Yes to all the negative statements about inefficient and durability... But come on, how hard could it be? Make a "plastic-coated" car cover that can create electricity. And then see how far off road someone can goooo. Or just use ot to power up the car/truck/whatever you got.
Hybrid Solar Electric Cars : Refueling With The Sun Cybertruck is larger surface area, but also larger energy usage. So : ~30 miles per day if you slathered the vehicle with panels, or ~15 miles per day of range with just the rear cover area.
That is the biggest part. If you want surface area to charge with, your house is a much better option to put it. It's larger and can accommodate much larger simpler panels, it's usually not doing 80 mph behind a semi throwing rocks at it, and it can charge other things if you aren't driving that day. Adding a bit of weight in panels won't decrease your homes efficiency. It is tough to get the costs somewhere where it would be realistic for a vehicle. Lets say you got the 15 miles on sunny days by parking outside all day every day, and that adds up to 300 days a year for you. Ok, you got yourself 4500 miles of range that year. Figure the 3-5 cents a mile for charging costs... that's $180 bucks a year you are saving. So if they can install and reliably protect it so it doesn't cost you repairs, and if they can keep it around $2000 (And that's a huge IF on the price to cover the back half of the vehicle with it, design it, warranty it, make their profit, etc...), you'd be seeing a return on investment only after 11 years of ownership, or sometime around 2034 if you are in front and getting one of the first ones. And just a little weight addition there might have you looking even longer. 12 years is a non-starter for me for return on investment on a vehicle. Heck, half that is not where I'd want it to be and I tend to hold onto vehicles longer than most. To me, that's kinda going away from the Tesla plan of making design features that people want where they aren't having to give up practicality and ease of life to get them. I want to be able to park my car indoors when I'm not using it, or use the covered parking at work rather than out in the sun. I want to be able to pick the shady spot next to the building. Just my thoughts...
Figure a solar panel collects 10 watts per square meter, averaged 24/7/365. (Night, snow, weather, angles, shadows, efficiencies, etc all considered.) The solar bed cover & variants are basically to: - ensure constant trickle charging to keep battery happy - provide “self charging” for emergency use, a few miles of use daily even if all power sources unavailable (“the best in zombie apocalypse technology” - Musk). Like a spare tire, something that doesn’t really amortize well, but you’ll pay near any price for it when needed.