The WAR on Residential Solar
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- čas přidán 2. 03. 2022
- There's a War on Residential Solar. Check out our sponsor Lomi, the electric composter that works in hours! links.pela.earth/ricky
Solar energy is one of our favorite things, and it's been a great few decades for the proliferation of residential solar. But a new bill proposed by California law makers, might completely alter the future of Solar in the Golden State. Let's take a deeper dive into what this really means today on Two Bit da Vinci!
Link to Solar Bill: docs.cpuc.ca.gov/SearchRes.as...
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I was a Senior Engineer at the CA PUC. PG&E is by far the most incompetent of the three big CA utilities. Engineers at PG&E have no voice in that organization; management is all lawyers and MBAs, so they have no interest or ability to safely supply electricity. They should thank the heavens that solar has taken load off their ancient fire-starter grid, not punish PV owners.
It’s gotten to the point that every time a new fire starts I turn to my wife and say, “$50 it was a utility company?”
@@SaveMoneySavethePlanet Every time I see a fire I think here comes all the lawyers. Everyone acts like the utilities can just print money but in reality they just pass their costs onto their customers.
Exactly! As an engineer YOU should be in charge! But since we have all accepted this privatize the profit but keep the costs public this is what you get! Schemes to make the public pay for obvious upgrades and laws that ensure ongoing profits even AFTER they make themselves obsolete!
As senior engineer, what is your opinion of Lomi as advertised in this video? It is advertised as a food composter, in reality it is a total scam, food dehydrator... using (wasting)lots of energy to dry out food overnight, so you can put it in the green bin or compost pile, where it was going anyway! Remove the machine entirely and save the cost of buying it and the energy wasted.
@@thecaretaker812 You are so right. All these whiney CA crybabies.
I'm so happy that I went off grid 5 years ago and don't have to deal with any of this. The government will always change the rule book on you to their advantage remember that.
@@kayakMike1000 only if you make dumb choices.
It's impossible not to make dumb choices in California when everything government tell you is a lie. And then Newsom/democratics will lie about the LIE. If you come to California be sure and get a ticket for the bullet train. The cost is only $14,764 for EVERY person in California.
@@Uvoted4this it's work to make decisions about anything you read, even your post.
@@HansSchulze I’m curious we’re your dumb choices and government oversight are misaligned. Please educate individuals on what “dumb” choices people are making and how to solve them. Instead of insinuating that individuals who disagree with California policies are merely idiots who continue to make dumb choices. Their is many reasons people dislike California. It’s why they have atrocious population growth, or shrinkage as is the reality. Those millions of Americans who moved out of California are all making “dumb” decisions? Or is it simply you making a dumb statement. Context bring clarity.
yes it's government, but who influenced the governments? In CA, dwp/edison, pge, sdge, are trying to protect profits and bonuses. They influence government. i have seen graphs where electricity production has declined in CA since 2008. That's not usage, however only production and delivery to end customers matter to those companies....because that hurts revenues......and then profits and bonuses. Increased housing solar installation is an existential crisis for these companies.
In Australia, the energy providers will limit your solar grid feed in and also control your battery so the maximum you can save in usage is 20% ... Disgusting!
In germany it gotten even worse, you are not allowed to go off the grid. You need to measure all the produced, used self collected, transfer into grid and pulls from grid electricity.
Self produced and used is tax free (not that they were trying tax that), but when you "sell" it to the grid they pay you the basic price net. , when you buy it back you have to pay the full tax...there was the point where batteries were installed. They handle you like a producer and when needed as a consumer, that's why a lot of pump storages got closed down (and storage projects hot canceled) you would loose money with every cycle
@@mammutMK2 seems like the energy companies have money in every governmental pocket. its pretty ludicrous!
@@mammutMK2 we used to call that slavery.
@@mammutMK2 They'll be implementing the same system in the Netherlands. Currently they're just crossing off your production against your usage and pay you the full price when you produce more than your consume. This means economically, my PV system generates money(like _a lot), as I over-dimensioned the system 😅 Simply so it could accommodate future heatpumps, airconditioners etc).
