Tesla: We build the largest battery in the world
"Tesla builds a battery park in 100 days - and if you do not, you get the system for free" - Elon Musk made a crazy offer to the state of South Australia, which was struggling four months ago. Now the superstar has actually received the contract among the tech entrepreneurs, the planned facility will be gigantic.
Tesla: We build the largest battery in the world [Update] Image source: OnInnovation, Attribution-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic (CC BY-ND 2.0)
Update from 07.07.2017, 10:50 Uhr: Tesla has won the contract: By December 2017, Elon Musk will build the world's largest lithium-ion battery store in South Australia, which will then supply 30,000 households with electricity. The energy is generated at the Hornsdale wind farm and fed into the 129-megawatt hours system. Muscler is optimistic as always: "This is the way of the future. I think other states will look closely at this and consider whether that is applicable to their needs. And I believe, in most cases it is the ".
Original article "Tesla-Boss: I solve Australia's energy problem in 100 days - or the facility is free" from 10.3.2017:
The man most known as a Tesla or optional SpaceX boss is obviously a marketing genius. At the very least, Elon Musk has to face the fact that he produces headlines with an above-average frequency that will benefit him and his business activities. Whether it is a 35,000 dollar electric car or the largest space ship of all time - the 45-year-old entrepreneur knows how to generate positive attention.
So now the next casual move of Musk, this time in the form of a bet on Twitter - what happened? Lyndon Rive (CEO of Tesla subsidiary SolarCity) has offered to install battery storage systems on the order of 100-300 megawatts of electricity. The company could build this very quickly, in under 100 days. Mike Cannon-Brookes (Australian billionaire and Atlassian co-founder) commented, "How serious do you think Lyndon and Elon? Can you guarantee 100 days? "
The answer came as a retweet within one day, from Elon Musk himself: "Tesla will install the system and get it running: within 100 days of signing the contract - if not, then you get it for free. Is that serious enough? "Thus Musk is betting on a 200 million order via Twitter message.
Has the man gone mad? Hard to say, but you can assume that it is certain how the construction of this plant can succeed in such a short time. After all, in January 2017, Tesla put the battery factory "Gigafactory" into operation, where energy stores such as Teslas Powerwalls leave the production line. The name is program: The Gigafactory is the largest production building in the world. No bad conditions for Musk and his bet.
I'll bet Tesla shareholders are biting their lips over this one. Elon probably could have sold SA on the battery idea without needlessly betting the future of the company in the process. Anything goes wrong and it could be lights out, especially given the record amounts of cash they're burning through.
All we can do is sit and wait ;)