Tesla takes us off-grid - Power(wall) to the people!

98% of our electricity comes from our solar panels and Powerwall - powering our home, business and our electric cars.

Inspired by our European electric adventures, where well over 90% of electricity comes from renewable and zero carbon sources, we wanted to increase our level of renewable energy use at home.  We were already getting over half of our annual electricity needs for the two electric cars and the house from the 5.7kWp of solar on the roofs. But how could we increase that? The solution – Tesla Powerwall.

Like all things Tesla, Powerwall is a thing of beauty.  Brilliantly installed by our local Tesla approved installers, East Green Energy, it has been operating since June this year. Absolutely flawless.  Totally seamless.  We love it!

It is wonderful to walk around our house at night knowing that every light and appliance is running on stored sunlight! The cost of electricity used from the grid for the last 13 weeks has been £3.22 and that has been at a time where we’ve charged the cars for over 5,000 miles of travel, powered the house and our business. 

It’s all about solar and now we no longer need to be concerned when the sun goes behind clouds, as Powerwall kicks in to take up any slack.  During the day, charging the cars is simplified. We endeavour to organise our schedules so that one of the electric cars is at home.  Both my wife and I work and visit clients and our teenage daughter has an active life. The cars often charge at public charge points while we are out and about.

Powerwall has already paid us back by knowing that we are effectively off-grid

Powerwall is so easy to use as it all happens automatically. We use an app so that throughout the day, we can see whether we are importing from the grid, powering everything from Powerwall or solar or whatever combination of these elements. The level of charge in our Powerwall is clearly shown, meaning we can manage our consumption, if needed.

People often ask me the question of when Powerwall will ‘payback’ or pay for itself.  Funnily enough no one ever asks that about a sofa, a carpet or a piece of clothing.  For me, Powerwall has already paid us back by knowing that we are effectively off-grid. It’s priceless knowing that our house runs on 98% sunlight / stored sunlight generated right here, that our business operates on zero-carbon electricity and that our cars run on clean energy with zero tailpipe emissions. 

For those of you who still want the numbers, on conservative figures, maybe in 10 years. More realistic figures for us we expect in 5 to 7 years. But we are already living and breathing our values and have fulfilled our ambition to be ‘off-grid’ and carbon negative, all while living life to the fullest - that is payment itself.

We love that through our Model S and Powerwall, we are connected to something huge that is happening all over the world. Not only are we helping to reduce dependency on fossil fuels, we are part of the world’s largest power plant powered by the Sun and enabled by Tesla.  Thank you Tesla.  Thank you Elon.

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