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Comment by dheera | Hacker News Reader

> less than 15 years

But can it pay itself in a month or two? That's the bar. I cannot financially plan for even one year later. Too many unknowns.

A really good coffee machine that can do lattes costs maybe $200. If lattes at coffee shops cost $8 including stupid high CA taxes and the stupid puppy face guilt tips, it pays for itself after ~35 lattes including supply costs, or just over a month. That's the bar for pretty much anything.

Figure out how to sell me $500 in solar panels that generates $500 worth of electricity over the next month and make it tax deductible with no income limits. That is how you cover the country in clean energy. FAST. Until politicians can get their act together, slam the hammer and make exactly this happen, we're going to be on dirty electricity for a long time.

That should especially be the bar for clean energy. Clean energy shouldn't be a luxury for the wealthy.

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Well first of all TFA is not talking about individuals buying solar or anything, so do we at least agree that renewables make sense for countries/state?

It seems like you have set an impossible bar for renewables so I don't know what to say to you. I do not think you'll be able to put a mini nuclear station, gas or coal one in your garden for less than the monthly electricity fee, so it's unclear to me what you are comparing it to.

The problem with giving money to individuals for their rooftop solar is that rooftop solar is not cost effective compared to large scale solar, if you really care about the planet and money is limited you should maximise the bang for your buck and help solar farms instead. But it's no secret that the current US administration is loudly anti-renewable and not keen on helping either of them.

I'm just saying what needs to happen in order for people to be lining up for solar in hordes and convert the country to renewable overnight.

The IRS needs to say: "We value clean energy in our country, we can live without nickel-and-diming people on the income used to make their solar purchase"

The Fed needs to say: "We value clean energy in our country, we can lend money to businesses at 0% interest, for the sake of supporting our country's clean future. Heck, -10% interest if you deploy today!"

The president needs to say: "We value clean energy in our country, we want solar as fast as possible, we will impose 0% tariffs on panels regardless of wherever they came from"

Wall Street needs to say: "We value clean energy in our country, it is saving the country from a multi-trillion dollar climate disaster, therefore we value solar companies at 100X their current valuations because that's what they are truly worth"

Solar companies need to say: "We aren't here to optimize profits; our only KPI is deploy solar as fast as possible"

The government needs to say to solar companies: "Do it! And don't worry if you're unprofitable, we value averting a 10 trillion climate crisis and will subsidize your losses from that 10 trillion loss that we averted"

Yeah, I know, it sounds impossible. Humans are shits, and they won't do the above. That's why the climate disaster is happening.

One thing that gets neglected by policymakers is that our top priority for energy policy should be resiliency. That means distributed systems with varied generation sources, without dependence on foreign suppliers.

This requires regulation unfortunately as it is inherently less efficient and cost optimized than the 1-2 solutions the market will coalesce around.

Solar + batteries are great but if the panels and cells all come from China we can’t base our energy future on that. We’d just be trading the Strait of Hormuz for the Taiwan Strait.

I know the USA can build forests of wind turbines that stretch from horizon to horizon. I’ve seen it in central Indiana. But can we do the same with solar cells and batteries?

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