around 6 months”, I contacted Tesla to see if that was correct and they told me “currently 6 – 7 months but you better order quick as it’ll very soon be at least 9 months” and seemed to think was awesome and a selling point. Very strange.
“But I won’t speculate on why Tesla isn’t producing enough Powerwalls… .”
OK, I will.
Tesla is s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d meeting demand for its many innovative products. We’d order a Model 3 right now, but Tesla simply can’t meet North American demand for this EV, let alone global demand.
Funniest comment here?
“There is an increasing proliferation of articles that suggest Tesla is a ponzi… .”
There are also plenty of articles which clearly identify the reason for this ‘proliferation’… . Those shorting the market thrive on this negativism. As Tesla systematically improves, addressing and meeting production demands, those shorting Tesla will be as exposed as that legendary ICE vehicle, the Pinto. 🙂
I guess I was right to order the PW2 as soon as it was announced for Australia (ordered in January 2017) and got it in December 2017 (11 months to the day, delays due to 2 things – Puerto Rico and the big battery in SA). But that pain of waiting has long gone now and the Tesla battery system is working well for the last 6 months. I was offered the Sonnenflat Battery system but rejected it on several grounds (even though the price was offered as the same price as the PW2 as Sonnen are more expensive systems). It had a smaller battery capacity (10kWh), lower power output (2.5kW). Both offered 10 years warranty. So, I said I would rather wait a bit longer to get the better spec’d Tesla Powerwall 2. I did not bother looking at the PW1…. first gen products should be steered clear. But where are the naysayers saying that PW3 should be here by now when they commented about the long delays of PW2s? Looks like they’ve gone into hiding…….
I went into a PW2 order almost to the deposit of 10% and also the AC council’s incentive of $5000 but the thing just became so unreliable I pulled out. Then Sonnen appeoached me but I’m going to wait until all this battery thing settles down.
I called in April to order pw2. They told me it would arrive Jul and Aug. They came out in May to check premises and told me all’s good. They called me back 2 days later and said they could install it in May. I changed the date to 6th of June when it was installed. Barely 1 month from start to end. Not sure what all the fuss is about.
Ben would you mind sharing the supplier you dealt with and your overall experience with them? Obviously great from a time to hit the ground perspective.
I’m coming to the realisation that batteries will never be economically viable for anyone connected to grid power. The operators will simply keep jacking up the “poles and wires” component of the bill to make up for lost revenue.
Tesla hasn’t made a profit yet, and I can envisage one day the backers will pull out and ask “where’s the money”?
I think I’ll stick with my original plan and go with DCS.
Don’t Tesla batteries keep catching fire in their electric vehicles even without any physical damage occurring to the vehicle ? I’ll stick with my tried and tested LG Chem thank you.
I’m only aware of 3 incidents of fires involving parked or charging Tesla vehicles not involving some kind of impact. That’s out of about 300,000 Tesla cars on the roads. But home batteries are new technology and I do suggest people take the possibility of fire into account when locating them, no matter what the type.
To be fair to them further, if you look on Ars Technica & CNBC there is a story that Tesla is claiming sabotage of their systems that’s caused problems with the cars by a disgruntled staff member.
AdamAnt…
You can’t really compare home batteries and car batteries….. One is stationary and one is subject to 3 dimesnions of G forces in a moving object capable of moving up to 200km/hr+..
What you’re saying is like boiling a kettle of water on the kitchen bench vs boiling water in the same kettle in a moving car. Obviously the moving boiling kettle needs to be a bit more reinforced and completely spillproof to avoid any disaster. The same design is not required for a kettle sittling in a stationary dock on the kitchen bench. 3 components required – 2 of which are the same (water and power) but the vessel needs to be different in each situation. Same with batteries.
A home battery would have different design parameters than an EV battery system, even if they are the same battery type. Which is why Merc Benz pulled out because they over-designed their home batt to be the same as EV which is unnecessary.
Why should LG Chem batteries be any different? Even more, LG don’t even make EV cars, so worlds apart trying to make a claim about batteries catching on fire.
What about the Samsung mobile phone battery scandal not so long ago? The entire new Samsung model had to be recalled!
Your water boiling doesn’t answer one boiling question… Why are the vehicle batteries (with all the fancy protection etc.) so much cheaper (per kWh) than PowerWalls?
My guess is profit.
They aren’t – the PW2 is $5,900 in the US. That prices the batteries even in the long range vehicles at about $20 -25K by the time you take out the cost of a couple of inverters and the fact that their are a lot more cells in the LR batt therefore there’s economies of scale. You can’t actually buy a Tesla M3 with a long range battery for much under $US60K (probably more like $70K) but there is a federal tax incentive that brings the cost down. When the mythical $35K Model 3 eventually hits the market I think that comes with 50kWh batt we can safely say about $17K will be battery cost. These are just back of the envelope figures. The cost to Tesla is a lot less.
Tesla are leaving customers in the lurch that have broken powerwalls.
It feels like essentially they are frozen up on the home energy side
They are ceasing expenditures except for their toy car Hail Mary project.
Even if you can find a powerwall don’t get one because when it breaks it will stay broken either forever or until Tesla survives 2018.