Solar Roof update of sorts

[brucet999]

Source?

Tesla roof tile production at Gigafactory 2 delayed
Gigafactory production projected to start at end of 2017. It will take some time to ramp up to much volume.
Tesla had already announced that Solar Roof was "sold out" until 2018.
Factor in Tesla Time and the inevitable ramp-up glitches, and it seems clear that any buyers not already in the queue (OP is deciding, so he likely has not put down his $1,000 deposit) will not see product until late in 2018. If he wants Tuscan or slate styles, the wait could be even longer.

 

[Dr Doom]

Since SolarRoof is not available until late 2018, there's no choice to be made right now anyway. Cost of solar roof is supposedly $22 per square foot on average, which for most houses is about three times cost of solar panels added on to an existing roof.

Tesla still, after all this time, has yet to release any specifications beyond physical size of the tiles, so no one knows how much output each tile has. Their so-called online estimator gives the same % active tiles for a wide range of usage inputs, so trying to calculate back from that is impossible.

My advice is to go ahead with solar panels on your existing roof and get them from anyone other than Solar City/Tesla Energy.

thanks! I am probably going to get a solar panel from sunrun or another company that is more competitive.

 

[brucet999]

thanks! I am probably going to get a solar panel from sunrun or another company that is more competitive.

Since SunPower and Panasonic are the best performing modules, you may want to contact those companies to find their best installers in your area.

 

[ElectricTundra]

Tesla roof tile production at Gigafactory 2 delayed
Gigafactory production projected to start at end of 2017. It will take some time to ramp up to much volume.
Tesla had already announced that Solar Roof was "sold out" until 2018.
Factor in Tesla Time and the inevitable ramp-up glitches, and it seems clear that any buyers not already in the queue (OP is deciding, so he likely has not put down his $1,000 deposit) will not see product until late in 2018. If he wants Tuscan or slate styles, the wait could be even longer.

Let's clear things up a bit. You said "Since SolarRoof is not available until late 2018,". That is inaccurate. It is available in limited supply today with availability increasing over time. They are currently producing Textured at the pilot plant and likely Smooth as well. These are being made available now to some reservation holders in CA. Availability will be rolled out to other states as they gain increased experience with manufacturing and installation, and turn up production at Giga2.

Availability of Tuscan and Slate will likely come in late 2017 from the pilot plant and sometime in mid 2018 from Giga2.

An new order placed today may not be fulfilled until late 2018 but that is a completely different from general availability.

 

[brucet999]

Let's clear things up a bit. You said "Since SolarRoof is not available until late 2018,". That is inaccurate. It is available in limited supply today with availability increasing over time. They are currently producing Textured at the pilot plant and likely Smooth as well. These are being made available now to some reservation holders in CA. Availability will be rolled out to other states as they gain increased experience with manufacturing and installation, and turn up production at Giga2.

Availability of Tuscan and Slate will likely come in late 2017 from the pilot plant and sometime in mid 2018 from Giga2.

An new order placed today may not be fulfilled until late 2018 but that is a completely different from general availability.

Dr Doom posted the he wasn't sure whether to install conventional solar modules or Solar Roof. I believe my answer to him was accurate, since he will not be able to get a Solar Roof until everyone already in line gets theirs. Indeed, I think my answer was an accurate estimate of general availability as far as anyone who has not already put down a $1,000 deposit is concerned.

 

[ElectricTundra]

Dr Doom posted the he wasn't sure whether to install conventional solar modules or Solar Roof. I believe my answer to him was accurate, since he will not be able to get a Solar Roof until everyone already in line gets theirs. Indeed, I think my answer was an accurate estimate of general availability as far as anyone who has not already put down a $1,000 deposit is concerned.

You didn't qualify your statement in any way though. You said rather definitively "Since SolarRoof is not available until late 2018". It would perhaps have been more accurate to have said "Solar Roof will likely not be available to anyone who has not put down a deposit until late 2018."

 

[ggr]

I spoke to a rep yesterday (he called me), and our installation is tentatively scheduled for late Nov/early Dec.

 

[nativewolf]

I spoke to a rep yesterday (he called me), and our installation is tentatively scheduled for late Nov/early Dec.

You trend setter you...a bit jealous here in Solar city less N VA.

 

[ElectricTundra]

I spoke to a rep yesterday (he called me), and our installation is tentatively scheduled for late Nov/early Dec.

Very good to hear. Textured?

 

[ggr]

Very good to hear. Textured?

That's what we asked for, yes.

 

[SageBrush]

I talked to a Tesla Energy (Solar City) guy in Home Depot today and asked when Solar Roof would be generally available. He said that they had had an employee meeting just yesterday at which they were told that Solar Roof is still in beta and the company is trying to judge market demand before committing to actual commercial scale production. He had the impression that production might be a year or more away. He had no idea how "market demand" would be determined.

No details were passed on to field employees about installation methods or how active tiles might be ganged together into strings, nor whether there would be power optimizers to compensate for shaded tiles or different sun exposures of various areas of roof.

Interp: Buy what we have today.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

It's looking like some form of major tariff will be placed on foreign modules. In light of this, would it make sense to tool the Buffalo factory to pump out primarily standard panels? What kind of volume could be achieved there if 90% of the floor space is dedicated to traditional panels?

 

[scharlesjr]

Has any Tesla vehicle owner owners with referral rewards receive their solar roof early access token?

 

[Ulmo]

It's looking like some form of major tariff will be placed on foreign modules. In light of this, would it make sense to tool the Buffalo factory to pump out primarily standard panels? What kind of volume could be achieved there if 90% of the floor space is dedicated to traditional panels?

Less value in cheaper panels will mean the same value in the pretty tiles will compare "less bad" (although not more good) in terms of cost.

 

[brucet999]

It's looking like some form of major tariff will be placed on foreign modules. In light of this, would it make sense to tool the Buffalo factory to pump out primarily standard panels? What kind of volume could be achieved there if 90% of the floor space is dedicated to traditional panels?

I think that is unlikely. The tariff proposal is aimed at low-efficiency commodity panels that are typically used in enterprise solar installations.

Tesla Energy's factory in Buffalo is shared with Panasonic, which makes highly efficient solar cells. Solar Roof depends on using highly efficient cells as well. Even the Solar City-owned manufacturer was making upper-middle quality modules, so the tariffs will not affect Tesla much except to the extent that higher prices on commodity modules will reduce the price differential of low-cost modules vis a vis the upper echelon products. Since NAFTA manufacturers will be exempt from tariffs, SunPower modules made in Mexico and Silfab made in Canada will benefit along with Tesla in Buffalo and the moribund Solar World in Oregon.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Even the high-end Tesla (SolarCity) panels were going to be $.55/W if I recall. If Chinese manufacturers were going to follow suit, that's about a 40% tariff bump on the competition. That's good for TSLA, but super bad for consumers, no?

 

[Skotty]

Re: Tariff

I tend to have bad luck with these kinds of things. And since I am buying panels for my rooftop solar install next Spring, there will most likely be significant cost increases before then. I would like to apologize to everyone for personally causing this. Sorry.

On the plus side, if I cause increased costs on foreign residential panels from tariffs, I might can convince my installer to use 'Murica' panels without sounding like a loon.