Rooftop solar is now cheaper than the grid in 42 American cities

Between 15% and 35% import duty on Chinese solar panels.

I don't know if that covers 100% of their externalities, but I'm sure in terms of "taxes paid for externalities caused" they are WAY ahead of any carbon industries now.

This probably wipes out most subsidies too.

Currently, as I understand, practically all residential PV coming online is grid-interactive without battery backup. The power companies actively oppose homeowners installing battery backup systems, because they're concerned about people charging their batteries using cheap power at night, and then selling that power back to the utility during the day. In some cases they have refused to approve PV installations with battery backup for this reason.

As a homeowner, I would find a system with battery backup to be more attractive than one that's useless in a power outage (though, granted, significantly more expensive, depending on capacity). While I understand the utilities' concern, I think there has to be a solution. Doesn't it stand to reason that with all this PV coming online, power prices in the middle of the day should drop, even below nighttime prices? And the prices should be highest on summer evenings? And that such a pricing pattern would supply the correct incentives to owners of PV systems with battery backup?

Dumping lots of solar power during the day makes usually efficient power generation inefficient.

When dealing with countries with a majority of coal-generation (like mine), it's even worse because they can't idle a coal plant, so they just keep it spinning and sell the power at a loss. This drives up the cost of the power for other times to subsidise the loss, and makes the overall market distorted. This then makes large scale capital investment for base load stations risky, meaning that grid instability is a given issue for the future.

The hand-wavers will say 'just use grid storage' - but the truth is that this is an order-of-magnitude more expensive than conventional generation.

When the push for design of energy generation stopped being an electrical engineering issue and became a social engineering issue, the seeds of the problem were sown.

The day when extreme cold or extreme heat shuts down a grid because of insufficient conventional generation will be the day people will realise.

I've also seen people argue against solar because it means that plant will have to run at variable temperatures, meaning less efficiency. This is also not true because gas stations usually output around 200MW a piece, and when you have 10s of these plants scattered you can stagger their shutdowns, allowing power plant operates to run efficiently longer.

[1]http://media.cns-snc.ca/ontarioelectricity/ontarioelectricit...

From an economic perspective, one solution is to buy home-generated solar power at the current wholesale rate, which changes throughout the day depending on supply and demand. This is usually lower than what consumers pay, although it may be higher during peak periods.

Since we have a natural gas glut right now, this isn't an immediate problem. Gas turbines go up and down in power in tens of seconds. It's an operational inconvenience, not a big problem. Things will get better if the battery guys ever deliver something cost effective at utility scale.

There is not really much to maintain in a standard residential solar installation as there are no moving parts. Except for the panels. They need to be kept clear of debris, dust, shade, snow (depending on geography).

It is my understanding that SolarCity does NOT maintain the surfaces. They will let you know of current degradation or fluctuations but it's up to you to debug / clear the problem.

In places with non-optimal solar climate I imagine that clearing the snow will be a pretty labor intensive job?

I don't believe there is too much confusion in terms of what alternative energy source work or do not. There are, however, plenty of entities pushing forward their interests.

For a quick run-down on the truly viable alternative sources:

Solar power:

* Works, it's sustainable, it will only get better. It has already reached grid parity in many markets, this trend will absolutely not reverse but continue. * Is nowhere near it's optimal efficiency, has tons of room for optimization of both cost efficiency and conversation efficiency (basically reducing the area required to reach a desired power output). * Requires a grid that is built with solar power in mind. Requires baseload generation, of which nuclear and natural gas are the best candidates (assuming the natural gas glut continues on).

Wind Power:

* Works, proven technology. It has reach grid parity in more markets than solar. * Is nearly at the limits of it's theoretical efficiency. There are pretty much only manufacturing cost and economy-of-scale gains to be had here, which I think really hurts wind power's future unless some sort revolutionary change happens in manufacturing process takes place. * Also needs a grid that plays nice with, with baseload assistance.

Hyro:

* Not much to say here, it's capped, very little room to grow. Extremely economically efficient but serious ecological effects.

Geothermal:

* See hydro, but will less serious ecological effects.

Biomass:

* Total crapfest. Until such time as we can bio-engineer some plant that turns sunlight directly into petrol or the like, biomass offers a a net gain to carbon emissions, especially in the case of corn. Sorghum/Sugar Cane is more interesting but hasn't panned out as of yet, mostly because of it being picky where it grows (it seems unwise to turn rain forest area into sorghum fields in the name of alternative renewable energy).

Nuclear:

* Massive amount of energy in a small form factor. * Potential for very bad accidents. (see: black swan event) * Nuclear proliferation concerns, nuclear waste to manage. * Decent economic efficiency. * Nuclear has a niche but can hardly be the world's power source. Would you want every country to be full of nuclear plants, including those whose governments change monthly, are prone to extreme corruption, etc. There are plenty of trade groups they are lobbying for support of "safe" nuclear technologies such as Thorium based breeder reactors, but the truth is these designs are almost entirely vaporwear, and have faults and dangers of their own.

I feel rather strongly the solar is the way forward, with nuclear in stable well-regulated countries for base load, with natural gas/hydro/wind/geothermal filling in the rest.

Untrue. Electric utility tariffs in California include both "Energy Rates" ($ per kWh in multiple tiers based on multiples of baseline monthly kWh usage) and "Minimum Charge Rates" ($ per meter per day, irrespective of usage).

With net zero usage, only the Minimum Charge Rate could be collected. But, given the way tariff setting works, if net zero was common, the Minimum Charge Rate would be much higher than it is now, to cover infrastructure, etc. costs.

