Tesla's Solar Roof Almost Ready for Distribution, How Much Will It Cost?

Billionaire and Tesla CEO Elon Musk recently launched the new Tesla Solar Roofs using a 'Desperate Housewives' set as a model house. The new Tesla roofs are equipped with solar panels are not just designed to harness solar power and store them in Power Wall, but the new solar roof is also designed to replace existing roofs.

The innovative solar roofs are said to be stronger than traditional roofing system. The solar panels are built in within the roofing panels so that the roofing itself will serve as the solar panels and vice versa. During the launch, Powerwall 2 and Powerpack 2 were also unveiled. The solar roofs will directly work with Tesla's home-based Powerwall.

Although it is not available on the market yet, it is looking good for Tesla as a lot of manufacturers and industry players are praising the new building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) solar roofs. This is the reason why a lot of industry players and the consumers as well are looking out for the would-be price point of Tesla's innovative solar roofs.

Typical solar shingles are already expensive, to begin with like CertainTeed, Suntegra and Atlanis. This is due to the high cost of materials and installation cost. But Musk argued during the launch that in the long run, installing solar roofs would be beneficial environmentally and economically.

The solar roofs are composed of a 6-inch solar cell. The economical advantage can be calculated depending on how powerful the solar cells and the kilowatt-generating power or solar cells on the roof combined.

Tesla's solar roofs are also designed to replace the typical type of roofing materials. On the onset, it will be of course, a bit more expensive than the regular ones especially if the home owner will choose to replace the whole roofing system with its solar counterpart. But Musk had also given that a thought. The Tesla CEO said anyone could choose only parts of their roofs to be replaced with the ones with solar cells and still keep some of the typical roofing materials. This is in respect to existing homes and the owner's aesthetic preferences.

In an educated guess, Brian Cinnamon of Green Tech Media expects that the Tesla solar roof to cost about $15,000 for a set that is capable of producing 9,000 kilowatt-hours per year.

But until the solar roofs roll out in the market, no one can tell for sure how much will the solar roof cost. Tesla's acquision of SolarCity paved the way for the production of Solar Roofs that is considered an integral part of Musk's environmental agenda mentioned in his 'Tesla Master Plan Part 2'.