The CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, Elon Musk, is the latest to get involved with the energy market in Texas. The billionaire tech mogul is now licensed to sell electricity through a company he created called Tesla Energy Ventures.
Musk filed the paperwork over the summer, and last week, the state finally approved the enterprise. Tesla Energy Ventures is now licensed to “provide retail electric services throughout the area served by ERCOT,” said the Texas Public Utility Commission. ERCOT covers most of Texas.
Even though the details of this new company are still a bit scarce, the Tesla company has experience in the energy field. The company sells batteries, solar panels, and of course, cars that can act as batteries. The company also owns a virtual power plant that is in operation in South Australia.
A beta version of that same project launched in California last summer. At that time, the energy firm Wood Mackenzie predicted that “less than 5%” of California’s existing 50,000 Powerwall owners would participate in Musk’s virtual power plant expansion.
Though these numbers aren’t great, Elon Musk projects that Tesla will be a big part of energy production in the future.
“I think long-term, Tesla Energy will be roughly the same size as Tesla Automotive,” Musk told investors last year. “The energy business is collectively bigger than the automotive business.”
Tesla Energy Ventures comes to the energy market at a time when Texas’ energy grid has been scrutinized for its reliability. During an unseasonably cold winter storm last February, natural gas infrastructure froze up and failed to perform.
Some experts have pointed to this failure as one of the primary causes of the blackout that occurred, resulting in extensive property damage and loss of life.
A Tesla power plant could potentially help alleviate and ultimately get rid of this problem. After the blackouts last February, Gambit Energy Storage, a subsidiary of Tesla, announced that they would be constructing 100-megawatt batteries to supplement energy grids with power in case of another blackout.
If the company grows in the market as expected, it’s clear that Tesla could potentially fill a void in the Texas energy grid.