Elon Musk's Tesla jumps gun on 100 day SA battery bet

Ben PotterSenior writer

Updated Sep 30, 2017 – 9.29am, first published at Sep 28, 2017 – 5.50pm

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The clock has begun ticking on Elon Musk's audacious bet that his Tesla electric vehicle and battery company can build a 100 megawatt battery in South Australia in 100 days or the $US50 million ($63 million) unit comes free of charge.

Tesla announced on Friday evening - when most attention was on Saturday's AFL Grand Final in Melbourne - that the company had signed an interconnection agreement with SA's monopoly transmission company Electranet that afternoon after receiving the blessing of the Australian Energy Market Operator.

Ben Potter writes on energy, climate change and innovation, and has been Washington correspondent, opinion editor and companies editor.