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Careful of the municipal utility bait and switch! Here in Idaho they recently adjusted the net metering credit to greatly decrease the value of solar energy. T

Careful of the municipal utility bait and switch! Here in Idaho they recently adjusted the net metering credit to greatly decrease the value of solar energy. They waited until there was a lot of solar adoption in the state, and then pulled the rug on solar owners under the guise of “making sure everyone pays their fair share”

janj 3y ago
That also happened in CA but if you already had solar panels you continue with the same rate for a while. Doesn't seem right to switch it for those already installed.
- colordrops 3y ago
  Doesn't seem right to limit it at all, new or already installed. In fact they should be quadrupling down on incentives for solar considering climate change.
  - MostlyStable 3y ago
    If what you care about is climate change, single home rooftop solar is a _terrible_ investment. It's dramatically harder and more expensive to install relative to large installations. For the same exact dollar, you get nearly twice the installed capacity with large scale installations vs. home scale.
    - colordrops 3y ago
      Why not both? With rooftop, you further accelerate the growth of renewables, and you get the benefit of not being beholden to regulatory capture and corrupt central authorities when they decide to do something stupid with the central power supply, and you also build up resilience in the grid with less single points of failure.
      - MostlyStable 3y ago
        I'm not against rooftop solar. My parents have, what was, at the time of installation, the largest residential install in the state of CA. But rooftop solar is not a good use of resources for fighting climate change, which is what I was responding to.
        colordrops 3y ago
        I don't follow. How does it not help in the fight against climate change? It may be less effecient than central power but it still reduces emissions compared to fossil fuels, and it's not a zero sum game as it does not take away capacity from central power.
        pfdietz 3y ago
        It's inferior on a CO2 avoided per $ spent basis compared to utility scale solar installs. This is not difficult to understand. What's your roadblock here?
        colordrops 3y ago
        There is a disconnect for sure here - I said I agree that it may be inferior efficiency-wise. I also said that, nevertheless, it's still far better than fossil fuels. Both statements are true, and are not contradictory. It moves the needle in a positive direction on climate change which was my original statement. I never said anything about it being the best possible of all solutions. If you want to be pedantic, not using any power at all, and going back to an agrarian lifestyle is more efficient that centralized solar. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. There's no way that our governments are going to put all possible resources into a centralized renewable grid, so we should also incentivize private individuals to invest while we are waiting for our politicians and power companies to get on board.
        ed25519FUUU 3y ago
        It’s superior $ for utilities though? Didn’t the public pay $0 for it?
timerol 3y ago
I wouldn't characterize that as a bait-and-switch, but as adjusting to economic reality. When solar is <1% of penetration, a solar kWh is basically just as valuable as any other kWh. When solar gets over 10% of penetration, a solar kWh is worth much less than any other kWh - when the sun is shining, energy is plentiful. By the time you get to ~25% solar penetration, energy is almost free on a sunny day at noon, and much of the value moves into storage, to move the solar energy from noontime to the evening.
- vuln 3y ago
  What’s “free” about maintaining the equipment or the cost of the equipment over time? The people that invested in installing solar still need to pay off the cost in order to break even. I guess they can eat the cost knowing that they’re saving the planet by giving away power they paid to harvest to a power company to profit off of.
  - timerol 3y ago
    You're misreading my comment a bit. It's only "free" on a sunny day at noon, because of the massive oversupply. The panels will make money, but at times when supply is lower, like after 2pm range. This depends on time-of-year as well. Solar prices have been falling rapidly, so the value of a kWh of energy generated via solar has also been falling in competitive power generation markets.
    - jacquesm 3y ago
      This only happens a very small fraction of the day, typically within an hour either side of solar noon. And if the voltage goes up too far inverters will typically back off either incrementally or by shutting down entirely.
    - ed25519FUUU 3y ago
      Net metering takes this fully into account, since it’s a dollar-for-dollar trade. I’d electricity is cheap during a certain part of the day, what they pay you is cheap.
Ekaros 3y ago
Net market price is only fair way. Anything else is wealth transfer to rich capitalists.
ftth_finland 3y ago
In Finland, solar producers get the spot rate for their energy, which is fair. The price can go negative, and it does.
rstuart4133 3y ago
> Careful of the municipal utility bait and switch! Here in Idaho they recently adjusted the net metering credit to greatly decrease the value of solar energy. As other have said, people taking the bait changed the economics, and that forced the switch. To be fair, it was foreseeable. Here in Australia we have the worlds highest rooftop solar take up. Feed-in rates are plummeting like a stone. It's not hard to see why - most days when the sun is shining brightly, the wholesale price of electricity is negative. Look at SA here at midday (the picture will change tomorrow): https://aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem https://aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-elec... We do have plans here that expose you to that wholesale price. If you export electricity when the price is negative, you pay the grid. Ironically, at the same time this over supply is happening all states that mainly use coal have been hit by a price rise this month. I got mine today. In 22 days, the price of my electricity is going up 45%. That mainly caused by renewables (and particularly solar) making the old coal plants uneconomical. They used to be able to sell power 24 hours a day. Now since they can't ramp down quickly they have to pay the grid to export their excess power during the day. I don't know whether that's the cause, but right now we have gigawatt coal plants shutting down years earlier than they said they would five years ago. Which is how we get a 45% price rise. So we are in this situation where feed-in tariffs are worth nothing, electricity prices are going through the roof, we are throwing away a ton of electricity we can't use during the day and solar installs are slowing down. The solution is storage, of course. Batteries were hard to justify price wise a few days ago. But after this 45% price rise changed that. Again it's a double whammy, but in reverse this time. Remember during the day the price goes negative. That means the grid pays you to charge your battery. I would not be surprised if for a while, the return on a battery will be higher than installing solar panels. Which means the next phase of the renewable change over has hit us with a vengeance in Australia. It's the invisible hand of the market finally directing investment where it's needed most I guess. It arrived a little late, and it's not so much a hand as a fist. We would have been better off building storage a few years ago. And again, that was foreseeable. Indeed it was foreseen by numerous published articles. But who reads learned engineering articles on future electricity tariffs? Not your average noob looking purchase roof-top solar apparent and if the people hawking solar panel installs read them, they didn't mention it. So here we are. We wanted an energy transition. Now we've got one, ready or not.

