Solar and wind less than half the cost of fossil fuels as price falls continue | Hacker News Reader

Solar and wind less than half the cost of fossil fuels as price falls continue

reneweconomy.com.au

45 pointsCapstanlqc8 comments

Solar costs are down but residential installation prices are up.

I've had solar installed 3 times over the last 6 years with roughly 3kw added per time.

Same installers, whatever the best deal panel on the market was that year, price never gets cheaper, despite solar being 80% cheaper over this period on paper.

I just self installed a 5.5kw system in Colorado. Based on quotes I got from installers the DIY approach saved me about $10k USD which is insane for what was a weekend of labor for two people. Permitting want that onerous coming in knowing little, and I’d expect professional installers to have this process locked down tightly.

My theory about the high installer prices (in the US) is the market is distorted right now by tax credits enabling installers to charge more, knowing the customer likely will qualify for a larger credit come tax time.

> My theory about the high installer prices (in the US) is the market is distorted right now by tax credits enabling installers to charge more, knowing the customer likely will qualify for a larger credit come tax time.

I can't speak for CO or solar installers specifically. But in general, trades labor is becoming "name your price" where I live. This includes electricians, plumbers, painters, etc. There is a severe shortage of folks willing and able to work on residential properties to any sort of quality level. I suspect this will get worse, and we will start seeing the "bottom" of the market start to learn basic handyman/construction skillsets again as they get priced out.

I know in my recent electrical work (not cheap, week long project or so) my electrician made more per hour than I do in a white collar executive job - by about double.

I can't blame them at all - more power to them. Residential trades work is not fun, and most of your customers truly are frustrating at best to work with.

Even with this recent runup in job costs - you will be likely waiting for months to get someone on-site for basic jobs. The good folks are booked solid at least a quarter in advance, if not a full year.

I figure labor being legitimately very expensive right now (almost certainly in Denver too) isn't helping either

Solar prices may be going up due to the quartz mines in North Carolina being shut down due to hurricane Helene. Apparently it's the source of the purest quartz on the planet...

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article293265924....

Given the need to remove all the oxygen and add several nines of additional purity regardless, that article is ringing "investor sales pitch" alarm bells for me.

Quick google suggests the USA produced about 3.6% of global silicon in 2021.

Even if this is about literally wanting quartz itself rather than as a source of silicon, IIRC most industrial uses are synthetic quartz rather than natural.

Ben's correct, the US simply isn't a significant player in the global PV supply chain. Perhaps later, but not at present.

I found this Wired article from 2018 with interesting information https://www.wired.com/story/book-excerpt-science-of-ultra-pu....

But I cannot find actual numbers to help understand how important that mine is. Are we talking about 1, 10, 50, 70+ percent of the ultra pure quarts market? From what I can see the US doesn’t seem to be a large player

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