Energy
Tesla’s giant Moss Landing Megapack battery storage project: How is it doing now?
Tesla’s Megapack farm in Moss Landing, California, has gone through quite a journey since the project was approved by the California Public Utilities Commission back in 2018. Comprised of 256 Megapacks, the 182.5 MW / 730 MWh installation would be capable of powering an estimated 136,500 homes for several hours during periods of high demand. The system is also upgradeable, with Tesla’s contract with PG&E suggesting that the battery could be ramped to 1.1 GWh in the future.
Similar to Tesla’s other high-profile energy projects, the Moss Landing Megapack farm, also known as the Elkhorn Battery Energy Storage Facility, would enhance the grid’s reliability by addressing capacity deficiencies due to increased local energy demand. It would also participate in the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) markets, providing both energy and ancillary services.
A Quick Background
It should be noted that the Megapack-powered Elkhorn Battery Energy Storage Facility is only one of four battery projects that were proposed by Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E). Among the four, three are owned and operated by a third party — only the Tesla-powered Elkhorn Battery is owned and operated by PG&E itself. As explained by Paul Doherty, a PG&E spokesperson, the utility has two underlying contracts with Tesla regarding the facility — an Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) agreement to build the battery farm, and a Long-Term Performance and Maintenance Agreement (LTPMA) that requires the EV maker to provide regular maintenance to the system for over 20 years.
The Tesla-powered Elkhorn Battery is not the largest battery among the four systems proposed by PG&E. That honor goes to the Vistra Energy Storage Facility, which features a 300 MW / 1,200 MWh Phase 1 and a 100 MW / 400 MWh Phase 2 system. Unlike the Tesla Megapack farm, which was built on a 4.5-acre plot of land in Moss Landing, the Vistra Energy Storage Facility was built into what was previously a gas-fired power plant. Utilizing over several thousand TR1300 battery racks supplied by LG Energy Solution, Vistra’s big battery was a symbol of the change happening in California’s energy sector.
Things, however, have not always been smooth sailing.
Challenges Over the Years
Being a project involving Tesla, it was no surprise that entities emerged to oppose the Elkhorn Battery project. After the Tesla-powered battery storage project was opened to public submissions about its potential environmental impacts, the California Unions for Reliable Energy took it upon themselves to stop the initiative. The union argued that Monterey County failed to meet the standards of the California Environmental Quality Act since the county should have looked further into the possibility of Tesla’s batteries overheating and exploding. The group also warned that the Tesla batteries could potentially harm the purity of the groundwater at the Moss Landing area.
These efforts proved to be in vain, however, as on February 2020, the Monterey County Planning Commission decided to approve the Tesla Megapack-powered Elkhorn Battery unanimously. Construction was set for late March, and expectations were high that it would take about one and a half years to complete. However, another speed bump for the project came in the form of the Covid-19 pandemic, which caused progress in the project to be delayed. Construction ultimately began in July 2020, and by early 2021, drone flyovers of the site showed that the Megapack installations were going smoothly.
PG&E spokesperson Doherty has informed Teslarati that as of writing, all the Tesla Megapacks have been successfully installed. The system is “currently undergoing final testing and certification, and is anticipated to be operational before Summer 2022,” pending the results of its final tests. Granted, this represents a delay from the facility’s initial targets, but PG&E’s apparent intent on being extra cautious is understandable.
An unexpected challenge for the batteries at Moss Landing came sometime last year, and while it did not involve the Tesla Megapack-powered Elkhorn Battery, it did result in energy storage projects being placed under a microscope. In early September 2021, a number of battery modules from the Phase 1 area of the Vistra Energy Storage Facility overheated, triggering the facility’s sprinkler systems. Local fire crews were sent to the site, and Vistra decided to shut down the Phase 1 zone until an investigation was completed. At this time, the Vistra Battery’s 100 MW / 400 MWh Phase 2 was just completed, so that part of the facility remained operational.
Unfortunately, the Vistra Battery’s Phase 2 area got involved in another overheating incident in February 2022. Similar to the incident in September 2021, the batteries in the Vistra facility’s Phase 2 area triggered a fire alarm. The local fire department attended to the facility once more, where they found roughly ten battery racks that were melted. This incident, which happened within five months since the September 2021 issue, caused the reactivation efforts for the Phase 1 area to be paused and Phase 2 to be shut down. This meant that the Vistra battery, at least until investigations are completed for both incidents, will likely remain offline.
PG&E’s Tesla Megapack Management System
What is rather interesting about the Elkhorn Battery Energy Storage Facility is the fact that while it features Tesla’s flagship battery storage units, the Megapack batteries themselves would not be managed by software from the electric vehicle maker. Instead of Tesla’s Autobidder platform, PG&E has opted to utilize “Fluence’s AI-powered Trading Platform to provide optimization and market bidding services,” confirmed Doherty.
