Tesla Powers Hawaiian Island With 54,000 Solar Panels, Battery Packs

Elon Musk and his team of experts in Tesla are not just focusing on the future of electric and hybrid cars. The tech company has a huge project underway and it's all going to happen in Kauai, Hawaii.

JB Straubel, CTO at Tesla, and Hawaii Gov. David Ige launched a partnership with the Kauai Island Utility Cooperative (KIUC) to launch a project tagged as Solar City. The project aims to power Hawaii with renewable energy from the sun.

According to Business Insider, the Tesla initiative has a whopping 54,978 solar panels. Tesla also installed 272 of its commercial battery, the Powerpack 2, to help Hawaii citizens use energy at night. KIUC has signed a contract with Tesla to buy 1 kilowatt hour of electricity for a reduced price.

It can be remembered that before the acquisition of Solar City, Tesla and KIUC actually agreed in February 2016 to use Tesla's Powerpack to bring 20 years of power to Kauai. This means the project has actually been in the works for quite some time. 

SolarCity is projected to reduce the usage of fossil fuels by approximately 1.6 million gallons annually, which will allow Tesla to gradually help the region to transition slowly into solar energy.

Interestingly, this is a good indication of Tesla's push towards solar energy after it acquired SolarCity last 2016. It can also be remembered that Ta'u in the American Samoa was also powered by Tesla's Powerpacks.

The project shows that Tesla is moving away from simply being "that company" with electric cars and actually be a leader in renewable energy. It has unveiled a myriad of power-saving technologies, both used in cars and as separate products. For instance, its solar roof is a unique product that Tesla is capable of providing efficient solar energy saving capabilities without sacrificing aesthetic.