Tesla: The Powerpack Business And Competing Technologies
Date: Jan 31, 2019
Summary
The next revolution is in energy storage. EVs are just a by-product, chemical batteries are the real game changer.
Elon Musk is “all-in” on a single battery type (Li-ion). Tesla benefits from accumulating knowledge and cutting costs, but it also “puts all eggs in one basket”.
Vanadium Redox Flow batteries are competing with Powerpack. They have a huge cycle life, but their efficiency rate is quite lower.
China and Russia have the largest vanadium reserves on the planet. Being allies as of late, they “sit” on all the necessary raw materials needed to fuel the battery revolution.
NaS batteries used to be “King”, but have lost their rank. The UltraBattery could, instead, be the new big thing.
*Pre-note: In Part I of this series on Tesla, we discussed the company’s EV business, and in Part II (the one you are reading now), we’ll be addressing its Energy Storage business (Powerpack). Part III then will expand into the potential of Powerpack, Powerwall and other secondary business components.
