The fourth quarter has passed its halfway point, and Tesla’s Lathrop, California Gigafactory still seems to be going full steam ahead. During a recent drone flyover of the site, a fleet of 332 Megapack batteries were spotted in the facility’s staging areas.
The Tesla Megapack may not be as visually appealing as the Cybertruck or the Model 3 Highland, but it is a key product in Tesla’s portfolio. Designed for grid use, the Megapack has the potential to disrupt the energy sector. The battery has performed well so far, having been successfully deployed in high-profile projects such as the 182MW/730MWh battery farm in Moss Landing, California, and the 150MW/300MWh system in New South Wales, Australia.
The Megapack is available in two versions: a 2-hour version providing 1.9 MW of power and 3.9 MWh of energy, and a 4-hour version providing 1 MW of power and 3.9 MWh of energy. The grid-scale battery is priced at $1,908,590 for the four-hour variant with installation and $2,123,590 for the two-hour variant with installation. Without installation costs, the Megapack is priced at $1,321,390 for the two-hour variant and $1,270,310 for the four-hour variant.
A drone flyover by Met God in Wilderness, who has been documenting developments at the Lathrop Megafactory for some time now, shows that the plant is still producing large quantities of the battery. The drone operator’s footage showed 258 Megapack batteries in the staging area opposite the Megafactory at the time of the flyover, and a further 74 on the site. That’s a total of 332 Megapacks at the time of Thursday’s flyover. Tesla watchers estimate that such a number of Megapacks is worth over $500 million.
The sighting of the Megapack batteries at the Lathrop Megafactory comes as Tesla Energy is becoming a growing part of the company’s business, and also one of its highest margin businesses. During the Q3 2023 earnings call, CEO Elon Musk noted that “the energy division is becoming [Tesla’s] highest margin business. Energy and Services now contributes over half a billion to quarterly profit.”
The Lathrop Megafactory is expected to reach full capacity of 40 GWh with its second phase of expansion. The facility also has a target output of 10,000 Megapack batteries per year.
