Plenty of news from the Investor day. Where to start?
Full write up to follow but one short interesting feature is that Tesla plans to offer customers in Texas access to charging at home for a low price of $30 / month.
- Elon Musk’s Tesla plans to offer unlimited overnight home charging for $30 per month to Texans.
- Texas has a lot of wind at night, which can be used to charge EVs.
- The $30 monthly subscription comes as part of Tesla Electric.
This is interesting as this is a way of Tesla to be a more significant player in the supply of Electricity to Tesla drivers.
Drew Baglino, Tesla’s senior vice president of engineering, said during the company’s Investor Day that customers in Texas would be offered the retail electricity plan in July as part of “Tesla Electric,” which provides sustainable energy to homes.
“This is part of reducing the total cost of ownership of our vehicles and the reason why we can do this is because Texas has a ton of wind. And in Texas, the wind blows at night,” Baglino said.
Last year, Texas generated the most wind power compared with all other US states, according to a February report by nonprofit news organization Climate Central.
The $30 monthly subscription was a way to incentivize Tesla customers to charge their vehicles in their homes during the night directly via a source of renewable energy, Baglino said.
Charging an EV at home depends on electricity rates and the range of the car.
Per car-buying guide Kelley Blue Book, analyst and journalist John Voelcker said that from October 2022, the US household average was about 16 cents per kWh. This meant it would cost around $56 per month to charge an electric car at home.
Customers can only sign up for Tesla Electric if they have the company’s Powerwall energy-storage battery and live in an area of Texas that offers retail choice, per the website.
Power Wall is the Tesla produced home battery that stores 13.5 kWh of power and connects to the home and to the grid.
