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> Wholesale rates never go to $1/kwh. Why should you get paid more than what PG&E pays its suppliers? I believe CASIO's spot price cap on generation is in fact

> Wholesale rates never go to $1/kwh. Why should you get paid more than what PG&E pays its suppliers? I believe CASIO's spot price cap on generation is in fact $1/kwh. This is only ever reached on a handful of peak summer days and only for a a few hours at most. > In a rich neighborhood this works really well. Solar is not exclusively a rich neighbor hood thing... well it certainly is now with NEM3 since the economics are broken. > Most people don’t live in single unit dwellings either Well you'll be pleased to know the utilities have colluded to make shared solar for apartments/condos un-economic too so everyone can get screwed. >So yeah, I’m on pg&e’s side here. It’s their grid. PG&E can't exist without eminent domain forcing private property owners to give away space for power poles and buried lines. They also enjoy both a monopoly and guaranteed profit! The regulator by law ensures that they get to recover all costs no matter what those are. I'm not saying utilities shouldn't get paid to build and maintain the grid. I'm also not saying they shouldn't get paid something to maintain extra generating capacity. I'm saying the hand-wringing about how rooftop solar owners are all rich leeches hurting the utilities and low-income people is a bunch of utility-created BS to justify screwing everyone over for higher utility company profits. Arbitrage is how utilities make money. Forecasting, signing contracts, making hedges. Figuring out what average price to charge consumers to even out the fact that electricity is dirt-cheap at 3am and outrageously expensive on the hottest summer days at 3pm. They can and do understand the impact of solar. Solar lowers their profits so they want to kill it. Was CA NEM2 unreasonable to the utility? Yes. Is NEM3 a good compromise? Absolutely not. Is charging customers a fixed monthly charge based on their income a reasonable or even fair thing to do? Hell no. > In what world is the grid down but your personal solar + battery installation is keeping the lights on for the entire neighborhood without using said grid? That's not what I mean. I'm not saying every home would be able to run this way, just that it is a good thing in a disaster if some homes here and there are able to supply their own power. It means there is somewhere in the neighborhood that can power a fridge/freezer to save food or handle sensitive medications. Where neighbors can go to charge cell phones. If you've never lived in a hurricane-prone area you may not understand how much of a lifeline it is for someone on the block to have a generator or solar+battery. I mean EV the same way: if someone on the block has an EV and solar then they can assist their neighbors... eg driving to a water/food distribution point even when gasoline supply is cut off for a few weeks. Or drive to a pharmacy to pickup critical medication. Hopefully you never find yourself in such a situation but from a public policy POV having that kind of distributed self-sufficiency capability (paid for by individuals on their own) is a good thing.

vlovich123 3y ago
Residential solar is primarily really for single family homes and similar types of residences. Within populated areas of California (which is where most energy consumption is going to be in California) it is 100% a richer area. Sure, those kinds of homes are also common in the suburbs but the suburbs where that’s affordable are where there’s significantly fewer people living. I don’t know the setup in other places but any big metropolitan area is probably going to look similar and that’s where most of the energy demand and resultant CO2 emissions are coming from. You don’t see solar on high rises because this kind of strategy does not work. As for emergency disaster response, historically this entailed the government having designated shelter places with disaster supplies (eg diesel generators, large amount of food stores, cots to sleep people, etc). This would typically be things like schools and sports arenas because of how much emergency shelter could be provided. I don’t see how adhoc disaster preparedness where you rely on some neighbors thinking ahead for everyone else is better than a strategic plan intentionally meant to cover everybody. It’s a nice perk if you’re lucky, but I’d rather make sure that centralized planning can actually help everyone. Btw this wasn’t because the local government was competent - if I recall correctly there were federal and state laws requiring cities be able to handle such emergencies. I’m not sure if we’ve gotten worse at them that you’re now concerned, but generally I have seen pretty good disaster response mechanisms.
- xenadu02 3y ago
  I was specifically referencing shared-billing scenarios which was just getting under way but has basically been knee-capped by the CPUC. The idea was that a homeowner's association (for condo owners) or apartment building owner could install solar panels connected to a designated meter. Then they could associate other resident meters to be the recipients of credits generated by the designated meter. The utility would distribute the credits in the configured proportions. This would allow condo owners to collectively buy solar panels for the whole complex. Or allow an apartment building owner to let renters buy "shares" of the panels to offset their own usage, or offer it for "free" as a feature eg "we have solar panels that lower your electric bill for free, rent here"*. None of that matters now though, they've made it not economically viable to do. * All features of an apartment are paid for in rent, absolutely nothing is really free. Anything an apartment offers for free just means "I'm paying for it in my rent as long as I live here".

vlovich123 3y ago

Residential solar is primarily really for single family homes and similar types of residences. Within populated areas of California (which is where most energy consumption is going to be in California) it is 100% a richer area. Sure, those kinds of homes are also common in the suburbs but the suburbs where that’s affordable are where there’s significantly fewer people living. I don’t know the setup in other places but any big metropolitan area is probably going to look similar and that’s where most of the energy demand and resultant CO2 emissions are coming from. You don’t see solar on high rises because this kind of strategy does not work. As for emergency disaster response, historically this entailed the government having designated shelter places with disaster supplies (eg diesel generators, large amount of food stores, cots to sleep people, etc). This would typically be things like schools and sports arenas because of how much emergency shelter could be provided. I don’t see how adhoc disaster preparedness where you rely on some neighbors thinking ahead for everyone else is better than a strategic plan intentionally meant to cover everybody. It’s a nice perk if you’re lucky, but I’d rather make sure that centralized planning can actually help everyone. Btw this wasn’t because the local government was competent - if I recall correctly there were federal and state laws requiring cities be able to handle such emergencies. I’m not sure if we’ve gotten worse at them that you’re now concerned, but generally I have seen pretty good disaster response mechanisms.

xenadu02 3y ago
I was specifically referencing shared-billing scenarios which was just getting under way but has basically been knee-capped by the CPUC. The idea was that a homeowner's association (for condo owners) or apartment building owner could install solar panels connected to a designated meter. Then they could associate other resident meters to be the recipients of credits generated by the designated meter. The utility would distribute the credits in the configured proportions. This would allow condo owners to collectively buy solar panels for the whole complex. Or allow an apartment building owner to let renters buy "shares" of the panels to offset their own usage, or offer it for "free" as a feature eg "we have solar panels that lower your electric bill for free, rent here"*. None of that matters now though, they've made it not economically viable to do. * All features of an apartment are paid for in rent, absolutely nothing is really free. Anything an apartment offers for free just means "I'm paying for it in my rent as long as I live here".