Tesla panels and total price after installation is too high to be competitive- only the Powerwall enthusiasts buy panels+powerwalls from tesla. Other panels are so cheap these days and EG4 makes excellent power storage options.

Last year I asked them for a Powerwall quote and was told that I can't get powerwall without their solar panels

Tesla was pushing solar pretty hard for a time a long time ago. My memories actually line up with the charts here.

Then they kind of just... stopped talking about it at all? In retrospect it was kind of a quiet sea change for the company as a whole.

That whole solar city acquisition was a bit of a debacle with Elon buying a very suspect and deeply indebted company that his cousins had founded and controlled for a questionable amount of money… that was probably the first big warning sign that Tesla’s board was out to lunch.

Yeah I don't think Tesla ever really cared about solar, they just had to talk the talk for a bit to help grease a very shady business deal (with strong echoes of the recently announced xAI/X deal).

I agree it feels similar to the xAI/X deal, but did they really never care about solar? I thought the solar roof was announced well after the SolarCity deal, and it seemed like they were serious about ramping that up for a while (though obviously that never really went anywhere or fulfilled any of the original promises either).

It's likely just not high-margin enough to satisfy Tesla investors. Panels have become commoditized.

Agreed. They stopped talking about it...

I have a feeling they are not really that competitive in this market segment, but were helped by a strong brand.

Anyone know if they actually make money on Solar at all, and have an idea what their profit margin is?

And what does the the competition look like (also for e.g. PowerWall)?

>I have a feeling they are not really that competitive in this market segment, but were helped by a strong brand.

All commoditized market segments are like that to varying extents.

SolarCity was about to go bankrupt (owned by Elon Musk’s cousins), so he found a way to justify bailing them out with Tesla money. He held the famous solar roof event, saying that all the homes behind him had solar roofs cheaper than a normal roof, which was later proven a lie. Tesla’s entire solar business was built on that foundation, and they struggled to justify it in the long term.

They were pushing it hard because at the time they needled to deflect the accusations that the SolarCity purchase was fraud, nepotism, and insider dealing. Now that most people have forgotten about that, there's no need to talk about it anymore.

The article notes they think Tesla should be about to find customers for solar easily, so asked, what's going on? And that a high point for them was installing 100 megawatts -- which struck me as small.

Some quick googling and clicking result #1 (risky, I know) showed this [1] claiming that 2024 was the second record-breaking solar installation year in a row. And that 50 gigawatts had been installed in the US.

That makes me think:

* Isn't Tesla Solar's max 100Mw number rather, well, tiny? A small drop? Why, for a company like Tesla?

* The article's exactly right. They _should_ be able to find more customers.

Does anyone have more insight? Does this part of the company have a good reputation?

[1] https://seia.org/research-resources/us-solar-market-insight/

Everyone I know who’s looked said they cost too much. I think they’re walking away from a commodity market because they don’t want to spend time on lower margin business lines.

True much more money to be made hyping crypto, AI and robotics.

Just bought a new house in the burbs. Want to get solar. I assumed Tesla was a good company to get them through.

Does anyone have (a non-political) opinion on Tesla Solar? And/or how I should think about getting panels (and battery) installed at my house?

If you are willing to put in some Project Management time yourself, you can get solar for a LOT cheaper than if you hire an outside solar company.

For the installation - most roofing companies will install the roof mounts and screw on the solar panels for $1.5k-$2k (might be different in your area, but still cheap). An electrician can be hired to make all the solar panel connections and the grid connection for a few hundred $$$.

As the Project Manager - you'll need to source the panels, file the permits, and hire the roofers and electricians. https://www.solarwholesale.com/jerry-rig-everything/ can assist (assist, not do) all of that for you for a cheap price. $10k-$15k with Solar Wholesale will get you the panels and cables you need, plus the engineering drawings, the permit paperwork, and etc. (thank you for the great Solar DIY series Jerry!)

For $20k and working as the Project Manager yourself, you can get what most solar companies will charge you $50k for. Which is ballpark inline with construction project management costs - typical residential construction project management cost 40-50% of the total project budget. A lot of those projects as complex enough to warrant those fees, unless you have a lot of experience, but in my opinion adding solar to your roof is not a complex process and does not warrant those fees.

I went through this process this year. Found solar installation companies on Yelp, got some quotes, chose an installer. A month later, I have Panasonic panels and a Powerwall powering my home. There’s plenty of info online. I live in the US and found this resource very educational: https://www.energy.gov/eere/solar/homeowners-guide-going-sol...

We have a Tesla car, but I never considered their solar because it's a commodity, and their options are overpriced. They also pushed leases pretty heavily, which I was not interested in. We bought our panels in 2018, the same year we bought the EV.

Just talk to your neighbors about reputable local installers. They'll have panel and storage options.