janj 3y ago

That also happened in CA but if you already had solar panels you continue with the same rate for a while. Doesn't seem right to switch it for those already installed.

colordrops 3y ago
Doesn't seem right to limit it at all, new or already installed. In fact they should be quadrupling down on incentives for solar considering climate change.
- MostlyStable 3y ago
  If what you care about is climate change, single home rooftop solar is a _terrible_ investment. It's dramatically harder and more expensive to install relative to large installations. For the same exact dollar, you get nearly twice the installed capacity with large scale installations vs. home scale.
  - colordrops 3y ago
    Why not both? With rooftop, you further accelerate the growth of renewables, and you get the benefit of not being beholden to regulatory capture and corrupt central authorities when they decide to do something stupid with the central power supply, and you also build up resilience in the grid with less single points of failure.
    - MostlyStable 3y ago
      I'm not against rooftop solar. My parents have, what was, at the time of installation, the largest residential install in the state of CA. But rooftop solar is not a good use of resources for fighting climate change, which is what I was responding to.
      - colordrops 3y ago
        I don't follow. How does it not help in the fight against climate change? It may be less effecient than central power but it still reduces emissions compared to fossil fuels, and it's not a zero sum game as it does not take away capacity from central power.
        pfdietz 3y ago
        It's inferior on a CO2 avoided per $ spent basis compared to utility scale solar installs. This is not difficult to understand. What's your roadblock here?
        colordrops 3y ago
        There is a disconnect for sure here - I said I agree that it may be inferior efficiency-wise. I also said that, nevertheless, it's still far better than fossil fuels. Both statements are true, and are not contradictory. It moves the needle in a positive direction on climate change which was my original statement. I never said anything about it being the best possible of all solutions. If you want to be pedantic, not using any power at all, and going back to an agrarian lifestyle is more efficient that centralized solar. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. There's no way that our governments are going to put all possible resources into a centralized renewable grid, so we should also incentivize private individuals to invest while we are waiting for our politicians and power companies to get on board.
        ed25519FUUU 3y ago
        It’s superior $ for utilities though? Didn’t the public pay $0 for it?

