Tesla releases Powershare bidirectional charging – on Cybertruck only, so far
Tesla has just delivered the first Cybertrucks, and with them comes a feature that we’ve been waiting for for a while: bidirectional charging.
Tesla has talked a bit about bidirectional charging in the past, but always seemed a little wishy-washy about bringing it to market. In its Investor Day presentation in March, Tesla VP Drew Baglino stated that the company could have bidirectional charging in two years, but CEO Elon Musk immediately threw some cold water on that statement, saying “I don’t think very many people are going to want to use bidirectional charging, unless you have a Powerwall, because if you unplug your car, your house goes dark, and this is extremely inconvenient.”
Now, nine months after that event, Tesla has released a vehicle that has bidirectional charging equipped – and its branding suggests that more vehicles will have the same capability in the future.
Tesla’s Cybertruck delivery event today was pretty light on details, and we’ve had to comb over the website to find out any sort of specs. And in the website we noticed one new feature that was completely absent from the presentation: Powershare.
Powershare is, apparently, Tesla’s new bidirectional charging feature which seems to include vehicle-to-load, vehicle-to-home, vehicle-to-vehicle capabilities (V2L, V2H and V2V).
V2L refers to a vehicle’s capability to power equipment – in this case, through five outlets – 2 x 120V 20A in the bed and cabin each, and 1 x 240 40A outlet in the bed. This can be used for work equipment, or for camping or other mobile power necessities (emergency response, for example).
We already learned that Cybertruck would be capable of some bidirectional charging features when specs leaked earlier this month. Those specs suggested to us that it would have ~12kW output capability, but today Tesla confirms that the Cybertruck has 9.6kW worth of continuous power combined through five outlets in the vehicle. By way of comparison, the F-150 Lightning has more outlets, but the same total 9.6kW maximum draw with the upgraded Pro Power Onboard package (and 2.4kW without).
But Cybertruck does have 11.5kW output capability from its V2H system, which allows it to power a home in the event of a power outage or grid instability.
The Lightning can also power a home, but that requires an additional $3,900 unit, plus installation costs. Tesla’s solution is no different – in order to power your home you will need additional equipment, seemingly in the form of Tesla’s Universal Wall Connector ($595) and Gateway ($1,800) products, and optionally Tesla’s Backup Switch (though this may depend on your utility).
But the big difference here is the existence of the Tesla Powerwall, and Tesla says that homes with Powerwall and Tesla’s Wall Connector installed will be ready to use Powershare without additional equipment (although it refers to alternately its Wall Connector and Universal Wall Connector, so we’re not sure which one is compatible, or both, or whether you need one made after a certain year, or what).
This is actually a huge deal, because Tesla already has an installed base of Powerwall users who can plug in without having to change anything in their homes. Lightning users might be hesitant to spend another $4,000+ just to make their home more resistant to power outages, but Powerwall owners have already spent (significantly more than that) on a solution that works with the bidirectional charging capability on the car.
So this would, essentially, turn a Powerwall with its 13.5kWh worth of storage into one with 100+kWh of storage (or whatever the size of the Cybertruck’s battery is – even after first deliveries, we still don’t know for sure).
Tesla says that Powershare can power a home for “over three days,” assuming the home uses an average of 30kWh per day (my home, for reference, uses 10kWh per day). This works out to a Cybertruck battery capacity of over 90kWh, but less than 120kWh.
The Cybertruck also has a higher continuous output capability than the Powerwall, with Cybertruck at 11.5kW and the Powerwall at 5kW.
So this could be big for V2H, because previously it has been more of a niche application. Tesla, having a market already built of houses that are V2H-capable, might see much higher usage of this capability.
Tesla also says that Powershare will be capable of V2V, or using the Cybertruck’s battery to charge another electric vehicle. We’ve seen something like this with the Lightning, where Ford cheekily released an adapter letting its Lightning charge up Teslas that need some juice. And with a NEMA 14-50 plug in the back, which is somewhat of a “standard” for EV charging, this should be something that a lot of cars already have an adapter for – including anyone with the Tesla Mobile Connector kit which used to come with every Tesla vehicle.
