Engineering news
The newly announced products from Elon Musk’s company are designed to look like normal roof tiles but convert sunlight into electricity. Installations will begin in the US this summer, and the UK and rest of the world in 2018. Tesla said the tiles, which come in smooth or textured designs this year and “Tuscan” and slate next year, are designed to be “simultaneously affordable, durable, beautiful”.
A typical homeowner in the US will pay $21.85 per square foot for the tiles, said Musk, and UK homeowners can now place an initial order for £800. Few technical details for the units are available, although they will connect to integrated Tesla Powerwall batteries to provide electricity overnight and in cloudy weather. The company claims the tiles will recoup their costs with the amount of energy they provide. Made with tempered glass, they are said to be three times stronger than standard tiles yet half the weight, and Tesla said the glass comes with a warranty lasting the “lifetime of your house, or infinity, whichever comes first.”
However, several issues in the UK means the tiles will probably not gain quick popularity said Jenifer Baxter, head of energy and environment at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. “Incentives for people to take these things up… aren’t really there,” she said. “We need to reassess how we think about future housing; how we want people to live and how to enable them through incentives. So there is still quite a lot of work we need to do here in the UK before we are in a position to allow people to access these types of systems, whether it is Tesla’s or someone else’s.”
"Conventional energy cheaper"
Incentives encouraging homeowners to install solar panels were cut 65 % by the Conservative Government last year after they were first introduced by the previous coalition. Baxter warned that federal help for solar panel installation in the US could also possibly be removed, potentially denting demand for the new tiles. Renewable energy critic Daniel Simmons was appointed head of the office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy last week by President Donald Trump.
In the UK it will take time for costs to fall enough for average homeowners and construction companies to start fitting Tesla-style tiles as standard, said Baxter. “What that period of time will be is difficult to tell, I think it will depend on people’s requirements for electricity,” she said. “If it is still much cheaper to buy it in conventional form, often that is what will happen, because it is established and easily accessible.”
Despite the challenges – including the lack of sunshine in the UK compared to Tesla’s California base – Baxter said the newly-announced product will provide a catalyst for the industry and could eventually lead to more domestic solar power use. “As with battery cars and home batteries as well, Tesla want to lead the way and it does mean other companies will start to think ‘Well yeah, they’ve got a good idea. We could start to adapt our technology to maybe look like this as well and do it possibly cheaper.’,” she said.