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People need to be off the grid completely and when that happens what will these power companies do? If we ever get the affordable battery system that are always
by 14 5y ago
People need to be off the grid completely and when that happens what will these power companies do? If we ever get the affordable battery system that are always just around the corner that will allow this to happen. I look forward to the day. Our electric company has been raising rates and the system is not fair. It is tiered so the more you use the more you pay in hopes to reduce usage. Fair enough. But in my house we have 5 adults and 4 children. We have the same tier as someone with 1 adult and no children. So even though we are more environmentally friendly and our heat heats 9 people, our lights provide light for 9 people, because we use more electricity in other areas like showers we always end up at the higher tier paying a lot for electric even though on a per individual basis we use less electricity. I unfortunately am in Canada and the solar power just isn’t efficient enough here to make it worth while.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago> People need to be off the grid completely I thought that when I was 16. Now that I'm 58, there is no way in hell I am in favor of every household having energy storage systems sufficient to see them through every night and season of high energy use. I'm all for some level of distributed power generation, and some level of distributed energy storage, but "people need to be off the grid completely" is, IMO, a step too far.
- zbrozek 5y agoI'm 34 and am working towards being grid-independent because the cost exceeds the value.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y agoAs I've described here (comment in thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30195830 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30195830 ), it would be essentially absurd to try to go fully offgrid in our home here near Santa Fe. Note that I define full offgrid as "not burning wood to supplement electricity usage for heat", which may differ from your view.
- zbrozek 5y agoIt's a lot easier for me than for you. I'm in the SF Bay Area, so my climate is milder on both extremes. Also I'm DIYing everything and scavenging discarded stuff where I can, so my costs are abnormally low. When all is said and done I'll have ~40-50 KWh of storage and a 20 KWp solar array for <$20k. And my cost of electricity is probably far higher than yours, so I have more incentive. When I think of grid independence, I mean the electric grid. I'm keeping an existing gas-fired heating system in addition to installing a heat pump system. I also have a generator.
- ed25519FUUU 5y agoHave you checked to make sure you can actually disconnect from PG&E? Grid defection is not legal in almost all cities of any size. They make some exceptions for new construction that was never attached to the grid.
- zbrozek 5y agoLuckily I'm not in a city of any size, and my remodel is extensive enough that my town has called in new construction even though it really isn't. But I don't actually care if I disconnect from the grid. I just don't want to pull any watt*hours from it. That's why I call it grid independence rather than off grid.
- _ea1k 5y agoI think a middleground is more realistic. Having solar and enough batteries to never need to send power back to the grid might ultimately similar in cost to selling it back. And on the plus column, you have backup power when the grid fails.
- ed25519FUUU 5y agoGrid defection is illegal in almost every municipality in the country. Companies like PG&E have a legislated monopoly and there's no other option for you.