The system also includes "standby reservation charges" for energy customers that are also energy generators, but small solar and some other generation systems that aren't selling energy as a primary function and are exporting only "incidental" amounts back into the grid are exempted from those charges under, e.g., PG&E's current tariff schedule. That limited exemption is more defensible as an unsustainable subsidy to small solar (and some other) generators than the basic net zero arrangement is.

Net metering can be a subsidy, but the act of paying for power is not inherently a subsidy, and should continue. There is no reason why people who generate power should not be paid market rate for it.

>Ad absurdum, consider if everyone purchased enough solar for their household to be net zero. The power companies would not be able to charge anything, but need to maintain the grid and provide power at night, cloudy days etc, with capital costs mostly the same as with 24x7 generation.

You're right, this is absurd. You've just declared power generation to be a cost free exercise.

>There's no way power companies would agree to net metering in a free market

I think it's absolutely hilarious that you can un-ironically use the phrase "free market" in the context of defending monopolistic power companies.

The reason why power companies don't agree to net metering is precisely BECAUSE it's the furthest possible thing from a free market (monopoly on infrastructure) and they don't like pesky competition.

'Very slightly higher electricity rates', 'fair share of contribution to solution of climate change'

The fact is, household solar panels has - rounded off to the nearest whole number - 0% changed the amount of co2 emitted in countries like the United States. This is because there has been no change in gas or coal power generation as a result of solar panels. The entire contribution of solar is still less than 1%.

Meanwhile the UK government started collecting statistics on fuel poverty and some areas had 15% fuel poverty - mainly in unemployed households in rented accommodation. This number has doubled since 2005, when 'fight global warming' policies by interfering in the energy market became popular and energy prices have doubled or more.

It's incomprehensible to me that anyone can say 'pay more, suckers, I got mine!' when we are talking about energy for people to keep their homes habitable. And all this for an ineffective response to a far-off problem.

I cannot fathom the popularity of such thinking, when the same people, if presented with any other taxation or cost increase on poor people to subsidise consumption of rich people - would say that it is unthinkable.

It takes 'suffer in silence, it's for your own good' thinking too far.

It kind of already is, which is why the fossil fuel industry panicked and got Obama to slap tariffs on cheap Chinese solar panels.

The cash payments for Teslas are just wrong. Subsidising the purchase of wealthy peoples cars using taxpayer money is indefensible IMO.

If I change the vehicle from a Tesla to a turbo diesel BmW SUV, is it still ethical? The X5 has lower emissions as well.

In other words, after projected solar generation is accounted for, the peak remaining power need for the specific grid in question is at 6-9 pm. (Other parts of the paper describe the "belly of the duck" being caused by "supply from solar generation resources" -- reducing the need for the rest of the grid to supply daytime power.) The paper in question may also be describing a residential-only grid.

Residential peak usage is from 6-9 pm, but when commercial/industrial power usage is accounted for, the peak is more like 2-6 pm. See the chart at around the 2/3 point of http://www.mpoweruk.com/electricity_demand.htm . Also note that residential demand may peak earlier on super hot / high sun days, as shown at http://blog.opower.com/2012/09/hot-and-heavy-energy-usage-ho... , and tends to peak later in the winter due to electric heaters kicking on in the evenings (https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachm... ).

Of course, I'm glossing over a lot of complexity here. Each region is going to be different depending on a lot of factors. But in general, having a decent amount of solar power generation can help meet demand at the peak of commercial/industrial demand.

If the cost of panels keeps dropping like this, i think a lot more money will go into electricity storage. no idea what that storage system might be though. with home generation, batteries aren't as encumbered by size and weight when compared to a car or a laptop. Maybe some big heavy battery tech will come along and give us a good chemical storage answer.

Maybe in the future, power is generated on rooftops, and large centralized installations store the excess energy till night - replacing some fraction of our current coal/oil/gas/nuke generating capacity.

The downside is that rivers of the size that can power a Hydro-dam are relatively rare, and ecological issues (flood zones, and whatnot) need to be taken into account.

So I'll amend my original post with Coal, Oil, Nuclear or Hydro.

Solar and Wind are absolutely terrible at "spin up" and "spin down". So other sources are needed to cover the differential.

Coal and nuclear fuel are simply used to boil water. The steam created in both plants is then passed through a steam turbine, which turns a generator. The turbine is finely tuned to a specific set of steam characteristics. These are generally related to temperature and pressure. The process of getting the steam loop up to the right temperature and pressure takes a significant amount of time and energy. Once it is at steady state, it is very efficient.

Natural gas turbines work differently. There is no steam. The natural gas is burnt directly in the turbine, much like a jet engine. Thus you can throttle it just like an airplane. There is some lag, but it is relatively responsive.

http://epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/gases/ch4.html

The IPCC predictions have all been revised downward with each report. The only thing that has increased is their 'confidence level' which is not statistical confidence but author confidence.

I don't know what will happen, but I do know that nobody else does, either. Every single simulation so far has been completely off by a factor which makes it worthless.

The only thing we can predict is that better, cheaper forms of energy will be produced, and these are likely to be lower emissions than what we have today. Pricing out lower income people in the present day in the hope of making a difference is morally wrong in thighs is context.

$2/gal isn't sustainable for anyone except consumers, and it won't last more than a few months.

Yep. See the Thiel essay about how the point of business is to acquire a monopoly, at which point you kick back and let the cash flow come in because there's no competition: http://www.wsj.com/articles/peter-thiel-competition-is-for-l...

One theoretical use of tariffs is to sacrifice economic efficiency in the short run to maintain healthy competition in the long run. Don't get me wrong -- tariffs also serve many more interests (protectionism, regulatory capture, etc.), but the there still is a short-term/long-term difference I think you're discounting.

All oil based products are less than 1%. Nat Gas is 27%, Coal 39%.