Elon Musk’s Tesla is plotting to enter the British energy market and supply households in the coming months.
The company has sought approval for an energy licence from regulator Ofgem in order to take on energy supply giants including British Gas owner Centrica and Octopus Energy.
It hopes to start supplying energy to homes and businesses in England, Scotland and Wales as soon as next year.
Tesla Energy Ventures applied for the licence last month, according to a new filing published by Ofgem.
The application was signed by Andrew Payne, director of the group’s energy business in Europe.
The electric car manufacturer, run by the world’s richest man, also has a solar energy and battery storage business.
It comes around two years after Tesla first started hiring for a head of operations to run its proposed energy supply business.
Tesla has been involved in the UK energy market since 2020, when it was granted a licence to be an electricity generator.
In the US, the group has been an electricity supplier in Texas for the past three years.
It comes amid a backdrop of waning demand for Tesla’s electric vehicles across Europe in recent months.
Industry figures showed an almost 60% plunge in the number of new Tesla registrations in the UK in July, compared with a year earlier.
Data showed that 987 new vehicles were registered in the UK in July compared with 2,462 in the same month a year earlier.
