Smart solar roofs. Is this the start of free electricity?

There’s always plenty of sun here in Phuket, even in the wet season and particularly in the dry season. For owners of villas and condominiums the changes in weather signal a sharp escalation of electric bills which continue to be one of the leading costs of living in paradise.

One new innovation that has caught my eye is the new Tesla solar roof. According to Elon Musk the product is expected to come at a cost lower than a typical traditional roof. While early projections have been based on a favorable cost when counting in energy savings along with the capital cost, Musk is now saying Tesla believes they can deliver a less expensive roof even before calculating energy savings.

This is a very big deal and if Tesla in partnership with SolarCity can indeed make good on the promise, this is a game changer for residential homeowners. While details are still forthcoming the solar roof will work with Tesla’s Powerwall batteries. The new rooftop solar tiles can either be shifted into direct electricity as the sun shines or else stored in the battery component.

While solar energy for houses has been around a long time, the messy units that have to be retrofitted or designed in such a way to be hidden, have not really been a sustainable answer. Tesla’s approach to simply using tiles which are inherent in most roofs is a natural answer and you have to wonder why it hasn’t be used broadly before.

The initial solar roof tiles come in Tuscan Glass, Slate Glass, Textured Glass and Smooth Glass tiles so can easily be retrofitted into existing houses or else incorporated into new builds. For more details about the Tesla solar roof CLICK

Bill Barnett