Wait until this tax issue is resolved, then it will actually make good sense here. (It's sunnier than most people think!)
Why is that? And are you absolutely certain it's true?
I also live in Michigan, and I've never heard of this. I've replaced major appliances before without it impacting my property tax assessment -- including appliances that have cost more than the Tesla Battery pack and been inspected+verified by the city (such as a new 96% efficient furnace).
I don't see why adding a Tesla Battery would change property tax assessment any, when adding a $6,000 furnace, $5,000 air conditioner, or a $2,000 refrigerator doesn't.
Solar systems are considered "real" property, i.e. property that is permanently attached to the house, and thus subject to taxation.
I believe the only time that an upgrade could possibly increase the taxable value of your house is if the township/county knows about it (I.e., you got a permit to install it).
I also live in Michigan, but haven't researched renewable energy sources vs taxable value. I'm surprised to hear the gp say they had an increase.
Always claim you just replaced the switch. Just replaced the plumbing. Even then they can make your life miserable if they want. (I can go into most people homes and find multiple code violations--some homes just a few years old.)
These towns are trying to make money. In my town, if you take a few pictures and sell them on eBay, or elsewhere the town wants a fee from you--guess what, you're a Professional Photographer.
My point is these counties/towns are drunk with power, and preventing homeowners from upgrading their homes. They are looking for every dime they can extract from you. A simple electrical switch in you house will require an Inspector in you home at least two times.
If you feel an inspector is picking on you; pull your video camera out and tape every move they make.(Keep the evidence if needed in a lawsuit.)
A building inspector can walk into your home without a warrant at any time. That needs to change, along with enacting all these petty laws most people don't even know they are breaking. Stop passing their bonds, bonds, bonds, bonds, until they stop harassing us.
(It's up to an inspector if they feel the improvements added to the value of your home in the counties I have worked in. Try arguing with some guy who just just looks up codes, and given way too much authority.)
If that's the case, the system itself wouldn't be a non-refundable investment, and calculating ROI on it would be as silly as calculating ROI on your house.
Also, what is the environmental impact of the manufacture of LI batteries at this scale? Lithium mining, processing, assembly, delivery... we can't just ignore that.
Strangely, all of these issues were conveniently left out of the article.
Not sure everybody knows this, but its not economically feasible to recycle these batteries:
"Recycled lithium is as much as five times the cost of lithium produced from the least costly brine based process. It is not competitive for recycling companies to extract lithium from slag, or competitive for the OEMs to buy at higher price points from recycling companies. "
Add in the fact there are currently very few dedicated LI recycling companies in the world, let alone in the US:
"With lithium recycling in its infancy, there is currently no main recycling infrastructure in the world that treats only automotive Li-ion batteries. A few pilot plants, such as Umicore's Hoboken plant in Belgium that are at a demonstration stage exist. Lack of standardisation in battery chemistries and changing landscape with respect to different elements under research for battery production other than lithium have made evaluation of the recycled value of the components uncertain for the recyclers."
source: http://www.waste-management-world.com/articles/print/volume-...
Call me skeptical, but I'm not sure Tesla has really given consideration to these issues. Their approach to these obvious issues are not addressed at all in their press release.
Why am I telling you all of this? Because the price of something has very, very, very, very, very little to do with how feasible something is, how much work is required on a fundamental level.
So what? Recycling lithium isn't profitable right now this very instant? Because the price is too high? Apart from the circular logic here, this means nothing.
(This kind of thinking is disappointingly common here. We will never get anywhere when we do some adhoc "price" analysis on every new technology and obviously deduce it's infeasible and should not be explored. Cars were economically infeasible back when you bought petrol from the pharmacy.)
the lithium, although lithium is sometimes thought of as a bigger thing than it really is for lithium ion cell.
It’s like using maybe a couple percent of the cell mass, but the biggest cost constituent is nickel
There's a great analysis of material constraints here [1].