Tesla’s Autobidder platform has been successfully operating at the Hornsdale Power Reserve (HPR) in South Australia, where it has effectively added competition to drive down energy prices in the area. But inasmuch as Autobidder is designed to work seamlessly with products like the Megapack, Fluence’s Trading Platform is pretty powerful and capable on its own. Seyed Madaeni, the chief digital officer of Fluence, expressed his optimism for the company’s AI-powered solution and its use in the Tesla-powered Elkhorn Battery Energy Storage Facility.
“PG&E was one of the first utilities to appreciate the need for a sophisticated AI-enabled bidding technology to optimize its energy storage assets. This technology-agnostic software provides PG&E with a single tool that can optimize not only the Moss Landing project, but potentially entire portfolios of generation and storage resources to enhance affordability of resources. We are excited to work with PG&E to use advanced technology to improve the efficiency and reliability of the CAISO market and lower costs for California consumers,” Madaeni said.
Future Expansions
While the Moss Landing batteries have faced their own fair share of challenges, PG&E remains extremely optimistic about energy storage as a whole. Depending on the success of the Tesla Megapack-powered Elkhorn Battery, the system could be expanded even further to 1.1 GWh. All signs seem to be pointing to this scenario, especially considering the state’s intense focus on sustainability. Interestingly enough, Tesla’s Megapacks courted some controversy themselves last year when one unit in the Victoria Big Battery in Australia caught fire during tests. The incident ultimately damaged two Megapack units, and it incited a lot of skepticism over the potential dangers of battery storage technology.
If PG&E’s massive Tesla Megapack farm could prove itself as reliable as the now-iconic Powerpack-powered Hornsdale Power Reserve in South Australia, then the project could potentially accelerate the adoption of battery storage systems in the near future. PG&E definitely seems to be confident about the potential of battery storage solutions, with the utility moving forward with Vistra on plans to expand the Vistra Battery even further.
Vistra spokesperson Meranda Cohn has stated that the incidents from September 2021 and February 2022 would not impact the companies’ push to move forward with its battery project. PG&E spokesperson Doherty was on the same page, telling the Monterey County Weekly that he has “full confidence” in the project and that an analysis of the incidents in September 2021 and February 222 revealed that the batteries were actually not at fault. The PG&E spokesperson further noted that the utility is committed to “advancing the field of fire safety at battery storage facilities,” which could be highlighted by the fact that it was awarded for its fire safety work at its Tesla-powered Elkhorn Battery Energy Storage Facility.
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Energy
Tesla Model 3 and Model Y can now do what only Cybertruck could
Tesla Model 3 and Model Y can power your home with Powerwall 3 during outages.
Tesla has turned its two top sellers into backup batteries for the house.
Tesla Energy announced on Tuesday that Powershare Home Backup is now available for new Model 3 and Model Y vehicles paired with a Powerwall 3, saying the car can “extend your home backup by over 2 days.” Minutes later, Tesla’s main account quoted the post with a broader pitch: “With Powerwall 3, every Tesla can now serve as your home’s backup battery.”
Until this week, the Cybertruck was the only Tesla that could send power back into a home, and that capability only began working alongside Powerwall 3 last month, after years of ambitious targets.
Tesla’s updated Powershare page says every Model 3 and Model Y ordered in the U.S. or Puerto Rico on or after October 1, 2026 can use the feature. Some, but not all, earlier cars also qualify. Owners can check on the touchscreen under Software, then Additional Vehicle Information, where a capable car shows “Powershare Support: Enabled.” As Electrek reported, bidirectional power on the two cars runs through an inverter Tesla calls PCS2 Lite, and the company has not said when that part entered production on each trim.
The home side is simpler. A house that already has a Powerwall 3 and either a Wall Connector 3 or Universal Wall Connector needs no additional equipment, and Tesla says compatibility is enabled through a software update. When the grid drops, the Powerwall and the car work together, with up to 11.52 kW of continuous power available. Tesla’s “over two days” estimate assumes a home using 30 kWh per day and a car starting at a 90 percent charge. Standard trims are rated for up to two days, while the Cybertruck adds more than three.
There are limits. Powerwall 2 and Powerwall+ support is listed as “coming soon.” Model S and Model X are not included, and Grid Support, the program that lets Cybertruck owners in Texas send power back to the grid during demand spikes for bill credits, is not available for Model 3 or Model Y.
The rollout also lines up with something Elon Musk said more than three years ago. At Tesla’s March 2023 Investor Day, Musk said, “I don’t think very many people are going to want to use bidirectional charging, unless you have a Powerwall.” Tesla has now shipped the feature for its volume cars with exactly that requirement attached.