timerol 3y ago

I wouldn't characterize that as a bait-and-switch, but as adjusting to economic reality. When solar is <1% of penetration, a solar kWh is basically just as valuable as any other kWh. When solar gets over 10% of penetration, a solar kWh is worth much less than any other kWh - when the sun is shining, energy is plentiful. By the time you get to ~25% solar penetration, energy is almost free on a sunny day at noon, and much of the value moves into storage, to move the solar energy from noontime to the evening.

vuln 3y ago
What’s “free” about maintaining the equipment or the cost of the equipment over time? The people that invested in installing solar still need to pay off the cost in order to break even. I guess they can eat the cost knowing that they’re saving the planet by giving away power they paid to harvest to a power company to profit off of.
- timerol 3y ago
  You're misreading my comment a bit. It's only "free" on a sunny day at noon, because of the massive oversupply. The panels will make money, but at times when supply is lower, like after 2pm range. This depends on time-of-year as well. Solar prices have been falling rapidly, so the value of a kWh of energy generated via solar has also been falling in competitive power generation markets.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    This only happens a very small fraction of the day, typically within an hour either side of solar noon. And if the voltage goes up too far inverters will typically back off either incrementally or by shutting down entirely.
  - ed25519FUUU 3y ago
    Net metering takes this fully into account, since it’s a dollar-for-dollar trade. I’d electricity is cheap during a certain part of the day, what they pay you is cheap.

Ekaros 3y ago

Net market price is only fair way. Anything else is wealth transfer to rich capitalists.

ftth_finland 3y ago

In Finland, solar producers get the spot rate for their energy, which is fair. The price can go negative, and it does.

rstuart4133 3y ago

> Careful of the municipal utility bait and switch! Here in Idaho they recently adjusted the net metering credit to greatly decrease the value of solar energy. As other have said, people taking the bait changed the economics, and that forced the switch. To be fair, it was foreseeable. Here in Australia we have the worlds highest rooftop solar take up. Feed-in rates are plummeting like a stone. It's not hard to see why - most days when the sun is shining brightly, the wholesale price of electricity is negative. Look at SA here at midday (the picture will change tomorrow): https://aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem https://aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-elec... We do have plans here that expose you to that wholesale price. If you export electricity when the price is negative, you pay the grid. Ironically, at the same time this over supply is happening all states that mainly use coal have been hit by a price rise this month. I got mine today. In 22 days, the price of my electricity is going up 45%. That mainly caused by renewables (and particularly solar) making the old coal plants uneconomical. They used to be able to sell power 24 hours a day. Now since they can't ramp down quickly they have to pay the grid to export their excess power during the day. I don't know whether that's the cause, but right now we have gigawatt coal plants shutting down years earlier than they said they would five years ago. Which is how we get a 45% price rise. So we are in this situation where feed-in tariffs are worth nothing, electricity prices are going through the roof, we are throwing away a ton of electricity we can't use during the day and solar installs are slowing down. The solution is storage, of course. Batteries were hard to justify price wise a few days ago. But after this 45% price rise changed that. Again it's a double whammy, but in reverse this time. Remember during the day the price goes negative. That means the grid pays you to charge your battery. I would not be surprised if for a while, the return on a battery will be higher than installing solar panels. Which means the next phase of the renewable change over has hit us with a vengeance in Australia. It's the invisible hand of the market finally directing investment where it's needed most I guess. It arrived a little late, and it's not so much a hand as a fist. We would have been better off building storage a few years ago. And again, that was foreseeable. Indeed it was foreseen by numerous published articles. But who reads learned engineering articles on future electricity tariffs? Not your average noob looking purchase roof-top solar apparent and if the people hawking solar panel installs read them, they didn't mention it. So here we are. We wanted an energy transition. Now we've got one, ready or not.