1. http://seekingalpha.com/article/654441-ev-myths-and-realitie...
But lithium is still not cheap. I suppose that a different battery technology, with lower energy density per unit of weight, could be much cheaper with comparable efficiency. But Tesla only has expertise in lithium batteries, so some other manufacturer could use the momentum with a lower-cost offer.
Lithium is extremely cheap. The cost of the Lithium has practically no impact on the cost of the batteries. Most of the cost of batteries is work.
This venture makes sense because as lithium batteries are used, they lose capacity, and thus their specific energy gets worse. At this point, they are no longer very useful for cars, yet still can be used for other things. As Tesla recovers the used batteries from their cars, they can resell them as home batteries.
The cost of the raw lithium is about 1% of the cost of the battery. It's engineering it in a very precise way that's expensive.
In any case, they wouldn't need to subsidize these batteries. $350/kWh is a pretty decent price, and consistent with estimates of what they cost in Tesla's cars.
And you really need to be using it, because a lithium-ion will still degrade even if its sitting unused on a shelf in a perfect climate-controlled room.
Demand shifting seems a much bigger payoff: using your AC to superchill parts of your building overnight (or build up ice packs) when electricity is cheap.
It is definitely safer than gas supplies, which strike me as an insane idea, especially in San Francisco where it previous burned down the city.
We will eventually do a home system. It is in the planning stages
Why not? The whole point to making it wall-mounted is that it won't take up any substantial amount of space. A utility/laundry room seems like exactly the logical place that you would want to put it.
Sure, there could be some trade off where it makes sense to add heat and A/C to my garage (and appropriate insulation) based on the economics. But, that's even more I need to spend.
I didn't see "insurance" anywhere on that Tesla page. Ideally my insurance company won't pitch a fit about about me installing this in my house, but will Tesla guarantee that?
(Ok, a burning lithium battery will release more energy than its storage capacity, but I'm not finding a nice reference, Tesla knows all about containing cells to prevent chain reactions, and one liter of gasoline is still enough to burn down your whole house.)
A gas can also will not light on fire just because it gets hit with a car. It would take malicious use of a gas can -- splashing it on a wall and then lighting it on fire -- to match the default configuration of a Powerwall.
Lithium fires do not require oxygen, so your typical Class ABC fire extinguishers won't actually work on it. You need a class D (dry powder) extinguisher, which is very rare and expensive.
According to the MSDS for lithium ion batteries, fires involving them can be extinguished with a typical ABC fire extinguisher.
Lithium batteries (not the rechargeable kind) are the ones that need a class D extinguisher.
Edit:
> CO extinguishers, halon or copious quantities of water or water-based foam can be used to cool down burning Li- ion cells and batteries. Do not use for this purpose sand, dry powder or soda ash, graphite powder or fire blankets.
> Extinguishing media Use water or CO2 on burning Li-ion cells or batteries
Obviously there should be a physically separate circuit for cutting off power in the event of catastrophe. That's pretty much rule-of-thumb for large li-ion battery banks.
I thought fire is by definition a combustion reaction, meaning some kind of material reacting with oxygen. What's fire, then? (I feel like a little kid, having to ask that...)
I don't think many people around here understand (a) just how efficient gasoline really is at storing energy, and (b) just how much energy is used by a typical passenger car.
For example, a friend had a rack with about $80k of servers in his basement a few years ago. I believe he paid an additional $400 for coverage.
* uses my zip code to figure out what my non-peak costs might be.
* allows me to optionally calculate solar energy capture (so I can see what impact having solar would be, given the average sunny days in my area)
* takes into account the wear and tear average cold weather would have on the lifetime of the batter and the payback period.
For example, I live in Michigan, and I don't know what my off peak cost is off the top of my head. I also have no idea how much sunshine I get, or how 10 degree lows for two months would impact the battery's ability to keep a charge.
Anybody know if something like this exists?