But they'll be scrapping that in a few years, I believe in 2025, but probably a bit later(hopefully _after_ I've paid off my PV installation), so you'd be paying 20 cents pro KWh when consuming and only get 6 cents or something close to that when producing. Since most consumption is going to be during the evening, it'll render most PV systems no longer economically viable. I'm seriously considering a battery system so I can charge during the day, use it during the night, so I don't have to draw from the grid during the evening / night.
Compared to many households, my monthly energy bill of 60 euros for both electricity and gas combined is ridiculously low. Apart from having a fixed-price gas contract for 3 years signed when gas prices were okay, the little gas we use(I also have a wood stove and a solar boiler, which suppy approx 50%-60% of the heat we use) is completely offset by the electricity the PV produces. Most of the bill is just a fixed fee used for grid maintenance.
There's reason for why they do that and grid fed solar makes it worse because the companies have to make assumptions on how much power is required at any given time because the more power fed into the grid the higher the voltage rises and at certain voltages things start will shutdown, overload or potentially catch fire.
Should be allowed to go offgrid though as here in Australia we pay about $100-$150 a quarter just as a supply charge.
So let me figure out here, I paid for the panels, invertors , and installation and now I have to pay others that didn't make that investment, starting to look like a tax to me. If this happens in NC, I will invest a little more and go off the grid, then no one will benefit from my investment except me. And no I am not rich, just work hard and lived without other nice things so as to pay for the solar, thinking I was saving the planet and reducing the load on the power company. Sleep with one eye open my friends, the wolf is always watching to take what is yours away from you.
Exactly - Less government = much happier & prosperous life.
@@Random-rt5ec The next Law will be communities saying you are not allowed to go off grid..... in fact I have seen that happen in more than a few states already.
Yup, CA has the most incompetent idiots in gov. All you hear is "equity" and all this fluff language with agendas behind your back.
Already did it all at the same time. Off-Grid 3 weeks. 20.64PV, 132kWh barttery.
I saw your post after making my own post saying almost the same thing. People will buy larger battery systems and go offgrid completely and the utilities well have to take up the slack. That means they'll need more power plants and more transmission lines... all while PG&E cannot seem to trim the bushes around their existing power lines.
I will always love how dedicated to educate are these educational youtubers. From historians to technologists to bakers to builders. I truly respect them hard work to make videos like this.
lomi scam alert
@@p.chuckmoralesesquire3965 Bigtime bro
@@thecaretaker812 I was with this youtuber guy until he started hustling that hunk of sht and now I see the cope he's doing here: there is no war on "residential solar" but a few rich entitled brats who insist the government pay them because they happened to have $40K laying around in 2010 to get in early on solar scams. Hard pass here, I'm not paying more for energy/taxes because these leeches are trying to revise the history of their scams.
100% correct
thunderfoot busted lomi though and I believe he's a true science man, so that's a minus for this video
Here in Norway our electric bill is in two parts the first part is called a grid rent and it is paid to the parent organizations (state) it goes to maintenance and expansion of the grid.
Part two of the bill is paid to subsidiaries were we pay a variable rate depending on time of day, time of year and so on as solar, water and wind power varies through the season as our needs.
This is probably the best system. Treating the grid "like the stock market" is a pretty objectively terrible idea and its not possible because the stock market has brokers (which would be like utility scale batteries that don't actually exist).
Presumably if you’re not connected to the grid (totally self-sufficient) then you don’t pay the grid rent?
@@garychadwick1240 Yes of course :))
U r adding a post to mostly American folk. Their systems r often screwy louiey
That's because us Americans voted in an Alzheimer patient to lead us.
We’ve had a 4 kw system since 2010 but no battery was offered. We just added a 9.6 kw system to that that has a battery and are loving it. We have battery backup in case of a power outage but the battery also powers the house during the evening and night and then gets recharged during the day before we start exporting energy to the grid. Can’t wait to see what this does during the summer.
If you are in Australia then pay back time for battery is 20 years. We have 4.5kw solar which has paid for itself, today I declined the battery quote for AU$5600 for 10kw battery.
