The specter of global warming and climate change has made it a necessity for companies as well as households to make an effort to switch to cleaner sources of energy. Over the past few years, solar energy has emerged as one of the more popular sources of alternative energy and electric car maker Tesla has gone into the business in a big way. Ever since it got into the business, the company has managed to attract some big-ticket clients, and two of them are retail giants Walmart and Amazon.
Earlier this week, it emerged that the solar panels that had been supplied to hundreds of Walmart stores had caught fire and the retail giant had to discontinue the usage back in November last year. However, this week, Walmart sued Tesla for having provided allegedly faulty solar panels to hundreds of stores in the United States. Moreover, Walmart went on to allege that Tesla had not made the effort to install the solar panels properly and had been in haste to get the job done. These are serious allegations and one that could have far-reaching consequences for Tesla. However, Walmart has found support from an unlikely quarter in this regard. The company’s bitter rival Amazon, which corroborated the concerns raised by Walmart.
Amazon sent an e-mail statement in which the company stated that a solar panel supplied by Tesla SolarCity at a warehouse located in Redlands, California had caught fire back in June last year. The e-commerce behemoth went on to state that after the fire, it had taken measures to protect that particular facility and have no plans of installing Tesla solar panels. This is a major blow for Tesla with regards to the lawsuit filed by Walmart and could be a mortal threat to the very future of the solar panel business that they have established. If clients of the size and clout of Walmart and Amazon are not happy with their products, then it is unlikely that smaller clients are going to be interested in installing Tesla’s solar panels. In addition to that, it is also necessary to point out that the solar panel industry is growing in the United States at an impressive pace and within a few years, there is going to be a lot of competition in the sector.
