Elon Musk Sees Tesla’s Batteries Providing Energy Storage for all SolarCity Installations within 10 Years

We often discuss the future of home energy production in terms of what LENR could make possible, but it’s likely that it will be some time before home LENR systems become available. Meanwhile an increasing number of homeowners are looking to cut energy costs and increase energy independence by installing rooftop solar panels on their homes.

An interesting development is being reported by the Wall Street Journal which involves Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla motors, and also chairman of SolarCity, one of the leading companies working in the domestic solar energy industry. At a conference in New York on Wednesday, Musk appeared with his cousin, Lyndon Rive, (who is the CEO of SolarCity) where they discussed a future collaboration between Tesla and SolarCity in which some of the batteries produced at Tesla’s gigafactory in Nevada will be used for “grid scale storage”.

Energy storage is seen as a crucial partner to solar and wind energy because of the intermittent nature of these renewable energy sources. If you can cheaply store energy produced by solar cells on your home, it could be a very attractive way to move off the grid.

From the Wall Street Journal article:

Thanks to the economies of scale that will come from Tesla’s gigafactory, within 10 years every solar system that SolarCity sells will come with a battery-storage system, says Mr. Rive, and it will still produce energy cheaper than what is available from the local utility company.

Mr. Musk also noted that in any future in which a country switches fully to electric cars, its electricity consumption will roughly double. That could either mean more utilities, and more transmission lines, or a rollout of solar—exactly the sort that SolarCity hopes for.

Elon Musk has proven to be force to be reckoned with in bringing advanced technology to market in new and visionary ways, and it will be interesting to see how this partnership with SolarCity develops. One wonders, of course, what Elon Musk might do in connection with LENR if it is proven to be revolutionary and viable way to produce energy. Electric cars could be a natural fit if LENR electrical production becomes a reality.