Economics

Your Home Doesn't Matter for Tesla's Dream of a Battery-Powered Planet

The Powerwall isn't the holy grail
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Elon Musk has done something remarkable. He built a 220-pound battery to hang on the garage wall and convinced a huge number of people that owning one is a lifestyle choice—like having a compost bin in the garden and reusable diapers on the baby. His battery is personal, and it's going to change the world with your help.

If only it were so. While the pairing of home batteries with solar power makes deeply intuitive sense, the problem is that it doesn’t make financial sense. Not now, not anytime soon, and definitely not in the U.S. I first wrote about the issueBloomberg Terminal just after the high-profile launch, arguing that interest in Tesla's consumer-oriented Powerwall batteries wouldn't be based on sound financial reasoning. When Musk was asked about my findings in his earnings call with analysts, the Tesla chief executive offered this reply: "That doesn't mean people won't buy it."