Australian Tesla drivers who also own Powerwalls will soon benefit from a new feature update, when charging from the Powerwall in the event of a blackout.
The ability to charge off a Powerwall in an outage has been available in Australia for some months now, however the car’s charging demands would draw from the household load, which could cause issues if other high load appliances were being used and risked draining the battery.
The new update is part of the Powerwall 1.46+ update, and is now operational in the US for Model 3 and Model Y owners, but is not yet in Australia.
Put simply, if a Tesla vehicle is charging and there is a blackout event, it will honour the Powerwall threshold and halt charging once the state of charge of the Powerwall falls below a set threshhold.
“Basically this update helps when the grid goes down,” Tesla owner Adam Sloan, who owns both a Tesla Model 3 and a Powerwall, and documents his ownership tales at the TeslaStraya website, tells The Driven.
“So if you set a percentage – say 50% [of Powerwall state of charge] – it will balance your car charging versus solar and battery availability.”
“When it hits the reserve, the car charging will stop so you don’t drain the battery and be in black out,” says Sloan.
Before the new update, if a Tesla vehicle were charging at the time, it would drain the Powerwall battery.
“This update puts some controls around that, which is great,” says Sloan.
In addition to halting the charge cycle, it can also restart charging the vehicle if there is enough solar to recharge the Powerwall above the set threshold.
Also, household power demands will dictate how fast the Tesla vehicle can charge.
“It will use the delta between house load and solar/Powerwall,” says Sloan.
According to an update on Tesla’s US site, the feature is supported by the following versions of Powerwall, app and vehicle software:
Tesla did not immediately respond to an enquiry about when this feature will become available in Australia.
Tesla elaborates further on the Powerwall update as so:
Powerwall now coordinates with Tesla vehicles during a power outage to charge your car without exceeding the energy and power capabilities of your Powerwall. The Powerwall reacts to the power needs of your home and will slow or stop your vehicle’s charging, keeping your home loads powered.
During a power outage, your Tesla vehicle will charge from the Powerwall whenever it is above the threshold set in the Tesla app. You can change this threshold to balance your home and transportation energy needs.
Keep your vehicle plugged in while the sun is shining and surplus solar will charge your vehicle. Charging stops when Powerwall’s stored energy drops below your set threshold.
Tesla goes on to outline the various states under which the new update will indluence charging behaviour:
Grid State | Home Electric Loads | Charging Behavior |
---|---|---|
On Grid | Any Load | Vehicle charges as normal |
Power outage with Powerwall above energy threshold or surplus solar | Low Loads | Vehicle charges with surplus power and energy |
High Loads | Vehicle slows charging to prioritize your home loads | |
Power outage with Powerwall below energy threshold | Any Load | Vehicle stops charging |
Bridie Schmidt is associate editor for The Driven, sister site of Renew Economy. She has been writing about electric vehicles since 2018, and has a keen interest in the role that zero-emissions transport has to play in sustainability. She has participated in podcasts such as Download This Show with Marc Fennell and Shirtloads of Science with Karl Kruszelnicki and is co-organiser of the Northern Rivers Electric Vehicle Forum. Bridie also owns a Tesla Model Y and has it available for hire on evee.com.au.
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