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What you need to know before getting a Tesla Powerwall - YouTube
Channel: Undecided with Matt Ferrell
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It took a while, but I finally got my Tesla
Powerwall installed.
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Thereās a few things I learned going through
the process that might be useful if youāre
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thinking about getting a home battery installed.
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So letās go through what you should know
before getting a Tesla Powerwall.
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And ... my first impressions of it.
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Iām Matt Ferrell ... welcome to Undecided.
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First off, I want to thank all of you who
used my Tesla referral code over the past
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couple of years.
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This Powerwall, as you can probably tell by
the color, is a founders edition Powerwall
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that I earned through the referral program.
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So I only had to pay for the installation,
but Iāll run through all of the costs and
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my first impressions in a bit.
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Getting this installed was a bit of a comedy
of errors.
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There wasnāt one big gotcha or anything
like that, but just a bunch of small road
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bumps and blips that collectively made it
an incredibly frustrating, almost 4-month-long
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experience.
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And itās what I learned from that that I
want to share with you so you know what to
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look for, what to ask, and what to expect.
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While my path had some bumps, Iāve still
got a fully functional Powerwall thatās
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already impressed me ... a lot.
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Thereās two basic categories of things you
should know about when installing a home battery.
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First is understanding what your energy requirements
are.
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Itās the same thing youād need to know
if youāre getting solar, but with a battery
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system itās important because of the electrical
load itās capable of supporting.
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If you donāt have an energy monitoring setup
in your home, which I do with Sense, then
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you can get a ballpark figure by looking at
your electric bill.
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Just look at the kWh used each month to see
how much electricity you use on average.
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And then create a list of your major appliances
and items around the house like HVAC, refrigerator,
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stove, pool, etc. and write down their power
draw in watts.
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You can usually find this on labels on the
device or online.
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If you add them all up, youāll start to
get a high level sense of what your home might
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use in kW if everything was turned on.
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Thereās some good reasons why doing this
is important.
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Iāve covered this in a previous video, but
home batteries have limitations for their
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continuous power output.
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The Powerwall has a cap at 5kW continuous
power with a peak load up to 7kW.
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These limitations are per Powerwall.
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So if you have 2, youād have a max of 10kW
continuous power output available.
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So you can probably see where Iām going
with this.
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Take the number from your appliance tally
and youāll understand how many Powerwalls
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you might need to support 100% of your use
if everything was running.
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In my case, one Powerwall isnāt quite a
enough, but thatās totally fine.
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It really depends on what your goals are with
battery backup.
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For me Iām most interested in providing
a base level of backup to keep things like
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the heat going in the winter during a power
outage, and to keep the refrigerator from
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defrosting.
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If youāre like me and your goal isnāt
100% coverage, there are a couple of options.
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One path is what I have here.
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This Powerwall is backing up my entire electric
panel, so in theory everything in the house
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ācouldā run during a blackout ... just
not all together.
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The other path I could have taken was adding
a sub panel which would carve out essential
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load circuits.
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That sub panel could have had my HVAC, refrigerator,
and a few other items in there.
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Then the Powerwall would only backup that
group and everything else in my house would
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go dark in a blackout.
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Going into this I had a basic understanding
of that, but didnāt really think about it
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until I was well into the process of getting
it installed.
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The installer I went with, which was not Tesla,
didnāt walk me through my options.
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They were just going to do a straight install,
but never even brought up other things I might
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want to consider doing.
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When I realized that was the case I started
asking questions, which caused a brief delay
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to the installation date.
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This was my first road bump in the install
process, which is why I bring it up.
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Make sure you do a bit of homework before
you leap in because thereās no guarantee
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your installer is going to be proactive and
inform you of your options up front.
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Whichever path you choose for your setup,
you might want to consider getting a soft
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start for appliances like your HVAC.
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As I mentioned, the Powerwall has a peak load
capacity of 7kW, but when you push into that
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zone, you risk tripping the Powerwallās
emergency shutdown if you overload it when
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something like your HVAC kicks on in a blackout.
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Major appliances like that can have a sizable
spike in power draw when the motor kicks on,
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so a soft start can dramatically shave off
that power spike.
