Tesla Powerwall Users to Sell Excess Power in Texas Grid Pilot Project

The logo of car manufacturer Tesla is seen at a branch office in Bern, Switzerland October 28, 2020. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann/File Photo

Tesla Electric customers in Houston and Dallas with Powerwall storage systems in their homes, in a first, have agreed to sell their surplus power back to the Texas electric grid, the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) said on Wednesday.
This additional source of dispatchable power for the grid comes as a part of a pilot project which aggregates several small energy devices, like battery storage systems and controllable electric vehicle (EV) chargers, into a single resource that can collectively reduce demand or feed power to the grid, Reuters said.
The Texas power grid operator Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) has broken power use records 10 times so far this summer, and urged consumers on Sunday to reduce electricity use due to extreme temperatures and high demand.
"It's a win-win for Texas. Home and business owners get paid for power they supply and consumers in ERCOT get more reliability," said PUCT commissioner Will McAdams in a release.
The project, which the PUCT directed ERCOT to begin developing in June 2022, currently has eight such Aggregate Distributed Energy Resources (ADER) amounting to 7.2 megawatts, the PUCT said, with Tesla Electric representing the first two, while six others are in the commissioning process.
The Tesla ADERs participating in the ERCOT wholesale market include Houston-area CenterPoint Energy customers and Dallas-area customers of Oncor Electric Delivery Company.
PUCT said there are 2.3 gigawatts of small energy resources, like backup generators or solar panels connected to batteries, across Texas, recording additions of 300 megawatts so far this year.
"As generation and distribution technology continues to improve, we expect to see more Texans taking advantage of these small energy resources in the future," said ERCOT President and CEO Pablo Vegas.