There’s been a lot of handwringing about the future energy demands of electric vehicles and AI data centers. But if Tesla’s latest charging station is any proof, almost anything is possible with enough solar panels and stationary batteries.Â
On Tuesday, Tesla announced that all Superchargers are now open for business at its largest charging station ever. The 164-stall location in Lost Hills, California, is powered by 11 megawatts of solar panels, which double as a canopy that shades the parking spots. Those panels feed 10 of the automaker’s utility-scale Megapack batteries, for a total of 39 megawatt-hours of energy storage.
By comparison, a typical fast-charging location has anywhere from four to 20 stalls, with Tesla leading the pack on larger installations. Previously, a 120-stall Supercharger site in Barstow, California, was the company’s largest.
“Yes, the largest Supercharger in the world is powered by the sun,” said Max de Zegher, Tesla’s director of charging across several regions, in an X post.
The station off of I-5 may set a new benchmark for fully sustainable EV charging. It’s also a strong testament to Tesla’s vertical integration. Elon Musk’s company develops not just electric cars but charging stations too, plus the energy systems that power them. That sort of convergence is a trend we’ll probably see more of across the industry, as other automakers emulate Tesla with ventures into public charging, home energy systems and stationary battery storage.Â
Using solar and battery storage helped Tesla deploy the humongous station faster than it could’ve with a typical grid connection, de Zegher said. It can take several months or years for utilities to make the necessary upgrades and get a new charging station energized. That’s one of the primary impediments to a quicker rollout of DC fast chargers in America.Â
The first phase of the world’s largest Tesla Supercharger station went up eight months.Â
Photo by: Tesla
“Our forecasts showed a severe charging infrastructure deficit along the San Francisco – Los Angeles corridor for the 2025 holidays and beyond, creating extreme urgency to bring more Superchargers online. Utility grid connections wouldn’t arrive in time,” he said. “With our own solar generation and Megapacks, we have control of our timeline, delivering the needed capacity in under 8 months from construction start.”
Tesla opened the first 84 stalls in early July, eight months after starting construction. That means the entire site took about a year.Â
The combination of solar panels and batteries is key. Renewable energy sources are clean, but intermittent. The batteries can store energy for times when the sun isn’t shining.
Tesla leads the charging industry in terms of larger sites with 12 plugs or more.Â
Photo by: Tesla
Tesla isn’t the only charging firm moving in this direction. BYD, the Chinese EV juggernaut, says it will need batteries at its ultra-fast megawatt stations in order to augment power from the grid. In June, we reported that Electric Era, a Seattle-based charging infrastructure provider, installed a small charging station at a Costco in just 54 days. The company said that was thanks to on-site battery storage that meant it didn’t need to wait for grid upgrades.
The trend could accelerate as charging stations look to deliver more power to cars and deploy their stations faster. Plus, shifting policy and slowing EV demand growth have created a glut of battery supply in the U.S. Battery manufacturers like LG Energy Solution and SK On have pivoted some production away from EV applications and toward stationary storage.Â
According to de Zegher, the Lost Hills station isn’t technically 100% off-grid, though. In a reply on X, he said the site has a small utility connection that will primarily be used to expand the station later on. But, for all intents and purposes, it’s entirely solar-powered.Â
“For almost every day of the year, it’s 100% sunshine powering the cars,” he said.Â
Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com