The Powerwall pairing was the hard part on Cybertruck. Tesla told owners in December 2025 that Powershare with Powerwall had been pushed to mid 2026, and lead engineer Wes Morrill explained that two devices capable of forming a home’s grid have to negotiate which one leads during an outage, across multiple generations of hardware. With that work done for the truck, Tesla was able to extend it to the Model 3 and Model Y within a month.
Ford and GM have offered home backup from their EVs for several years, but both require a separate inverter and backup hardware. Tesla’s version leans on equipment many Powerwall 3 owners already have on the wall. Powershare for the two cars also ships as part of software update 2026.38.3, the same release that began delivering Halloween Mode on Tuesday.
Elon Musk
Google just picked SpaceX for its first step into orbital AI
Google will launch its first Project Suncatcher AI satellite on SpaceX’s Transporter-18 rideshare next week.
Google is about to put its own AI chips into orbit for the first time, and it is paying SpaceX to get them there.
The company said Thursday that the first in-orbit test of Project Suncatcher, its research effort to find out whether space can host large-scale AI computing, will fly next week on SpaceX’s Transporter-18 rideshare mission.
The satellite, called MVP, is about the size of a refrigerator and carries four of Google’s Tensor Processing Units, the same chips Google runs in its ground data centers. Google originally planned to launch two custom satellites in 2027, but chose to move faster by integrating its chips into a satellite.
MVP’s solar panels supply about one kilowatt of power, and Google will run Gemini models on the TPUs only in bursts of roughly 15 minutes before the chips shut down so the radiators can shed heat. In a blog post, Google said its Trillium TPUs survived vibration testing that mimicked sustained launch loads of up to 10g, with individual components seeing 50 to 100g, and handled a radiation dose greater than a five year mission would deliver.
SpaceX and Google mull massive partnership on Musk’s orbital data dream: report
Next week’s flight, slated for October 1, follows a relationship that became public in May, when Teslarati reported that Google was in talks with SpaceX for a launch deal tied to orbital data centers. Google also holds a stake of roughly 6% in SpaceX.
The two companies are chasing the same idea from very different starting points. SpaceX’s own orbital compute program is built around the AI1 satellite, a roughly 70 meter structure derived from Starlink V3 hardware that is designed for 150 kW of peak compute, about 150 times the power MVP will draw. Elon Musk has brushed off concerns about crowding orbit with those satellites, and SpaceX is building its Gigasat factory in Bastrop, Texas, to produce them, targeting an annualized rate of about 1 GW of space compute by the end of 2027.
Musk also posted on X on Thursday that “the amount of compute in space will obviously round up to 100% of all compute.”
Google has been more cautious in public. Its research estimates that launch prices need to fall below about $200 per kilogram before an orbital data center can compete with a ground facility on energy cost, a threshold the company believes could be reached around the mid 2030s. The Suncatcher team has said it expects the effort to remain a project rather than a product for years, which leaves the first real test of its hardware riding on a rocket from the company with the most aggressive timeline in the field.
Energy
Tesla Semi factory is getting a celebration nobody expected
Tesla will inaugurate its Nevada Semi factory September 24, five months after production quietly began ramping.
Tesla says it will officially inaugurate its new Semi factory in Nevada next month. The Tesla Semi account posted the announcement on X, sharing a graphic titled “Semi Rollout” with a date of September 24. No further details were given about the format of the event or who would attend.
While Tesla’s dedicated Semi plant in Sparks, adjacent to Gigafactory Nevada, opened back in April, with the first trucks rolling off the high volume line on April 29, the timing for the factory inauguration comes at a surprise. The ribbon cutting event five months into production is a break from how Tesla has usually handled its other factories, where the first truck or car off the line typically served as the milestone moment.
Inauguration of new Semi factory in Nevada next month pic.twitter.com/a8kAlxrOOn
— Tesla Semi (@tesla_semi) August 24, 2026
The 1.7 million square foot factory was built as part of a $3.6 billion expansion Tesla announced in early 2023, and it shares a site with the battery cell lines that feed the Semi’s structural pack, a decision meant to remove the supply bottleneck that delayed the truck for years. The plant is designed for 50,000 trucks a year at full ramp. Semi program director Dan Priestley has said production “is now ramping” rather than claiming it has reached scale.
Nine years passed between the Semi’s 2017 unveiling and this stage of production, with the truck slipping from an original 2019 target through hand built pilot units for PepsiCo and a slow build out of the Nevada plant. An inauguration event now gives Tesla a stage to talk up that ramp and reset expectations for how many trucks it can begin delivering at scale.
The September date also lines up with the Semi’s next milestone. Tesla confirmed the truck is heading to Europe with a full unveiling at the IAA Transportation trade show in Hannover, Germany, running September 15 through 20. Between the Nevada event and the Hannover reveal, Tesla has roughly a week and a half in September to make the case that the Semi is now a truck being built and sold on two continents rather than tested in a handful of fleets.
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