South africa

With South Africa’s electricity rates set to increase by 9.4% this year and the country’s unstable grid prone to outages, home energy storage systems are expected to become quite popular in the region. Tesla is aware of the opportunity and opened an office in the country earlier this year to develop the market for its ‘Tesla Energy’ products: the Powerwall and Powerpack.

Now we learn though a new report from Bloomberg that Enel Green Power SpA, the renewable energy unit of Italy’s biggest utility, is offering a “home-power kit”, which includes a Tesla Powerwall, to the South African market.
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Last month we reported that Tesla was in talks to build a Gigafactory in South Africa according to the Western Cape Executive Council for business opportunities. The news came a month after Tesla hired former GreenCape CEO Evan Rice to lead Tesla Energy’s effort in the country.

Now we learn that Cape Town mayor Patricia de Lille confirmed that Tesla is opening a new office in the city and that the company should announce its plans for South Africa “soon”.
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When Tesla CEO Elon Musk first announced the Gigafactory project, he said that even though the planned capacity of the factory is equal to the entire global production of lithium-ion batteries in 2013, the world would sill need around 200 more giant factories of similar size to support the auto industry’s transition from fossil fuels to electric.

Tesla named the factory in Nevada: “Gigafactory 1”, implying that the company plans to eventually introduce “Gigafactory 2” and so on. Late last year, German Vice-Chancellor and Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel confirmed being in contact with Elon Musk over the possibility of building a battery factory in the country. Now we learn that Tesla is also reportedly in talks to build another Gigafactory in South Africa.
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