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to answer the first question in the article "Many consumers want to know how long it will take them to make back the upfront costs of solar" my answer is that

to answer the first question in the article "Many consumers want to know how long it will take them to make back the upfront costs of solar" my answer is that the payback is imediate, right from the first moment watching as energy is generated out of thin air, and the sudden relief from getting off the energy angst missery-go-round, and the sheer borring inertness of solar pv as it does the thing with zero detectable effort, is gratifying and relaxing in a way that money never gives. I will add that solar pv is increadably robust, and damage tollerant as well, you can drive a claw hammer through a panel, and while it does not improve the performance, the degradation is actualy not that much, and it will continue to function for years

9wzYQbTYsAIc 7mo ago
The mindset shift towards “how many hours of computer usage did that one panel enable” is like the mindset shift from learning calculus, in some ways. Not quite a paradigm shift, but you gain a new appreciation for conservation of use when it’s a difference between choice of $/kW/hr and “wow, the panel powered that for most of the day”. At the same time, many people will just use a solar calculator or watch or yard lights etc, oblivious to it all. Show people a solar powered laptop, a solar powered phone, or a solar powered tablet, then they will be impressed. Remember the craze about solar powered car competitions? permacompute + solar would make for quite the $100 laptop competition.
zowie_howie 7mo ago
Is it immediate? Sure, there is satisfaction that you are using 'free' electricity. But it does have an upfront cost. I calculated that it would take over 11 years to recoup the investment based on our current usage. Given we already get cheap night-time rates to charge the car and run appliances, it is hard to justify. Like many UK houses, we have gas central heating too. I guess if we had a battery too (more investment) then we could switch to using electric oil-filled radiators, though they would not heat the whole house. And we could install a hot water tank. I guess for new builds there is a real opportunity, but for an existing household I'm struggling to see how it works - and I want it to!
- pjc50 7mo ago
  I don't think it ever makes sense to switch to electric radiators. It might make sense to switch to a heatpump, but you need to avoid being hugely overcharged by the installers and there are flow issues if you have 8mm piping. This ROI calculator looks reasonable: https://ukcalculator.com/solar-panel-roi-calculator.html https://ukcalculator.com/solar-panel-roi-calculator.html - note that it subtracts the install cost for you, so any case where the final figure is positive is profitable. But of course that depends on whether grid prices go up or down in the next decade ...
  - mytailorisrich 7mo ago
    Well France did move to electric everything (cooking, hot water, heating) in the past thanks to ample nuclear electricity production (and possibly not too harsh winters). Unfortunately they let their nuclear programme decay and are struggling now (EU grid integration does not help)... I think a big part of the push to install heat pumps now is that it is understood that electricity production is in dire straights, taking into account that the transition to EV requires a lot of electricity.
    - synotna 7mo ago
      Part of the struggle is that renewables have state aid exceptions, enabling massive taxpayer funded subsidisation of the """industry"""
    - masklinn 7mo ago
      > hot water, heating Not really. Urban flats frequently got resistive heating (rather than heat pumps) but when France finally phased out furnace oil it phased in gas heating (again instead of heat pumps). And EU grid integration was mostly a boon, at least to EDF, with the country able to export its large stable supply and arbitrage between its neighbours. It largely missed its opportunity and should have ramped up electric use way more aggressively in the 90s. And built up research labs and industrial and practical knowledge in heat pumps and batteries tech.
rdtsc 7mo ago
>> "Many consumers want to know how long it will take them to make back the upfront costs of solar" > my answer is that the payback is imediate, So if I pay $35k for an install, I get a $35k check the first time I connect it to the grid? Pretty sure it doesn't work that way. But it would be a nice subsidy from the government if they were really motivated. I guess you're saying you start to feel good and validated to have spent the money by seeing _some_ savings every billing period. It's hard to argue with feelings of course, but that's not not the original concern. People want to know how long is it going to take: 1, 5, 10 years or ... never (if panels degrade or break before it will never pay off) to pay off their investment.
- phyzome 7mo ago
  From the article: > According to Solar Power Europe, it takes an average of two to six years to recoup the cost of the system, depending on what you paid for it, its size and where you mount it. And then it just keeps working for decades. There's degradation, but even after 25 years I believe it's down to maybe 85% output, which is still huge for something with essentially no operating costs.
  - otherme123 7mo ago
    Panel degradation is very easy and cheap to fix. Our original panels costed about $2,000 each 400W (made sense in our circumstances, recoup in 7 years). After a couple decades we just added 2kW more power for about $300. In another couple of decades you will buy the same for less than $100 probably. The fun part is that we might never recoup the cost of our gasoline backup generator, as it only worked for about 10 hours in 30 years. Anyone that worries today about degradation has zero real interest in this stuff, just complains for the sake of complaining.
jrmg 7mo ago
We just got solar panels and a battery installed on our house. I try to be hard-headed about the economics when planning, but I have to say the _experience_ of having done it is exactly as you describe. The other thing it made me is angry at the political morass that these things seem to be in. At a technical level I understand the ‘base load’ arguments, but we are throwing away _so much energy_ that’s just there for the taking by not having these everywhere. On most days, our house (in Western North Carolina) gets enough energy from the sun that we net-export to the grid - and we have an EV! There’s just no need for the massive amounts of carbon we are spewing into the air - the energy is just falling onto us! In the future, providing we’re still around, we’ll look back at a time when we could’ve been getting all our energy needs from just the sun (and wind etc.) and shake our heads in disbelief at those who fought against the idea that we should even think about efficiently using it so viscerally.
- testing22321 7mo ago
  I’m in Canada and for 8 months of the year our residential solar net exports to the grid. Over 30 years we’ll profit ~$25k after spending zero. It’s crazy how my energy just hits the ground everyday.
mbgerring 7mo ago
It’s already possible for consumers to know that, I worked on the software that powers the tools that tell US consumers this at Genability ca 2015. As far as I know, they never cracked the European market, so if you’re interested in working on that, I’m currently available for hire! Info in profile :)

