I get so many questions
about my Tesla solar roof, and I have to thank you. Most of you are full of praise and seem to really enjoy my video series, where I documented the entire process from ordering, installation, payments, savings, cleaning, you name it, but some of you had some concerns. So in this video, I'm going to address the top 10 questions, counting down from least to most, shall we say bizarre? And this is happening right now. (upbeat music) Starting with number 10. The least bizarre question was about the peak performance of the system. Now I have about 135 active solar tiles facing in various
directions towards the sun. Each active tile has
a maximum 58.47 Watts. And together this comes to
just under 7.9 kilowatts. However, the peak performance
I've been able to measure is about 5.9 kilowatts. And people were wondering, why is it not 7.9 or close to it? The answer is quite simple. The tiles are not facing
the sun at optimum level, all at the same time. An East facing tile might
reach peak performance in the morning, while a South facing tile
might get there around noon. And unlike regular panels, some of the tiles will
actually face to the North. So they may never produce more than 50% of their rated maximum, simply because the sun
will never reach them in an optimal way. The tiles are basically a roof first and a power plant second. (fire burning) Alright, moving on to number nine. Since the roof is
electrified in its entirety, isn't it a big fire hazard
and a risk to firemen? What about smoke ventilation when you need to control the fire? To be honest, I haven't really considered
this until you brought it up. But luckily after a
little bit of research, I was able to find out
that the roof is quite safe and easy to ventilate in case of smoke. There's a great video by Brock Archer, who posted a training tutorial developed by firefighters and engineers
from around the world. - [Brock] Typically only about 16 volts is present in each branch. All of the testing conducted
indicated that there is almost zero risk of shock or electrocution when cutting or crushing the tiles, or when cutting the diode trunk harness. - It demonstrates some simple solutions on how to safely and effectively
handle a Tesla solar roof. I'll leave a link in the description. (chainsaw buzzing) It's quite fun watching
them destroy the tiles. Number eight on our bizarro
list. Not quite bizarre yet. Tesla has gotten quite a bad
rep when it comes to service. I'm an avid reader of the
Tesla Solar Reddit thread, and not a day goes by where someone is complaining about their
Tesla project manager, wait times on the install or repairs. - [Speaker] Thank you for calling Tesla. Your estimated hold time
is greater than one hour. - Clearly Tesla needs to do better. When I got my Model 3, there was a small
blemish on the paint job. So I brought it in for service, and that first appointment was terrible. Tesla was in the midst of
ramping their mass production and they were ill-equipped to deal with the increased need for service, but that changed. All other service calls have been stellar, no wait time, often I didn't even have
to bring in the car. They would come to my house
to address a service request. I expect that Tesla solar is going through a similar transition right now. Maybe I was lucky, but I needed quite a lot
of help from the Tesla team to get a grant approved, and my caseworker was responsive and on top of all deadlines. (thunder rumbling)
Also after a storm, one of the ridge covers blew off. Luckily they have a 24 hour hotline and a crew came out to repair
the exposed ridge vent, and they prevented water
from coming into my attic. I was very happy with the service. Number seven, plenty of people commented
that the Tesla roof is outrageously expensive. It's a valid point. 50,000 is a lot of money, and I made a separate video
just about why it still may make sense to many
to make that investment. Let's just say, once you realize that it's
not just a solar system, but a full premium roof
replacement and a battery that protects you from power outages, 50,000 might seem more reasonable. Unfortunately, Tesla raised their prices and they will probably remain expensive until they can keep up with the demand. However, I just placed an order on my garage, which I'm still remodeling. And the quote for that smaller
roof came in at 19,000, including an additional battery. Since this is new construction, the price does not appear to
have gone up all that much 'cause they don't need
to replace the old one. Counting down to number six. Still not that bizarre yet, but a lot of you think that solar is not environmentally friendly. You have concerns about
the toxic materials used to make them, the carbon footprint, and unethical mining of certain metals. I've done some research and I'm gonna leave you
two different sources. One of them is a big report
by the Cambridge University that analyzed all major
peer-reviewed studies on the environmental impact of solar. And the bottom line is this. While there are no
global warming emissions associated with generating
electricity from solar energy, there are emissions
associated with other stages of the solar life cycles. Most estimates of lifecycle
emissions for photovoltaic systems are between 0.07 and
0.18 pounds of carbon dioxide equivalent per kilowatt hour. This is far less than the
lifecycle emission rates for natural gas and coal. The second source comes
from Tesla directly. Every year, they publish a comprehensive
environmental impact report on their entire product line,
supply chain, distribution, manufacturing, and end of
life recycling programs. If you think that Tesla
actually cares about expediting our transition to sustainable energy, which I happened to do, that report can help you understand the steps they take to
accomplish that goal. (hail falling) All right, number five. Hail? Some think that the Tesla
glass can not withstand a hailstorm, hurricanes, or other extreme weather situations. Well, here's a video that begs to differ. - [Speaker] Pretty significant, consistent ping pong to
large golf ball size. The next morning, and we looked around and I'm like, I don't see anything of significance in terms of damage to the roof. No hairline cracks. There's no functional degradation. You know, performance degradation. - Solar roof tiles are more
than three times stronger than your standard roofing tile. It has a hail rating of class three. It can take a hail clump
