Tesla wants to start selling electricity itself, CNN reports, with the company filing with the Texas Public Utility Commission to generate electricity and sell it directly to the public.
The company said in its filing it plans to sell electricity directly to consumers, with a focus on those who already own Tesla cars.
So far, Tesla has sold its ‘big battery’ Megapacks to other companies and has not tried to sell directly to consumers. This looks set to change, according to its filing.
“Despite its long association with oil and natural gas, Texas has the third most EVs in the country, behind only California and Florida, according to recent statistics from Electrek. Texas also generates a significant portion of electrical power through solar and wind power, sources of power that need to have storage of electricity since they are not constantly available. Texas generates by far the greatest amount of electricity from wind power of any state and is second only to California for the amount of electricity coming from to solar power,” the CNN report stated.
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“But its electrical grid suffered a massive failure due to a winter storm in February. Part of the problem was that Texas is the only state in the continental United States not tied into the national grid, which would allow it to tap into other states’ electricity supplies at times of crisis. Some electric companies have filed for bankruptcy since then.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk spoke about the need for more electrical storage if utilities in Texas were to avoid the problems of the past winter.
“In Texas, there was a peak power demand, and … because the grid lacks the ability to buffer the power, they have to shut down power. There’s no power storage,” he said in a call with investors in April, suggesting that the greater adoption of solar panels on homes and Tesla’s Powerwalls would help to provide that buffer needed for the grid in Texas and elsewhere.
The filing comes as Tesla and Musk focus more attention on Texas, with the company building its second US car factory just outside of Austin and Musk moving his residence to Texas.
Musk’s aerospace company SpaceX also has a strong presence in South Texas, include a manufacturing facility, launch and landing pads.
