Tesla Photo voltaic Gross sales Declined for 4 Straight Quarters, Then Tesla Stopped Publishing the Numbers

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I’ve to place my arms up — when Tesla acquired SolarCity in 2016, I supported the choice. Sure, Elon Musk was chairman of each corporations. Sure, it was his cousins who had been CEO and CTO, and had based the corporate based mostly on a suggestion from Elon Musk at Burning Man. Sure, Tesla was saving SolarCity financially in key methods. Nonetheless, I assumed there was very good synergy between the businesses and large potential for extra photo voltaic gross sales by the Tesla model, gross sales community, and buyer base.

Since then, Tesla has achieved some good things, however I’ve to say that I’ve been very upset in Tesla’s relatively gentle, disconnected, and total lame efforts to promote extra rooftop solar energy.

One thing I seen some time again proved the purpose. Tesla’s quarterly rooftop solar energy installations began dropping, and dropping, and dropping. Sooner or later, I spotted this had gone from an up & down section of Tesla’s enterprise to a long-term, vital decline.

I made a decision to return and truly see how lengthy Tesla had been seeing its photo voltaic enterprise decline. Sadly, the findings weren’t uplifting. After it’s “final good quarter,” the 4th quarter of 2022, when 100 megawatts (MW) of solar energy had been put in, Tesla’s rooftop photo voltaic installations declined for at the very least 4 consecutive quarters. The corporate printed the numbers for these 4 quarters, however then, within the subsequent quarter, Q1 2024, Tesla merely lamented that its photo voltaic installations had declined 12 months over 12 months however stopped publishing these figures. Presumably, the rooftop photo voltaic gross sales decline continued — in any other case, Tesla would have highlighted a return to progress. However we simply can’t be sure of that in each quarter.

Within the “Belongings” part of Tesla’s quarterly monetary experiences, the corporate does nonetheless publish “Photo voltaic power programs, internet.” And the totals for which have continued to say no in each quarter since then. So, if we presume continued quarter-over-quarter declines in solar energy installations, that will be 8 straight quarters of decline (not making a judgement on Q1 2025 but, however I’m not hopeful about that quarter both).

Apart from current quarters, when you have a look at the complete chart and graph above, it definitely stands out that Tesla’s photo voltaic installations have dropped off a cliff in comparison with the place they had been proper after the SolarCity acquisition. In This autumn 2016, 201 MW of solar energy had been put in. In Q1 2017, 150 MW had been put in. In Q2 2017, 176 MW had been put in. After which Tesla by no means acquired near these figures once more. In Q3 2017, 109 MW of solar energy had been put in, and Tesla has solely damaged 100 MW of latest solar energy capability in 1 / 4 twice since then.

The pattern in these 4 quarters of 2023 — the final quarters Tesla printed that information for — was dangerous, very had. If that pattern continued in 2024, now we have to imagine Tesla’s photo voltaic enterprise is a shell of what it was a number of (or perhaps a few) years in the past.

That is horrible to see for anybody cheering on cleantech progress. Way more solar energy must be put in, and an enormous slowdown in photo voltaic installations from a big firm like Tesla simply doesn’t make sense to me. Even not making an attempt arduous, it looks as if the corporate ought to have the ability to discover many purchasers able to take the photo voltaic plunge.

Right here’s the above chart and graph once more in interactive kind (finest considered on an actual laptop, not a telephone):

Some other ideas on these numbers and graphics?