As of now, Powershare is only available on the Cybertruck, but the fact that Tesla has branded it with its own name suggests that it will be available on other vehicles in the future. Tesla’s website says it’s “currently” available for Cybertruck only, but doesn’t mention a timeline beyond that.
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In a joint statement, French and German economists have called on governments to adopt “a common approach” to decarbonize European trucking fleets – and they’re calling for a focus on fully electric trucks, not hydrogen.
France and Germany are the two largest economies in the EU, and they share similar challenges when it comes to freight decarbonization. The two countries also share a border, and the traffic between the two nations generates major cross-border flows that create common externalities between the two countries.
At the same time, the EU’s transport sector has struggled to reduce emissions at the same rate as other industries – and road freight in particular is a major contributor to harmful carbon emissions issue due to that industry’s heavy reliance on diesel-powered trucks.
And for once, it seems like rail isn’t a viable option:
While rail remains competitive mainly for heavy, homogeneous goods over long distances. Most freight in Europe is indeed transported over distances of less than 200 km and involves consignment weights of up to 30 tonnes (GCEE, 2024) In most such cases, transportation by rail instead of truck is not possible or not competitive. Moreover, taking into account the goods currently transported in intermodal transport units over distances of more than 300 km, the modal shift potential from road to rail would be only 6% in Germany and less than 2% in France.
That leaves trucks – and, while numerous government incentives currently exist to promote the parallel development of both hydrogen and battery electric vehicle infrastructures, the study is clear in picking a winner.
“Policies should focus on battery-electric trucks (BET) as these represent the most mature and market-ready technology for road freight transport,” reads the the FGCEE statement. “Hence, to ramp-up usage of BET public funding should be used to accelerate the roll-out of fast-charging networks along major corridors and in private depots.”
The appeal was signed by the co-chair of the advisory body on the German side is the chairwoman of the German Council of Economic Experts, Monika Schnitzer. Camille Landais co-chairs the French side. On the German side, the appeal was signed by four of the five experts; Nuremberg-based energy economist Veronika Grimm (who also sits on the National Hydrogen Council, which is committed to promoting H2 trucks and filling stations) did not sign.
You can read an English version of the CAE FGCEE joint statement here.
Electrek’s Take
MAN Trucks’ CEO famously said that it was “impossible” for hydrogen to compete with BEVs, and even committed to building 200 hydrogen-powered semi truck to prove out that hypothesis.
He’s not alone. MAN’s board member for research and development, Frederik Zohm, said that the company is the one saying hydrogen still has years to go. “(MAN) continues to research fuel cell technology based on battery electrics,” he said, in a statement quoted by Hydrogen Insight, before another board member added that, “we (MAN) expect that, in the future, we will be able to best serve the vast majority of our customers’ transport applications with battery-electric trucks.”
With companies like Volvo and Renault and now Mercedes racking up millions of miles on their respective battery electric semi truck fleets, it’s no longer even close. EV is the way.
SOURCE | IMAGES: CAE FGCEE; via Electrive.
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GE Vernova has produced over half the turbines needed for SunZia Wind, which will be the largest wind farm in the Western Hemisphere when it comes online in 2026.
GE Vernova has manufactured enough turbines at its Pensacola, Florida, factory to supply over 1.2 gigawatts (GW) of the turbines needed for the $5 billion, 2.4 GW SunZia Wind, a project milestone. The wind farm will be sited in Lincoln, Torrance, and San Miguel counties in New Mexico.
At a ribbon-cutting event for Pensacola’s new customer experience center, GE Vernova CEO Scott Strazik noted that since 2023, the company has invested around $70 million in the Pensacola factory.
The Pensacola investments are part of the announcement GE Vernova made in January that it will invest nearly $600 million in its US factories and facilities over the next two years to help meet the surging electricity demands globally. GE Vernova says it’s expecting its investments to create more than 1,500 new US jobs.
Vic Abate, CEO of GE Vernova Wind, said, “Our dedicated employees in Pensacola are working to address increasing energy demands for the US. The workhorse turbines manufactured at this world-class factory are engineered for reliability and scalability, ensuring our customers can meet growing energy demand.”
SunZia Wind and Transmission will create US history’s largest clean energy infrastructure project.
Read more: The largest clean energy project in US history closes $11B, starts full construction
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