Tesla becomes utility, battery storage supplier to Hawaii's Kauai
Tesla Energy has for the first time become an electric utility to Hawaii's Kauai island, having recently flipped the switch on a solar panel array and corresponding battery storage plant. The facility will generate up to 13 megawatts (MWs) of electricity for the island's power grid to meet peak demand in the evening.
Tesla, and its subsidiary SolarCity, not only constructed the power plant, but is under contract to run it. Under the contract, Hawaii's Kauai Island Utility Cooperative (KIUC) will pay 13.9 cents per kilowatt hour of electricity, only slightly more than the cost of energy from KIUC's two existing 12MW solar arrays, whose output is available only during the day.
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