This is what Tesla will unveil Friday night

The new roof system would integrate with the Powerwall 2.0 battery system, which Musk said could power the refrigerator, sockets and lights of a four-bedroom house for a day – or indefinitely when combined with rooftop solar.

During an earnings call on Wednesday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that he has three main goals for his electric vehicle company while getting in a healthy dose of smack talk against various competitors.

Musk also demonstrated Tesla’s new line of solar shingles, rooftop panels created to more inconspicuously camouflage with the average house. “People love their homes and we want them to be better”, Musk said. There are also concerns that solar power customers can go off-the-grid – reducing the number of people who rely on the grid for electricity and passing the costs to its remaining customers.

Tesla is now attempting to acquire SolarCity and shareholders of both companies will vote on the acquisition in November, so concrete pricing and availability info wasn’t discussed at the event.

Photovoltaic cells, embedded under layers of glass, become visible as the tiles are tilted in different directions.

Musk refused to answer a reporter’s question about how Tesla’s balance sheet would accommodate the acquisition of SolarCity.

Elon Musk late Friday debuted glass roofing shingles that generate electricity from the sun, a critical step toward merging Tesla Motors with his solar energy firm, SolarCity.

Tesla is also expected to reveal an updated version of its Tesla Energy Powerwall home-storage unit.

First up, the new Powerwall 2.0 can handle twice as much energy as the initial generation, with a 14kWh energy storage capacity and a 7kW power output.

In a private conversation with journalists after the announcement, Musk declined to state a price for the roof or a price-per-square foot.

Musk envisions two-thirds of all power being produced at the utility scale (using the Powerpack 2) and a third of it being produced locally, or from the panels on a person’s house (using the Powerwall 2). “It needs to be handsome, powerful, and seamlessly integrated”, Musk said. If they were to all start building using a solar roof, it could power the home and avoid the need add solar panels on top.

Critics, however, have said the merger highlights the financial risks of combining two money-losing companies that need to raise billions of dollars in new capital from investors each year to fund their operations.