9wzYQbTYsAIc 7mo ago

The mindset shift towards “how many hours of computer usage did that one panel enable” is like the mindset shift from learning calculus, in some ways. Not quite a paradigm shift, but you gain a new appreciation for conservation of use when it’s a difference between choice of $/kW/hr and “wow, the panel powered that for most of the day”. At the same time, many people will just use a solar calculator or watch or yard lights etc, oblivious to it all. Show people a solar powered laptop, a solar powered phone, or a solar powered tablet, then they will be impressed. Remember the craze about solar powered car competitions? permacompute + solar would make for quite the $100 laptop competition.

zowie_howie 7mo ago

Is it immediate? Sure, there is satisfaction that you are using 'free' electricity. But it does have an upfront cost. I calculated that it would take over 11 years to recoup the investment based on our current usage. Given we already get cheap night-time rates to charge the car and run appliances, it is hard to justify. Like many UK houses, we have gas central heating too. I guess if we had a battery too (more investment) then we could switch to using electric oil-filled radiators, though they would not heat the whole house. And we could install a hot water tank. I guess for new builds there is a real opportunity, but for an existing household I'm struggling to see how it works - and I want it to!

pjc50 7mo ago
I don't think it ever makes sense to switch to electric radiators. It might make sense to switch to a heatpump, but you need to avoid being hugely overcharged by the installers and there are flow issues if you have 8mm piping. This ROI calculator looks reasonable: https://ukcalculator.com/solar-panel-roi-calculator.html https://ukcalculator.com/solar-panel-roi-calculator.html - note that it subtracts the install cost for you, so any case where the final figure is positive is profitable. But of course that depends on whether grid prices go up or down in the next decade ...
- mytailorisrich 7mo ago
  Well France did move to electric everything (cooking, hot water, heating) in the past thanks to ample nuclear electricity production (and possibly not too harsh winters). Unfortunately they let their nuclear programme decay and are struggling now (EU grid integration does not help)... I think a big part of the push to install heat pumps now is that it is understood that electricity production is in dire straights, taking into account that the transition to EV requires a lot of electricity.
  - synotna 7mo ago
    Part of the struggle is that renewables have state aid exceptions, enabling massive taxpayer funded subsidisation of the """industry"""
  - masklinn 7mo ago
    > hot water, heating Not really. Urban flats frequently got resistive heating (rather than heat pumps) but when France finally phased out furnace oil it phased in gas heating (again instead of heat pumps). And EU grid integration was mostly a boon, at least to EDF, with the country able to export its large stable supply and arbitrage between its neighbours. It largely missed its opportunity and should have ramped up electric use way more aggressively in the 90s. And built up research labs and industrial and practical knowledge in heat pumps and batteries tech.

rdtsc 7mo ago

>> "Many consumers want to know how long it will take them to make back the upfront costs of solar" > my answer is that the payback is imediate, So if I pay $35k for an install, I get a $35k check the first time I connect it to the grid? Pretty sure it doesn't work that way. But it would be a nice subsidy from the government if they were really motivated. I guess you're saying you start to feel good and validated to have spent the money by seeing _some_ savings every billing period. It's hard to argue with feelings of course, but that's not not the original concern. People want to know how long is it going to take: 1, 5, 10 years or ... never (if panels degrade or break before it will never pay off) to pay off their investment.

phyzome 7mo ago
From the article: > According to Solar Power Europe, it takes an average of two to six years to recoup the cost of the system, depending on what you paid for it, its size and where you mount it. And then it just keeps working for decades. There's degradation, but even after 25 years I believe it's down to maybe 85% output, which is still huge for something with essentially no operating costs.
- otherme123 7mo ago
  Panel degradation is very easy and cheap to fix. Our original panels costed about $2,000 each 400W (made sense in our circumstances, recoup in 7 years). After a couple decades we just added 2kW more power for about $300. In another couple of decades you will buy the same for less than $100 probably. The fun part is that we might never recoup the cost of our gasoline backup generator, as it only worked for about 10 hours in 30 years. Anyone that worries today about degradation has zero real interest in this stuff, just complains for the sake of complaining.

jrmg 7mo ago

We just got solar panels and a battery installed on our house. I try to be hard-headed about the economics when planning, but I have to say the _experience_ of having done it is exactly as you describe. The other thing it made me is angry at the political morass that these things seem to be in. At a technical level I understand the ‘base load’ arguments, but we are throwing away _so much energy_ that’s just there for the taking by not having these everywhere. On most days, our house (in Western North Carolina) gets enough energy from the sun that we net-export to the grid - and we have an EV! There’s just no need for the massive amounts of carbon we are spewing into the air - the energy is just falling onto us! In the future, providing we’re still around, we’ll look back at a time when we could’ve been getting all our energy needs from just the sun (and wind etc.) and shake our heads in disbelief at those who fought against the idea that we should even think about efficiently using it so viscerally.

testing22321 7mo ago
I’m in Canada and for 8 months of the year our residential solar net exports to the grid. Over 30 years we’ll profit ~$25k after spending zero. It’s crazy how my energy just hits the ground everyday.

mbgerring 7mo ago

It’s already possible for consumers to know that, I worked on the software that powers the tools that tell US consumers this at Genability ca 2015. As far as I know, they never cracked the European market, so if you’re interested in working on that, I’m currently available for hire! Info in profile :)