That said, because these things are largely commoditized, there's some turmoil in the market. Our (excellent!) local installer was saved by the PPP during the pandemic, which was a bit of a sobering thought -- they're the ones backingthe 25 year installation guarantee!

Then Sunpower (our panel vendor, and one of the higher end ones, at that) went out of business. Our monitoring system continues to work thanks to the work of the bankruptcy courts, though it's been transferred to a company who is trying to support those assets be having a freemium model.

Friend ordered the solar roof (the solar panels that look like shingles), and after waiting a year switched to their regular solar.

From my conversations it was a complete mess to get installed, with poor communication on their end. After it was installed he had 2 issues within 2 years resulting in them needing to replace hardware.

Add in that it was quite expensive, he is not a happy customer.

You should look closely at solar rate plans and interconnection fees in your area. If you're hoping to save money with solar, it's possible that you never recoup the initial investment because of the way the newer rate plans are structured (esp. for PG&E).

In the bay area, it might be cheaper to opt into 100% renewable rate plans from CleanPowerSF or Peninsula Clean Energy. (Silicon Valley Power is 100% renewable by default, IIRC.)

Higher price than competitiors and they have a poor reputation for after sales service.

A repuatable local company will be cheaper and you can have roughly the same equipment (tesla powerwall) and have after sales support.

Not political => without even looking at the solar panels, I'd be wary based off all the numerous issues with their cars. The CyberTruck in particular is like a modern day DeLorean, but much worse. That kind of cost cutting is going to be company wide and makes me wonder if their solar stuff is also problematic (not that I've heard anything).

Political=> he did a full blown Nazi salute twice and has been working to have millions fired from their government jobs. The conservatives who don't seem as bothered by that have never been interested in EVs to begin with and his liberal fanboy customers will never buy from him again now. He is extremely unpopular in Germany and China's Tesla market is being out competed. I don't think that makes Tesla look good long term, so I'd be cautious about a long term investment with them like rooftop solar. That's just my opinion anyway.

I have personal no experience to give, but I thought this was a good video when I watched in a while ago, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJeSWbR6W04

Except you can guarantee MKBHD got the best of the best service with Elon Musk personally holding a gun to the head of whomever was in charge of the install.

They literally work with their top influencers for FSD to make it looks more impressive than it really is.

He even talks about how everyone was having problems but "for whatever reason it went perfectly"... and it still took 8 months

https://electrek.co/2024/07/09/tesla-insiders-say-elon-optim...

Tesla solar is PV panels. I think you're thinking of the solar shingle thing which, as far as I know, never really took off. From googling around, they're still advertising it, and people have gotten quotes for it, but I imagine it's a tiny fraction of sales.

Tesla is a meme stock. Caveat emptor. For a considerable period, the price has never made sense considering the fundamentals. It's currently valued at ~$450k per car delivered in 2024 with a P/E ratio of 108 and that's after a 50% decline from its peak.

Just compare it to any other car company, be it the Big Three, European car makers or BYD.f

The whole purchase of SolarCity was one of Elon's companies (Tesla) buying another company of Elon's that was failing (SolarCity) because it owed a lot of money to a third company of Elon's (SpaceX).

Tesla's most recent quarterly shipments are down 13# Y/Y with likely worse to come. The brand is being publicly torched by the actions of its CEO. A protracted trade war with China could end very badly for Tesla. A trade war with Europe may see the EU replace its demand for EVs with the likes of BYD.

Solar is (now) a commodity business. The panels get ever-cheaper. The only real cost is installation. And a labor-intensive cost like that doesn't scale.

I predict that Tesla will be forced to try and save itself by ousting its CEO in the coming years.

It's hard to take a company seriously whose founder goes all in for Trump. It's humiliating.

Well, to be fair, solar installations and EV sales have been surging, just not from Tesla.

> Kind of interesting that we should now rejoice of EV and solar panel numbers dropping.

Maybe I missed it in the article but why should we rejoice that EV and solar panel numbers are dropping?

Isn't that a bad thing?

No we shouldn't be but I think the point here is more that "this company's sales are dropping".

Tesla is no longer a leader in any part of decarbonizing anything, and for good reason: 1. Teslas image rests entirely on Elon Musk; 2. Aging products and no successful innovation.

That’s not what is happening though. Solar panels are being installed at an exponential rate, and EVs are growing relatively fast.

People are just happy that consumers are choosing other alternatives instead of supporting certain billionaire. The Tesla solar roof has always seemed like an inefficient use of resources too.

Tesla is not the only company that makes solar panels or electric cars. The other companies CEOs also aren't indiscriminately firing federal workers, breaking government code, or doing Nazi salutes. There's no obligation to give money to a company associated with any of those things to prop up the stock

That's definitely two different sets of clashing memes being mixed there. Right wing - cheering on Oil and Tesla. Left wing - cheering on Teslas demise and Solar.