Elon Musk\u2019s Tesla is preparing to enter the UK energy market in the coming months, with plans to set up a household electricity supplier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The company has applied to Ofgem for a licence that would allow it to compete with the likes of Octopus and British Gas by offering electricity to households.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This means Tesla could start supplying electricity as early as next year, in a major expansion of its energy ambitions in Britain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The supplier will be called Tesla Electric and is likely to be closely linked to Musk\u2019s electric cars and Powerwall home batteries, offering savings to households.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Texas operation<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The company already operates as an electricity supplier in Texas, allowing Tesla owners to charge their cars cheaply and get paid when they sell excess power from solar panels or electricity stored in their batteries to the grid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The company\u2019s energy subsidiary, Tesla Energy Ventures, applied for an electricity supply license with Ofgem on July 25.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The application was signed by Andrew Payne, a Tesla veteran who runs the company\u2019s energy operations in Europe. The Telegraph revealed in 2023 that Tesla was preparing to launch an energy supplier for households.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The advantages<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Tesla already has some of the key elements that give it an advantage over the established energy companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It has sold tens of thousands of Powerwalls \u2013 home batteries that charge with solar power or during off-peak hours \u2013 to British households.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It also sells chargers for electric cars and has millions of cars on the road, offering a significant potential customer base.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tesla has sold over 250,000 cars in the UK. This puts it in a good position to exploit \u201cvehicle to home\u201d technology, where the car\u2019s battery powers the home. Energy companies are already conducting trials of this technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wholesale energy market<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition, Tesla is a major player in the wholesale energy market, with large battery installations and the Autobidder software used to buy and sell electricity stored in batteries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It has had a manufacturing license from Ofgem since 2020. Despite some advantages, Tesla\u2019s sales in the UK have fallen significantly in recent months, due to increasing competition in the electric car market and backlash over Musk\u2019s statements, such as his support for Donald Trump and far-right Tommy Robinson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The figures show a 60% drop in sales in July. Tesla launched its electricity supply in Texas three years ago, with a flat rate for unlimited charging of Teslas at certain times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Powerwall customers connect their batteries to the grid and get paid when the company uses the stored energy to power other homes, creating a \u201cvirtual power plant\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While it\u2019s unclear what Tesla\u2019s proposal will look like in the UK, job postings suggest the company will implement the same concept of a virtual unit, where a network of home batteries balances out erratic energy sources like wind and solar, storing energy when it\u2019s plentiful and feeding it back into the grid during peak times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tesla launched an energy program with Octopus Energy in 2020, but ended the partnership three years later.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It has since partnered with Octopus to allow Powerwall owners to use the company\u2019s software to sell energy during peak times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The process of obtaining a power supply license from Ofgem can take up to nine months, although some licenses are granted in a matter of weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Stricter requirements were introduced following the 2021 energy crisis, as several suppliers collapsed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Tesla has not applied for a gas supply licence, meaning households that use both electricity and gas \u2013 the majority in the UK \u2013 will have to choose a different supplier for gas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Elon Musk\u2019s Tesla is preparing to enter the UK energy market in the coming months, with plans to set up a household electricity supplier….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25581,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[620,946,2955],"tags":[1855,3944,7247,7246,7244,7245],"class_list":["post-25580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-companies","category-energy","tag-electricity","tag-great-britain","tag-musk-elon","tag-powerwall","tag-retail-electricity","tag-tesla-electric"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25580"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25582,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25580\/revisions\/25582"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.liberalglobe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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