Just about 5 years ago, shortly after Tesla announced that it would be acquiring SolarCity (a company founded and ran by Elon Musk & his cousins), Elon got on the set of Desperate Housewives TV Show and claimed that Tesla & SolarCity would soon release beautiful looking solar tiles that would be cost-competitive with standard – less attractive looking – solar panels. Standard solar panels still to this date make up more than 99% of photovoltaic solar systems installed in the residential and commercial solutions in major markets.

Elon got a lot of heat for Tesla’s acquisition of SolarCity and his overly optimistic claims about the solar roof tiles. Many people argued that SolarCity was insolvent and that Elon was essentially saving his cousins and his own investment at the expense of Tesla shareholders.

Today, in 2021, Elon still gets heat for Tesla’s acquisition of SolarCity. In fact, he was in court last week getting sued by Tesla shareholder’s shareholders for giving away ~10% of Tesla to save SolarCity, his cousins, and its shareholders from bankruptcy.

Five years after Elon’s promise, what is the deal with Tesla’s Solar Roof Tiles?

Not many people know. As recently as last year, according to this PV Magazine article, Tesla solar tiles were installed on only about 100 homes. When I called my local Tesla store (in July 2021), their salesperson confirmed that there are long wait times for Tesla solar roof tiles. And when I asked him, “How long of a wait?” his answer was “Unfortunately, there isn’t an exact date for the installation, because there are too many factors that can affect the installation time.”

While Tesla seems to be “still working on their solar roof tiles offering”, other competitors are sprouting with similar solutions. We recently had the opportunity to connect with one of them.

Ergosun is a building-integrated-photovoltaics (BIPV) solar company that started its operations in the UK market 7 years ago and has been active in the UK and Canada markets since. They delivered dozens of residential roof tile solutions in those markets and recently entered the US market. With an office in San Diego, and a number of key regional installer partnerships (with players like Moxie, Rodeo Solar, and Curtiss) Ergosun seems to be making a strong entry in the US Market.

If you are a homeowner looking for solar roof tiles, after your call to your local Tesla store, you might also want to call Ergosun’s regional installer partners which are listed on this page. If you are a solar installer or developer looking for BIPV solar roof products, you might want to call Ergosun. They are looking for more installer partners.

Below is our conversation with Patrick Sichel of Ergosun USA.

In our conversation with Patrick Sichel, we covered the following topics:

• • The history of Building Integrated Solar PV & Ergosun
  • Ergosun and the markets it is active in (Uk, Canada, & USA)
  • Ergosun’s channel partnerships
  • Ergosun vs. Tesla
  • Cost of Ergosun solar tiles ($2/W and change)
  • Number of systems Ergosun has installed
  • Ergosun’s focus area: Residential
  • The technical details of the product (15 watts per tile, how to string them, compatible inverters,…)
  • Ergosun’s current market reach and desire to connect with new partners
  • Ergosun’s 25 yr warranty
  • Ergosun’s maintenance process for installed systems