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(Image credit: Tesla)
Walmart has linked a series of store fires in recent years to the alleged mismanagement of the installation and maintenance of solar panels by Tesla, bringing to justice the holding of Elon Musk.
A new lawsuit filed by the US retail giant is demanding damages from Tesla and the removal of solar panels in all stores, while "systemic and widespread failures" of Tesla have been reported. 39; origin of a series of fires on the roofs over the last ten years.
"To say that solar systems that are obvious, properly designed, installed, inspected and maintained do not burn spontaneously, and that multiple fires involving Tesla's solar systems are only an unmistakable sign of Tesla's negligence," reads in justice.
The document – filed Tuesday in the New York County Supreme Court – urges the court to declare Tesla in violation of more than 240 contracts between Walmart and Walmart between 2010 and 2016, charging it with the establishment of Operation and maintenance of the solar system. signs in hundreds of places.
Hotspots "visible to the naked eye"
The Walmart lawsuit plans a schedule for at least seven stores between 2012 and 2018, which the US retailer all attributes to what he calls "Tesla's" gross negligence.
The series begins with three fires in Tesla-equipped stores: Long's California (2012), Milpitas (2016) and Colorado's Lakeside (2017). According to Walmart's estimates, the damage caused by the first two incidents ranged from $ 90,000 to $ 500,000.
According to the lawsuit, the schedule continues with three more torches throughout the first half of 2018 in sites equipped with Tesla facilities. After the last of three incidents, another California fire in May 2018, Walmart asked Tesla to disconnect all solar systems on the roof.
Tesla agreed but this, according to Walmart, did not stop another fire at the Yuba City plant in California with panels shut down in November 2018. The investigation revealed that wires "sparkled" when the fire was discovered said the American retailer.
According to the trial, post-fire investigators detected "hot spots" – or "precursors of" micro-fissures "- where heat and pressure were formed at various locations. Tesla, according to the document, routinely used personnel without "basic training and knowledge of solar energy" and adequate equipment to perform inspections.
In the case of the Yuba City fire, according to the document, a Tesla technician would have helped create a "fire hazard" by not closing the blender box. Tesla staff, according to Walmart, also failed to disclose a ground fault alert issued on the site last summer.
Eyes riveted on musk during a solar revival
At the time of writing this article, it is still unclear whether Tesla responded to the complaint and how. Contacted today by PV Tech, the company had not made any comment at the time of publication of this article.
The prosecution asserts that Tesla has not yet proposed a "complete set of final root cause analyzes" of the key factors behind the series of fires. The Silicon Valley firm did not pay "one cent" for the damages and other costs that Walmart faced in four of the seven fires, according to the document.
The lawsuit does not identify the solar module marks found in the stores in question. ROTH Capital's figures indicate that the main suppliers of its Californian photovoltaic facilities in 2016 were the REC group (35% of the total module offering), Kyocera (30%), Tesla (11%) and Trina Solar ( 8%).
Walmart says it tried one last time for Tesla to respond to the July 2019 charges, giving the company a 30-day deadline to shed light on the causes of the fires and compensate Walmart for the losses suffered so far. Tesla, according to Walmart, failed to comment on these points as of August 15, paving the way for the ongoing trial.
For Tesla, the prospect of litigation and controversy comes days after the restart of its solar panel business, which offers a new rental service in the United States. "With the new discounted price of Tesla, it's like having a printer printed on your roof if you live in a state with high electricity costs," Musk chief executive commented. launched the revival on Twitter during the weekend.
The company has witnessed low levels of solar energy deployment in recent quarters, reaching record levels of deployment in the second quarter of 2019, even as energy storage has reached new heights . The Silicon Valley player, who merged with SolarCity since 2016, has recently lost its position as America's leading home installer to Sunrun.
See here to read the lawsuit and the other documents of the case in their entirety.
US solar prospects to take center stage at Solar Media's Solar & Storage Finance USA, to be held in New York on October 29 and 30, 2019
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