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Some installers recommend doing that as par
for the course.
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Mine didnāt, but I may add one down the
road.
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Again, knowing this kind of thing up front
means you can ask the right questions of your
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installer.
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And if youāre installing this with solar
and want to ensure that your home can go indefinitely
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in a power outage, you need to make sure youāre
balancing the batteryās power capacity with
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the output capacity of your solar panel system.
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If your solar panels can output more power
than your battery can take in, the battery
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system will have to shut off the panels during
a blackout at times to manage that intake.
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Otherwise itās too much power for the battery
to handle.
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The second category of things to be aware
of is all around how prepared your home is
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to handle a Powerwall.
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And the first thing you have to look into
is ... do you have a service disconnect switch?
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To my knowledge, Iāve never lived in a house
with a separate service disconnect switch.
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Itās standard procedure for new homes, but
all of the older homes Iāve lived in havenāt
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had one.
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Theyāre usually just gigantic switches near
the power meter, or sometimes on the meter
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box itself.
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My house didnāt have one.
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The main circuit breaker in my panel was acting
as the service disconnect too.
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Well, with a Powerwall, or any battery system
for that matter, youāre going to need a
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service disconnect.
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That bit me in the butt when one of the electricians
stopped by the night before the install to
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scope out the setup in person.
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He spotted the lack of a service disconnect
right away, which delayed the project significantly.
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They had to coordinate with the electric company
for shutting off the service temporarily and
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had to install a disconnect at the same time
as the Powerwall.
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Iām still not sure why they didnāt include
any questions about this in the self-evaluation
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form I filled out, or why nobody caught it
in the photos I took.
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Thatās the next big road bump that I experienced,
which brings me back to asking a lot of questions
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up front.
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You canāt rely on your installer having
procedures in place to mitigate that type
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of thing happening ... but in my opinion,
a good installer should have that covered,
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like having a simple question about service
disconnects in the self-evaluation.
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If itās required, they should confirm you
have it upfront.
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Happily, this next one wasnāt a road bump
for me, but be sure you select a place with
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plenty of space.
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The Powerwall comes with a Gateway, which
is what manages where the power goes.
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Itās the brain of the system.
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The gateway needs about 2 feet of width and
3 feet of height.
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And the Powerwall itself requires 4 feet by
5 feet for each Powerwall, and about 6 feet
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open in front of it.[^1] And you need a really
good Wifi connection in the area of the Gateway
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or an available ethernet jack for a wired
network connection.
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Overall, my installation experience was not
great.
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It wasnāt one big thing that caused problems.
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It wasnāt one personās fault that I got
hit with lots of delays.
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It wasnāt 100% the installers fault ... and
Iām not blameless in this either.
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The Powerwall arrived at my home on July 29th,
but wasnāt installed and activated until
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November 20th.
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Almost 4 months.
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Some of my late questions caused delays.
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The lack of a service disconnect switch caused
more delays.
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Some really bad communication issues with
my installers left me in the dark for the
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better part of 7 weeks.
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They fixed that, but one of the giant issues
behind the scenes was 2020 itself.
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COVID caused issues for my installer and made
scheduling very tough.
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But my favorite moment of the whole thing.
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The day they installed the Powerwall the electrician
discovered that there was a missing part ... a
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communications wire harness, which probably
costs about a $1 (or less).
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So the whole thing was setup, but couldnāt
be turned on for several more weeks because
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of that one tiny part.
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And when the final setup was completed a different
electrician ran a new set of communication
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cabling on the outside of the conduit even
though the previous electrician supposedly
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already ran some inside.
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Iām not thrilled about that ... but the
system works.
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If I get a second Powerwall, Iāll most likely
get that fixed up.
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But to be very clear, my experience isnāt
normal and none of you should think this is
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what your experience will be like too.
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Since this was a referral reward, I was given
the option of having Tesla install it, or
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selecting my own installer and theyād ship
it to me directly.
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Thatās the path I went.
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For all of you out there, your installer will
show up with the Powerwall on the day they
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install it, so you wonāt have a Powerwall
sitting on your garage floor for months ... me
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... I chose my option ... poorly.
