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> It costs more to put them on residential roofs. If you mean slanted shingle roofs the installation is still trivial. There are also plenty of flat residenti

> It costs more to put them on residential roofs. If you mean slanted shingle roofs the installation is still trivial. There are also plenty of flat residential roofs which are exactly the same as an 'industrial' roof.

jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
No, what the comment says above is correct: there's a rather dramatic difference in levelized costs between utility scale solar and rooftop residential solar. Commercial rooftop solar is only slightly better than residential. There's multiple factors that feed into this, such as how much supporting infrastructure is amortized vs scale, being able to design the array for optimal lighting vs working with an existing building, systematic regular cleaning to keep the array working near peak efficiency... lots and lots more details like that. This isn't to say residential rooftop solar is bad. However atm it's something of a vanity project for people who can afford the investment. It is most definitely not some sort of obvious solves the whole problem slam dunk idiots in government are ignoring because they're stupid. They know what they're doing and are focusing on the highest impact places to put funds, and that can scale up a lot faster than fighting NIMBYs. And yeah, I'm really disappointed in Elon's solar roof tile stunt surrounding this.
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  Requiring solar on new builds is a good policy though and is implemented in various German locations.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    True, retrofitting will always cost more than outfitting during original construction, and having the builder involved enables economy of scale when many (near-)copies of the same house design are built.
- kergonath 4y ago
  > It is most definitely not some sort of obvious solves the whole problem slam dunk idiots in government are ignoring because they're stupid. The thing is, there is no slam dunk obvious solution. But every bit that helps could be part of a more global solution that has a chance of working. Public transport, better insulation, electric transportation, solar panels and wind turbines where it makes sense, large-scale carbon-free baseline production, etc. We need to do all of that. > And yeah, I'm really disappointed in Elon's solar roof tile stunt surrounding this. Elon is not on the right side of this. His pseudo-ecologist speeches are just window dressing.
ncmncm 4y ago
At issue is that a residential roof is no bigger than the residence. That does not make residential installations a dumb idea. They just cost more than alternatives. On very large commercial buildings, a project may claim economies of scale, and support dedicated personnel to keep them operating well. That said, roofs are far from the best place to site solar.

jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago

No, what the comment says above is correct: there's a rather dramatic difference in levelized costs between utility scale solar and rooftop residential solar. Commercial rooftop solar is only slightly better than residential. There's multiple factors that feed into this, such as how much supporting infrastructure is amortized vs scale, being able to design the array for optimal lighting vs working with an existing building, systematic regular cleaning to keep the array working near peak efficiency... lots and lots more details like that. This isn't to say residential rooftop solar is bad. However atm it's something of a vanity project for people who can afford the investment. It is most definitely not some sort of obvious solves the whole problem slam dunk idiots in government are ignoring because they're stupid. They know what they're doing and are focusing on the highest impact places to put funds, and that can scale up a lot faster than fighting NIMBYs. And yeah, I'm really disappointed in Elon's solar roof tile stunt surrounding this.

ZeroGravitas 4y ago
Requiring solar on new builds is a good policy though and is implemented in various German locations.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  True, retrofitting will always cost more than outfitting during original construction, and having the builder involved enables economy of scale when many (near-)copies of the same house design are built.
kergonath 4y ago
> It is most definitely not some sort of obvious solves the whole problem slam dunk idiots in government are ignoring because they're stupid. The thing is, there is no slam dunk obvious solution. But every bit that helps could be part of a more global solution that has a chance of working. Public transport, better insulation, electric transportation, solar panels and wind turbines where it makes sense, large-scale carbon-free baseline production, etc. We need to do all of that. > And yeah, I'm really disappointed in Elon's solar roof tile stunt surrounding this. Elon is not on the right side of this. His pseudo-ecologist speeches are just window dressing.

ncmncm 4y ago

At issue is that a residential roof is no bigger than the residence. That does not make residential installations a dumb idea. They just cost more than alternatives. On very large commercial buildings, a project may claim economies of scale, and support dedicated personnel to keep them operating well. That said, roofs are far from the best place to site solar.