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Powerwall 2: Installation
- Thread starter JeffreyY
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- Powerwall Tesla Energy
You're asking if anyone got them? The answer is yes. They are installing them now. I
Man, there are a few hundred people that post in this area. Solarcity alone has 320k folks installed. The probability that a user is on here is so slim, that they ordered a PW2 slimmer yet, that they have one installed is actually odd. Besides which I actually know someone with an instal going on right now as well and not in Houston but they are borderline preppers and would never share any info or want there situation discussed. Not like Tesla car drivers that rush to post about their nice toys. Different sort of vibe with solar energy folks.
Good luck on the house build, lots of folks received the original powerwall, lots wrote about it on this forum. PW2 is a much more compelling solution and I'd like a Powerpack2 but if you think info is hard to get on a PW2 try being a residential consumer/farmer and trying to get powerpack pricing. What does building a house have to do with it though? Get the electrical done as if you are going to have a PW2 installed, panel and subpanels, get as much capacity as you can afford in your main panel. They can install the PW2 whenever, nothing to do with the house build. Now the roof, if you wanted a solar roof that would be a delay, I'd be torn between leaving tarpaper up for 6 months and hoping to get a solar roof or putting on a cheap cheap 15 year asphalt from the discount pile.
Our house on the farm needs a roof in 3 or 5 years and I'm going to do a solar roof if I can swing it.
Good luck on the house build, lots of folks received the original powerwall, lots wrote about it on this forum. PW2 is a much more compelling solution and I'd like a Powerpack2 but if you think info is hard to get on a PW2 try being a residential consumer/farmer and trying to get powerpack pricing. What does building a house have to do with it though? Get the electrical done as if you are going to have a PW2 installed, panel and subpanels, get as much capacity as you can afford in your main panel. They can install the PW2 whenever, nothing to do with the house build. Now the roof, if you wanted a solar roof that would be a delay, I'd be torn between leaving tarpaper up for 6 months and hoping to get a solar roof or putting on a cheap cheap 15 year asphalt from the discount pile.
Our house on the farm needs a roof in 3 or 5 years and I'm going to do a solar roof if I can swing it.
I just got off the phone with Tesla. Basically, unless you're in an area currently covered by SolarCity, you're SOL.
Apparently they're "working to add certified installers to their network". However, they're certifying and approving installers in markets with the most powerwall reservations first. The Tesla rep quite literally said "I'm not sure when we'll be getting to more rural areas". The metro area I live in has 1.2 million residents. While not an incredibly impressive number, that's not what I consider "rural".
Apparently they're "working to add certified installers to their network". However, they're certifying and approving installers in markets with the most powerwall reservations first. The Tesla rep quite literally said "I'm not sure when we'll be getting to more rural areas". The metro area I live in has 1.2 million residents. While not an incredibly impressive number, that's not what I consider "rural".
well in that case I get, too bad aquion went bust I thought they would be a decent play. They just could not get to scale. Pika energy is another neat company but I don't think that islanding inverter is really an off grid play (very too bad). So you need battery power...i hear you I hear. Me too. I wanted to buy a different farm,did not work out but had a 12k foot easement for power at 10/ft . Prior poster said only SolarCity clients getting PW2 for now. So...we're hosed at the moment. Oh, you could buy from some of the guys offering founders series PW2s. That would get around it.
You would still have to find a "powerwall certified" installer to get a founder series PW2 installed if you want the warranty honored. If you're in a SolarCity area then you're good. Otherwise, you'll be SOL just like everyone else who have powerwall reservation but no local certified installer.
I'm assuming all the units that say Residential and 5kW, 13.5kWh are all single PowerWall 2 applications. I also saw one or two that were 10kW, 27kWh, so that must be two PowerWalls.
Thanks for the constructive comments all. My sales rep confirmed what you guys have indicated. Tesla told him initially (last December) that should have 2 PowerWall2's around May 1st. They made a deposit at the time. He just heard back from Tesla today that now it's "maybe September". Unfortunately as much as I *wanted* to go with Tesla, my timeline doesn't allow me to do that.
I just gave my Sales rep (Solar) the go ahead for Sonnen. This is the pricing he gave me if anyone is interested:
4 kWh - Eco-4 is $10,950
6 kWh - Eco-6 is $12,951
8 kWh- Eco-8 is $ 14,950
Yeah...holy crap is right!
I just gave my Sales rep (Solar) the go ahead for Sonnen. This is the pricing he gave me if anyone is interested:
4 kWh - Eco-4 is $10,950
6 kWh - Eco-6 is $12,951
8 kWh- Eco-8 is $ 14,950
Yeah...holy crap is right!
I found a post on Reddit that shows a recent Powerwall 2 installation and the app, see the first two posts.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Powerwall/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Powerwall/
Thanks for the Reddit link! Quote from the first Reddit post:
Our current deal with LASG is that we are saving $950 by not paying for a "critical loads" subpanel, and every circuit in the house is supposed to get backed up. It turns out that our AeroVironment charging station (installed back in 2011 when we bought our Nissan LEAF) only goes up to 30 amps. The 2011 LEAF only actually draws 16 amps, and our Model S (which we charge via the J-1772 adapter) allows the current to be configured to lower levels. And we have no other appliances that draw anywhere near as much as the charging station. So the planned setup might actually work.
