California — well known for being on the bleeding-edge of planet-saving initiatives — has been subsidizing solar power home installations for years. But apparently, human survival must take a back seat to an even more important crisis looming over all of our futures: LACK OF EQUITY. Don’t miss this Möbius Strip of Left Coast Virtue Signaling!
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The last time I noticed solar panels and coal are the same color. As I understand solar panels are not recyclable but gray coal dust is. For nimrods like Newsom there is always nuclear power.
25K Solar system.
My monthly electric bill is $125.oo on high side with efficient appliances.
200 month pay-back. 16 years not too bad.
Anyone know lifespan of a solar panel?
Between 15 and 30 years depending on multiple factors. They also degrade over time and the output begins dropping well before the point where they would be considered unusable. You should hit the break even point somewhere between 6 and 10 years after your installation came online. Which should also still be in the peak output range of your panels. After that, it’s all gravy for the life of the panels. If you paid that 25K out of your own pocket basically what you’ve done is subsidised your own power bill by paying a big chunk of it up front… Read more »
I live in central Pennsylvania. On October 6, 2021, my 36-panel 12.2 kW PV system with 10kWh battery backup went online. This system cost me $43,312.50, installed. It was financed through KeyBank at 0.99% interest for 20 years. I had been tracking the system operation closely, and on average over their lives, each panel has produced… 1 kWh a day. The actual payback period as of September of 2023 (I need to catch up my data) is 21.28 years. Although I enjoyed messing with it all, it’s a colossal waste of money. The installer wasn’t very experienced, they were never… Read more »
The whole problem with alternate “green” sources of power is that they’re not economically competitive. If they were economically competitive then everyone would benefit equally no matter their wealth or lack thereof. If the price of energy from alternate sources were lower than the price of hydrocarbon energy then the market would naturally trend towards “green” energy all by itself, without any government interference at all. Someday that might be the case but that day is not today. In order to compensate for the cost differential various government entities are tampering with prices. Subsidies are one way, artificially driving up… Read more »
As with everything else about California, what begins as “good” is regulated, mandated, taxed, etc. to the point it is no longer good for anybody other than those sitting in elective office.
What did progressives have before candles? Electricity.
I had solar panels put on my roof in 2016. The next year I put in a battery (in the garage…they are large!) I live around San Diego, CA, and we have sun pretty much every day, SDGE is expensive and just increased their prices. I have NOT PAID a single dime in electricity since it was installed. I got 30% deductible off solar panels, included installation, and another 30% off the battery, included installation. As to the battery, how many panels you have determines how many rooms you can connect. In my case, I could connect 4 rooms. I… Read more »
Sash – just curious but quick math says that without the deductible (what I take to mean subsidy) the payback is closer to 8 years. That about right? And that is for half the house? So the whole house without subsidy would have been 16 years? Would you still have done it? My issue is not with people who put them up and pay for it intending to be there for the 15 life cycle, it’s the subsidy which means others are paying part of the cost. Also, when the 15 year life cycle runs out, what is the cost… Read more »
We had our week of winter this past week in SW VA. Actual temps in the single digits and teens (it will be 60F on Friday). During the day when the sun hits the front of our house we employed a very old style of solar heating – we raised the blinds and opened the front door to the glass storm door. The sun hitting all that glass warmed the upstairs of our ranch style home very nicely. The thermostat was set to 65 (I like it cool in the house and don’t like to pay the power company –… Read more »
About 10 years ago I was working a home trade show for an HVAC company. We set up next to a booth that was selling solar panels. I think the subsidy incentives were lower then. Since we had the software tools on hand, we calculated the ROI for their solar installations based on install costs, current electricity rates, efficiency of panels, and average household usage. Also, we assumed no repairs or rate increases and a sun that reliably shines (even though it’s PA). The number came up 59 years just to break even.
But they only last 25 to 30 years at best. I looked into it for my home. It is all a scam.
Did a similar thing years ago when I worked for a Power Transformer Company. As the kids say – the math just doesn’t add up.
And that is not including the incredibly high cost of power it takes to manufacture the damn things.
As with most things promoted by the government, you get what you pay for. Just like all the illegitimate babies we “bought” since the War on Poverty, we will end up with a big pile of useless, decrepit solar refuse and abandoned solar companies like Solyndra that just served to make friends of the Democrats rich.
I agree with every word of that.
When people say “you get what you pay for” that has multiple meanings. The problem is often that you do not get what you pay for. You pay for the thing as represented to you when you bought it and you end up getting something else entirely. If you do not get the thing as it was represented prior to purchase then you did not get what you paid for. Cost is not always an indicator of quality.