, Columnist
Tesla’s Big Batteries Aren’t the Fire Problem. Lithium Is
Investors need to look behind the headline data and realize the danger in the widespread use of this technology.
Investors beware.
Photographer: David Paul Morris/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
When a Tesla Inc. battery caught fire at an energy storage facility that helps power California last week, critics were quick to pounce. Michael Burry of “The Big Short” fame, who called the mid-2000s housing collapse correctly, hit out at the EV maker.
Blaming Elon Musk’s firm for a bad battery misses the point, however. Instead, we need to ask whether lithium-ion powerpacks — typically used in consumer electronics and electric vehicles — should be used for such energy storage at all. Just because these work well on a small scale doesn’t mean they’re appropriate for large set-ups.