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I should have let Tesla do it.
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As for the cost, the installation cost $2,500
including the cost of installing the service
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disconnect switch.
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That would have made the total cost with the
Powerwall and Gateway about $10,500.
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The price is going to vary based on your specific
situation and what you want done, like having
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a sub-panel installed for essential load carve
outs, and any other upgrades needed to support
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a home battery.
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I got installation quotes that ranged from
the $2,500 I paid up to almost $7,000, so
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shop around.
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But howās the Powerwall?
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Before I get to that, Iād like to thank
Surfshark for sponsoring this video.
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I know weāre not traveling much right now,
like me being stuck at home with my Powerwall
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Thanks to Surfshark and to all of you for
supporting the channel.
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So how is the Powerwall?
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Well, itās kind of awesome.
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Iāve only had it up and running since the
end of November, but Iām super impressed
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by it all ready.
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If youāve seen any of my solar panel videos,
where I go in depth on how my system has been
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working out, youāll know that the winter
time is my lowest solar production.
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So this time of year isnāt going to keep
my battery full by any stretch ... BUT ... Iām
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very excited for this as just a battery backup
for winter power outages.
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Anyone that lives in the Northeast knows what
Iām talking about.
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Norāeasters, freezing rain, strong winds,
really heavy wet snow, it can all take down
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tree limbs and power lines, so power outages
arenāt uncommon.
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In my area they might only last for a few
hours, but weāve had a couple that lasted
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for a day or two.
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The Powerwall has some really nice controls
for managing this type of thing.
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I absolutely love the Tesla app UI for this,
by the way.
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Iām mesmerized by the Power Flow screen
that shows exactly where your energy is coming
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from and going.
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I canāt stop checking it out.
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I even figured out how to get it showing up
in Apple Home.
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Anyway, in the app you can configure how the
battery should work.
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Thereās three basic modes: backup-only,
self-powered, and advanced.
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Backup-only shouldnāt need an explanation.
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Self-powered, which is what I have it set
to, will store excess solar power production
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for use when there isnāt sun.
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In here you can configure how much of the
battery should be reserved for backup power.
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Since this is the lowest point of the year
for me for solar production, and I want to
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maximize the backup potential for storms,
Iāve set it to 50% for now.
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The Advanced option is really meant for people
who have time-of-use rates.
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It will charge and discharge the battery to
maximize savings for you.
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Where I am in Massachusetts, we donāt have
time-of-use, so thatās not a good option
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for me.
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But within the first couple of weeks of having
this up and running we got a really bad snow
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storm that came through.
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Really heavy, wet snow and high winds, which
ended up knocking out power for lots of people
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around New England.
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We didnāt lose power, but I got to see Storm
Watch in action for the first time.
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The system detected the storm warning and
automatically charged my battery up to 100%
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the night before the storm and kept it there
for the duration.
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Locked and loaded and ready to go.
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That alone made the long wait so worth it.
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Itās that type of automation for emergency
backup that got me so excited for the Powerwall.
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Thereās a lot more I could go into about
this, but Iām going to wait until Iāve
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gone through the winter and gotten some better
solar production as well.
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Iāve also applied to be part of a virtual
power plant system with my Powerwall, so Iām
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hoping to be able share about that as well.
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Be sure to subscribe at hit the notification
bell to not miss out on my full-on review
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of the Powerwall and my experiences with it.
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I hate being that YouTuber asking for you
to āhit that bellā ... canāt stand saying
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that ... but itās the only way to be sure
you donāt miss out on new videos.
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Only about 12% of you have done it by the
way, so letās see if we can get that up
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to 15% ... heck, letās live a little ... 20%!
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Now jump into the comments and let me know
what you think about the Powerwall or home
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batteries in general.
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Do you have one?
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Want one?
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If you liked this video be sure to check out
one of the ones I have linked right here.
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Be sure to subscribe and hit the notification
bell if you think Iāve earned it.
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And as always, thanks all of my patrons and
to all of you for watching.
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Iāll see you in the next one.
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