Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[thx1139]

If I’m Tesla, I’d rather take the short term stock price hit than divulge off of this information to have it used against me when deviations inevitably happen.

As an investor with a multi year horizon, I say “carry on!”

Thats why they have a disclaimer like Zach did at the very beginning.

 

[Singuy]

I'm talking about it because I think V2H is a key enabler of the transition to a clean energy grid and electrified transport.

Maybe, but not according to Musk. In his mind, the cars are too busy being autonomous taxies then to power the grid.

 

[MP3Mike]

Doesn't look like it to me

So you think they are selling power below cost for essentially all Supercharging: $0.12/kWh (site/depreciation) + $0.62/kWh (demand) + $0.20/kWh (energy) = $0.94/kWh Tesla cost (But yet the most Tesla ever charges is ~$0.60/kWh.)

I think it is more like: $0.12/kWh (site/depreciation/demand) + $0.20/kWh (energy) = $0.32/kWh Tesla cost

($0.20/kWh is probably both low and high, depending on state and TOU, so I figured it was a reasonable estimate.)

For example, in NY they charge $0.39/kWh. Which seems reasonable since they want to make a small profit.)

 

[TN Mtn Man]

After watching videos of charging non-Tesla cars on Superchargers, I have to wonder...is Tesla going to dominate the charging infrastructure the same way they do EV vehicles? Will EVGo, EA and Chargepoint go under? And is charging a significant profit center?

 

[SageBrush]

Maybe, but not according to Musk. In his mind, the cars are too busy being autonomous taxies then to power the grid.

Pretty obviously not, since that scenario also precludes them charging up during the day

 

[Nocturnal]

3) Monterrey is almost 2,000' above sea level, so Tesla can ignore battery supply constraints and just roll the cars down the hill into the ocean w/o batteries.

Cost savings. The cars will charge themselves as they roll downhill.

 

[SageBrush]

So you think they are selling power below cost for essentially all Supercharging: $0.12/kWh (site/depreciation) + $0.62/kWh (demand) + $0.20/kWh (energy) = $0.94/kWh Tesla cost (But yet the most Tesla ever charges is ~$0.60/kWh.)

Yes. That is the conclusion I draw from the slide. Did you see any errors in my arithmetic ?

P.s., volumetric charges are much cheaper on demand rate schedules. Perhaps 5¢ a kWh So 62¢ + 12¢ + 5¢ = 79¢ a kWh
The silver lining here is that a doubling to 400 kWh a day*post will do wonders for their cost sheet. Hopefully customer routing will keep the waiting down. And I do expect Supercharger storage to come online.

 

[phoggy123]

After watching videos of charging non-Tesla cars on Superchargers, I have to wonder...is Tesla going to dominate the charging infrastructure the same way they do EV vehicles? Will EVGo, EA and Chargepoint go under? And is charging a significant profit center?

I actually believe this, that the US government is going to fund Tesla into becoming standard oil 2.0. There is nobody else in the US that competes. All other products are trash at the moment and all anyone really wants is 100Kwh+ that is reliable.

Reliable charging enables EV's to be mainstream, without it all other manufacturers are toast in the worlds most valuable auto market.

 

[SageBrush]

I actually believe this, that the US government is going to fund Tesla into becoming standard oil 2.0.

I think it will happen too, unless the competing companies slash their installation costs to something approaching Tesla. Currently they are 3x more expensive

 

[Singuy]

After watching videos of charging non-Tesla cars on Superchargers, I have to wonder...is Tesla going to dominate the charging infrastructure the same way they do EV vehicles? Will EVGo, EA and Chargepoint go under? And is charging a significant profit center?

Tesla is aiming for 30% gross margin and 10% net profit. However I believe the 10% is based on a particular amount of down time when no one is charging. If station utilization goes up, the net profit goes up as operating cost stays flat.
As for will it bk EVGo and such? Well they are about to get subsidies to keep them afloat.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1510691354623590410

 

[MC3OZ]

Incidentally, it doesn’t look like this Cybertruck is being manufactured using their new out of the box method, but has the parts of the final.

Keep in mind the Cybertruck body you are looking at doesn't have a bottom.?

If it still has a front casting, structural pack and rear casting they might put components on them, join them up, and then marry with this body.

But it does look like there might not be a rear casting or it is already attached? (Access to the rear does look very good)

They mentioned some parts of Gen3 as being similar to Cybertruck.

 

[MP3Mike]

Yes. That is the conclusion I draw from the slide. Did you see any errors in my arithmetic ?

Well, the slide you reference says nothing of demand charges. So, what you made up, is exactly that made up. (And I think some states have specific plans that don't have a demand charge component for EV charging sites.)

