The Tesla Solar Roof is coming to Canada, says Elon Musk — but how does it handle snow?

The Canadian solar industry and homeowners alike have been wondering when the popular Tesla Solar Roof tiles will be available to order or install in Canada.

The wait is over … well, almost!

In a reply to a recent tweet, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the upcoming roofing tiles will be available in Canada at some point in 2021.

Later this year

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2021

While specifics of the 2021 availability are still unclear, one thing for sure, we are getting closer to having them installed in Canada.

Tesla’s solar roof tiles are designed to look like normal roof tiles when installed on a house while doubling as solar panels to generate power.

The company first unveiled the solar tiles in 2016 and has been tinkering with them ever since.

There are many videos on social media that depict various properties that have either always been part of the original design or added later.

A good example is this video that seems to showcase the hydrophobic characteristics of the tiles.

The video shows snow gliding off a roof with the tiles installed on it. Elon Musk replied to the tweet confirming the property.

The Tesla Solar Roof is slightly hydrophobic, so water, snow or ice slide off easily

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2021

For a better demonstration of this property, check out this other video (posted by Jason Lassen on Youtube). He is in the final stages of building his house in Wisconsin.

Canadian winters can be brutal, so this snow-handling property will definitely be a big plus to help boost adoption.

Tesla and its partners have installed more than 3.6 gigawatts of its solar roof tiles on 400,000 roofs in the U.S.

With this new update that the company will be launching the product soon in Canada, we can expect these figures to continue to grow.