Tesla has launched its Megapack, a utility-scale energy storage solution that offers 60 percent greater energy density compared to the existing Powerpack.
It can store 3 megawatt-hours of electricity and 1.5 megawatts of inverter capacity, building on Powerpack’s engineering with an AC interface and 60 percent increase in energy density to achieve significant cost and time savings compared to other battery systems and traditional fossil fuel power plants.
For utility-size installations such as the upcoming Moss Landing project in California with PG&E, Megapack will act as a sustainable alternative to natural gas “peaker” power plants. Peaker power plants fire up whenever the local utility grid cannot provide enough power to meet peak demand. They cost millions of dollars per day to operate and are some of the least efficient and dirtiest plants on the grid. Instead, a Megapack installation can use stored excess solar or wind energy to support the grid’s peak loads.
Tesla developed its own software in-house to monitor, control and monetize Megapack installations. All Megapacks connect to Powerhub, an advanced monitoring and control platform for large-scale utility projects and microgrids, and can also integrate with Autobidder, Tesla’s machine-learning platform for automated energy trading. Tesla customers have already used Autobidder to dispatch more than 100 gigawatt hours of energy in global electricity markets. And, just as Tesla vehicles benefit from continued software updates over time, Megapack continues to improve through a combination of over-the-air and server-based software updates.