I don't consider demand charges part of the energy charge, since it doesn't increase with the kWh usage, so I think it is included in the $0.12/kWh figure Tesla provided.

 

[SageBrush]

Well, the slide you reference says nothing of demand charges. So, what you made up, is exactly that made up.

https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/68963.pdf

Aside: I did think of one correction that can be applied: Superchargers are +/- limited to 150 kW per post. E.g, V4 is 600 kW per every 4 stalls. So max demand charges per stall can be modeled as 150 kW rather than the 200 kW I used.

 

[MP3Mike]

https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/68963.pdf

Aside: I did think of one correction that can be applied: Superchargers are +/- limited to 150 kW per post. E.g, V4 is 600 kW per every 4 stalls. So max demand charges per stall can be modeled as 150 kW rather than the 200 kW I used.

Where did you find V4 specs? Will they max that out with the grid/transformer?

And current V3 sites are normally ~83kW/stall.

 

[MC3OZ]

Model 3 production back at GF Shanghai:-

Shanghai factory in last week due to the first phase of upgrading, we did not see the Model 3 figure • 【Giga shanghai】GF... And today's flight observation we found that the Model 3 figure is back again, and the rate of out of storage looks very high, not only Model 3, Model Y is also the same, the second phase of the road test site, a dozen units Model Y arranged in the field road test. Finished car parking lot is even busier, a delivery truck full of Tesla driving away from the factory, seems to have been full-blooded. So Phase I of the transformation is over? According to the news, the Highland version of Model 3 is expected to go into production in Shanghai in September.

 

[electracity]

Why isn't next gen being built in China?

Also, I think the report that next gen is not for North America is wrong.

 

[Cosmacelf]

After watching videos of charging non-Tesla cars on Superchargers, I have to wonder...is Tesla going to dominate the charging infrastructure the same way they do EV vehicles? Will EVGo, EA and Chargepoint go under? And is charging a significant profit center?

Be aware that while Tesla Superchargers are great for Tesla vehicles, they aren't great for many others. The Magic Dock seems limited to 150 kW, and those that have 800V architectures are often capped at 50kW or 100 kW when charging at 400V Superchargers.

 

[jerry33]

I keep seeing this, and these arguments are incredibly short-sighted.

Does a car battery have MORE storage than a powerwall? Yes.

But the big GOTCHA with this is the following:
1) the Inverters in the car are NOT designed to run that power in the opposite direction for any significant load. This means:
-- a) Tesla will need to design new bidirectional inverters.
-- b) Those inverters will likely add some cost to the car, as they are not are simple as what Tesla has honed in on and produced now
2) you have to have a house setup designed to accept this power - you guys expecting Tesla to put a bunch of 240V connectors in and you string some massive cables back to your breaker box? Even the Tesla wall charger is not designed to accept the power required for something like this. And here is an example:

Our house has 4 x PW 2.0 in it, each one is on a 30A 240V circuit (120A 240V total). That's the BARE MINIMUM to run our electric oven and either one AC, or the two AC units alone (but not the oven), and then various other lower-power devices. To run that kind of power that 4 PW2s provide you would need at minimum a set of 1-gauge copper wires connecting from your entry point from the car to the house. THAT IS NOT small. It's a lot larger than the wires in your wall charger (4-gauge).


People here are looking at STORAGE CAPACITY (the size of the swimming pool) and completely forgetting POWER OUTPUT (the thickness of the hose).

For any meaningful power output, the inverters need to be beefed up, and you need a substantial mechanism to access that power (i.e. thick wires back to a bidirectional wall charger or a lot of big ports on the car).



If Tesla implements V2G/H I would expect it will be limited to something like 5-7kw output (i.e. one powerwall power output). It will be helpful for something like a disaster, but it's not going to replace powerwalls unless someone is willing to pay for a VERY beefy inverter + cabling setup.

Things like the Ford F150 aren't setup either to run a whole house. They are "partial home" backup solutions.

Agreed, but it would do nicely to charge a Powerwall.

 

[GhostSkater]

Why isn't next gen being built in China?

Also, I think the report that next gen is not for North America is wrong.

It is, but they said in a way almost nobody noticed

I don't remember the exact wording, but is was something along "And we can build it on any of our factories"

I think there is a chance some vehicle on the new platform out of one of the current factories before Mexico

 

[MP3Mike]

https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy17osti/68963.pdf

Aside: I did think of one correction that can be applied: Superchargers are +/- limited to 150 kW per post. E.g, V4 is 600 kW per every 4 stalls. So max demand charges per stall can be modeled as 150 kW rather than the 200 kW I used.

I just did a quick calculation, and with their current open Superchargers, they have a total demand capacity of 1,439,002kW for 18,038 stalls. (Which works out to ~80kW/stall)

What do you get for demand charges per kWh if you use those numbers?