Tesla is indeed going to launch some new batteries during its April 30th event, BuzzFeed has learned, as the company on Tuesday briefly informed investors of what’s to come. Bloomberg has also confirmed the news, adding that Tesla batteries have already been in testing in homes and stores.
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“We have decided to share a bit about what we will announce on the 30th,” Tesla’s vice president of investor relations Jeff Evanson wrote in a message seen by BuzzFeed and confirmed as authentic. “We will introduce the Tesla home battery and a very large utility scale battery. We will explain the advantages of our solutions and why past battery options were not compelling.”
Tesla would not say anything else on the matter to the media when asked to comment, adding that it’ll share more details next week during the announcement.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed in late March that a new product line is going to be unveiled at the company’s Hawthorne Design Studio, and that it’s not going to be a car. Subsequent reports speculated that Tesla is making home batteries, with an extensive Benzinga post sharing plenty of details about Tesla’s daring new product.
It turns out the company may have been testing home batteries for almost two years in California and other states. The new batteries can receive energy from the grid and from solar panels, and can feed energy back to the grid – read more details about the unconfirmed Tesla home battery specs here.
Bloomberg also revealed that Tesla has been testing batteries in 300 homes in California, but added the company partnered with Walmart, which has deployed the new batteries in 11 stores in the state. Cargill also plans a 1-megawatt system for its animal-processing plant in Fresno, according to the publication.
Musk did say Tesla is working on a home battery during a February earnings call, without going into much detail about the yet-to-be-announced product.
“We’re going to unveil the Tesla home battery, or the sort of consumer battery that will be for use in people’s houses or businesses, fairly soon,” Musk said at the time. “We have the design done, and it should start going to production, probably in about six months, or so. We’re trying to figure out a date to have the product unveiling, but it’s probably in the next month or two months. And it’s really great; I’m really excited about it.”