Now, if we happen to be charging the Tesla at 30A overnight and the power goes out, then I'm assuming the PW2 would stop delivering power because it only supports 5kW continuous output. It should then be easy enough for us to go out and unplug the Tesla, then get the PW2 going again. As for the LEAF, we generally only charge it during waking hours but between 10pm and 8am. Therefore, I'm thinking we should be able to avoid inadvertently draining the PW2 to charge EVs, while preserving the ability to do limited EV charging during a long outage.
If we later add a second charging station (a Tesla "wall connector"), however, it would be ideal if it's not backed up. I'm not sure I'd want to have to add that "critical loads" subpanel just to support this, though.
Our current deal with LASG is that we are saving $950 by not paying for a "critical loads" subpanel, and every circuit in the house is supposed to get backed up. It turns out that our AeroVironment charging station (installed back in 2011 when we bought our Nissan LEAF) only goes up to 30 amps. The 2011 LEAF only actually draws 16 amps, and our Model S (which we charge via the J-1772 adapter) allows the current to be configured to lower levels. And we have no other appliances that draw anywhere near as much as the charging station. So the planned setup might actually work.
Now, if we happen to be charging the Tesla at 30A overnight and the power goes out, then I'm assuming the PW2 would stop delivering power because it only supports 5kW continuous output. It should then be easy enough for us to go out and unplug the Tesla, then get the PW2 going again. As for the LEAF, we generally only charge it during waking hours but between 10pm and 8am. Therefore, I'm thinking we should be able to avoid inadvertently draining the PW2 to charge EVs, while preserving the ability to do limited EV charging during a long outage.
If we later add a second charging station (a Tesla "wall connector"), however, it would be ideal if it's not backed up. I'm not sure I'd want to have to add that "critical loads" subpanel just to support this, though.
Kant.Ing
Member
Note PW2 in discharging-only mode can support up to 7kW, so you have almost 30A peak to spare and if you budget well between the appliances' max and typ. When the grid is outage, I wouldn't use the wall to charge EVs either unless PV is producing (during the day and sunny).
My EVs are already on a subpanel so I hope it'll be easier for me.
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I guess powerwalls just sort of eventually show up at the house. I'm still waiting from 2015.
From the reddit thread:
We initially ordered our orig Powerwall May 2015. We next got an email for install in Feb 2016 and didn't hear anything else.
We then got an email Oct 2016 introducing Powerwall 2. Placed an order about a month later and started getting emails and calls early this month (April 2017). After an onslaught of DocuSigns they had a surveyor come out and then a couple weeks later it was installed.
From the reddit thread:
We initially ordered our orig Powerwall May 2015. We next got an email for install in Feb 2016 and didn't hear anything else.
We then got an email Oct 2016 introducing Powerwall 2. Placed an order about a month later and started getting emails and calls early this month (April 2017). After an onslaught of DocuSigns they had a surveyor come out and then a couple weeks later it was installed.
Please note that the stated 7 kW number is peak power only and then only for 10 seconds. It won't discharge at 7 kW continuously.
Is SolarCity in your area? If not then you'll be waiting until there is a certified powerwall installer in your area.
My Powerwall Purchase Agreement states:
Approximate Start Date: 30-90 days from the day you sign this agreement.
Approximate Completion Date: 30-90 days from the day you sign this agreement.
When I spoke to my rep, he said it would probably be sooner than that as Tesla was ramping up production of the Powerwall 2 batteries. Will have to wait and see. Signed my docs on 4/7. No sign of Solarcity installation team yet.
Approximate Start Date: 30-90 days from the day you sign this agreement.
Approximate Completion Date: 30-90 days from the day you sign this agreement.
When I spoke to my rep, he said it would probably be sooner than that as Tesla was ramping up production of the Powerwall 2 batteries. Will have to wait and see. Signed my docs on 4/7. No sign of Solarcity installation team yet.
I think we've finally nailed down my design. We're bringing it up close to the house to my pool house. They want $700 for trenching 20'. I don't trust them anyway so I'll probably just rent a trencher and do that part myself. Otherwise I think we're there with a two Powerwall solution.
I don't trust them anyway so I'll probably just rent a trencher and do that part myself. Otherwise I think we're there with a two Powerwall solution.
I certainly would have preferred to have done our PV and PW2 simultaneously. Going forward, particularly outside of California, this ought to become a no-brainer for many homeowners.
In our case, we actually started trying to get quotes on PV late last September, well before PW2 was available. Our PV panels were finally installed in March, after a series of delays for various reasons (we initially went with SolarCity but after several weeks they "disqualified" our site due to an arbitrary shading threshold, then there were winter weather delays affecting LA Solar Group). And it wasn't until March that I learned about California's SGIP program and began to seriously pursue our battery storage options.
Had I been better informed about SGIP, I might have waited until around now to install everything at once. On the other hand, in SCE territory, the cutoff for NEM 1.0 is July 1 which is sort of cutting it close. Thankfully, SGIP is so generous that it should mostly take away the sting of having to re-do electrical work.
The big downside of SGIP, of course, is that it only has enough funding to generously incentive home battery systems for a fraction of each year; as a result, PV installers may be less motivated to talk about this program outside of a relatively narrow time window. In other words, I doubt that PV installers are keen on having customers postpone jobs for months in order to optimize SGIP rebates.