of this size repeatedly. It also is a class F best wind rating. - [Speaker] This is the
ultimate version of that moment. You get the hundred year cold snap. You power up the battery and you look down the street, and you're like, damn, it actually did matter. - Okay. You might think so far, the questions haven't
been all that bizarre. Well, it's time to step it up a notch. Number four, many of you had concerns when
you saw shots of the crew kicking the tiles during
the install process. You thought that was unprofessional and damaging the tiles. Well, several sources confirmed
that this is actually the best way to install the tiles. And it's the way the crew's
being trained to do that. There were many Tesla workers and reps that responded to these
comments on my video, backing this up. So yes, if you see the crew kicking the tile, totally okay. They can take all kinds of beating. There's no micro-fracturing
as with regular panels. Now that we cleared that up, let's go to number three. We're getting to the good stuff now. Talking about the good stuff, it's the perfect segue to thank Skillshare for their support. It's an online learning community, where millions come together
to take the next step in their creative or career journey. It offers thousands of classes on topics, including illustration, design, photography, video, freelancing, and more. I'd like to recommend
a class by Hayden Aube, where he presents a
simple five step process to teach yourself to draw. - Just about anything that
you'd ever want to draw. This is a routine that
you can apply to it, so that you actually
make sure that you learn. - [Sven] Within just 25
minutes of practicing, you'll take a reference photo, learn how to break it down
into its most simple shapes, emulate those shapes, and go back to fix your mistakes. - [Hayden] It's very important
that we don't just notice the problems that we've had, but that we actually correct them. - [Sven] Finally, you revise and repeat
getting your first drawing to go from zero to pretty awesome, in just one session. - To actually put this into practical use. You are going to choose
a subject of your own, and you're going to go
through the five steps. - [Sven] And this is what's
great about Skillshare. It's curated specifically for learning. Meaning there are no ads, and they're always launching
new premium classes. So you can stay focused and follow wherever your creativity takes you. So take advantage now. The first 1000 of my subscribers to click the link in the description, will get a one month
free trial of Skillshare. So you can start exploring
your creativity today. Now, back to your question about the warp. Some of you commented on a warp in my roof and you are correct. On one side, there's actually a warp which has to do with a roof inconsistency, when the original house was
connected to an addition. This is something that I
haven't really noticed before, but going back to the shots
from the original roof, you can clearly see a
transition line here. Now, whenever there are inconsistencies, the tiles are not really bendable. Instead what Tesla does
is use actual metal tiles in those spots and bent them into place. The metal is so thick that
you can't bend it by hand. Instead, you need special tools. And this is what they used
at the transition line. However, some of the metal tiles still
are not perfectly aligned and you can see a panel gap. When they come back for my garage remodel, I will definitely ask them to
give that side another pass. Number two, supposedly collecting
rainwater is illegal. So in several videos, I point out that a nice side effect of having a clean glass tile and a metal roof for that matter, is that you can collect rainwater and not have to worry about the petroleum leaching
of an asphalt shingle. Now this blew me away, but several claimed that it is illegal to collect rainwater in California. It's really strange, since many cities in California
actually have programs where they give out free rain barrels to encourage rainwater collection. So I went back to Google and
figured out that before 2012, it might've been indeed
illegal to collect rainwater. Well, not anymore. Most states will let you
collect rain water. No problem. However, if you happen to live in Texas, while still legal, you'll face some of the
toughest requirements to collect rainwater, including giving a written
notice to your city and submitting a full
building design plan. And this brings us to numero uno of your most pressing concerns
for my Tesla solar roof. And it has to do with my garden. Everyday, there's one guy who tells me often, in a not so nice way, that I should get a frickin' lawn. People keep complaining
about our front yard. - [Harriet] What's wrong
with our front yard? - [Sven] Well, they always want like lawn. They don't understand why we do. - [Harriet] Hello! Drought much? - [Sven] They don't
appreciate a Joshua tree. - [Harriet] Ya hello? Meet Josh! - [Sven] He's going to be such a beauty. - [Harriet] Ya, he's awesome - [Sven] He's gonna be 15 feet tall? - I don't know. But, he's showing his beauty. - [Sven] We have what is called, a California native rain garden. My city actually paid me over
3,500 to convert the lawn we used to have into this wildlife oasis, in order to eliminate the
need for constant irrigation. Before we had this garden, we used to spend more than
$200 a month on watering and an additional fee on a gardener, who would have to come out
every week to mow and blow. Did you know that if you
run a lawnmower for an hour, it creates as much carbon emission as if you drive over a hundred
miles with your everyday car. So no, we're not going to get back to a lawn. If you'd like to find out
how we set up that garden with the valley and berms to
ensure that the little rain we do get in California
stays on the property and does not shed into the storm drain. I'll leave a link to a video series, where I show you the steps we took. I hope you enjoyed this video. If I missed any other questions, especially more bizarre ones, please do leave a comment. I'll try to address them. As always thanks for watching, and keep things sunny. (upbeat music) Oh, and if you're thinking about getting a Tesla solar roof or the panels, which supposedly have the
best deal on the market, please click my referral code to check out all the current savings. The link is as always in
the video description. (upbeat music)