Nobody should be wasting labor money to put one in a house. V2G will make them worthless soon enough anyway
@@dj__grizzly Will's stuff is the budget DYI version and isn't exactly comparable to the commercial, tested, prepackaged, and supported product that quote would be for. Also that is $5600AUD which is $3960USD. $400USD/kWh isn't that far off the DYI systems Will is making so probably not a bad price. Just the batteries of the cheapest he has found are still in the 300s, and by the time you add batteries from a known and reliable manufacturer, the BMS and charger, you are very close to that 400 mark.
some other yt-ers here have said they art least get small cheques back
So you have a battery and solar yet you are still connected to the grid. How much are you paying to be connected to the grid? Why stay connected if you can be self sufficient?
LOMI is not a composter: it is a food waste grinder. Compost takes months of natural processes to break down the waste.
Guy wants to be green and he paid a grand to waste $$ and power making his house smell like shit and emit more CO2 than just tossing the trash... like a normal person.
Worse still, this dessicated waste doesn't compost as well outdoors - enzymes need water in their structures to break down waste. This product is a huge scam.
The biggest factor in net metering was left out of this video. SDG&E broke the fee per KWh into two parts: 1) generation: and 2) transmission. The transmission part is fixed at $0.39 per KWh and the generation portion is what varies by time of use (between $0.07 and $0.15 per KWh). So if I use 1 KWh at midnight I pay $0.46 for it and if I use 1KWh at 6:00 PM I pay $0.54 per KWh. For the extra electricity I generate at noon I only get paid $0.07 because that is the generation fee. I never put solar on my house to make money off of it, I put it in to reduce my usage to below the threshold for tier 3 pricing (which was the previous rate plan) where the cost per KWh doubles. SDG&E has effectively used the PUC to neutralize any benefit to having solar and are now trying to make if cost more per KWh for solar customers then non-solar customers.
Transmission is how they kill you. same in Michigan.
I've been considering getting solar but have found the rate plans just too confusing. A few questions then. Hope you can help to clarify.
1. Under the old Net Metering 2, ideal is to generate just enough from solar that it's used at that instant? $0.07/kWh for any additional capacity is so close to zero that essentially means you're giving free power back to the utility.
2. Under NM2, it's practically impossible to zero out the the electric bill (without battery storage)? With solar generated power banked at $0.07/kWh but nightly rate $0.20/kWh, that's a 3x price differential. This means that if I were to use 10kWh at night, I would have had to generated 30kWh excess during the day to zero out?
3. Under NM3, I'd be screwed with a solar install even with battery storage? That $8/kW of base fee means for a 8kW solar install, I'd get a $64/monthly bill, period? This is on top of whatever electricity I pull from the grid, right?
@@RobertLeeAtYT In my opinion getting solar in general is a good idea, I put up my ~4Kw system myself in 2013 and it paid for itself in less than three years. I'll be honest - I don't understand the ever evolving rate system myself as it currently exists, which I believe is intentional on the part of the utilities. I recently reviewed six months of my energy usage in detail at the hour resolution to try to identify what was still costing me so much on my electric bill.
The only approach I could identify was to exclusively use electricity while I was generating it, otherwise it was costing a fortune. There is some weirdness in my usage data I downloaded from SDGE. It showed my house using 1Kw continuously all night even though nothing significant is turned on - I haven't gotten to the bottom of that yet.
Before I got solar, and under the four tier system, my electric bills would get up to $450 some months ($350 of which came from the top two tiers) . After I installed solar they were in the $150 - $250 range, When I changed my behavior to only run big appliance during solar positive hours my bill dropped to about $90.
I know that every rate increase since the 2001 California energy crisis has been born by high usage residential customers (by increasing the top two tier costs). Those are the same people who are getting solar now which is why SDGE changed their rate structure - the cash cows they were milking for 20 years left the farm. Every change they make to the billing system is an effort to get the high usage residential customers to pay more regardless of the justification, because if they can't then commercial and low usage residential users will have to pay their share - and that's what's happening now and why it's in the news.
Yup. Our company invested 5 million in a solar farm. Once the fees and net metering gets added to the bill, it completely blew out our ROI. We looking at a 20 year pay back.
I'm in a coop in Texas. I still get 1 to 1 net metering, but my minimum bill is $20. A $10 meter fee, and a $10 distributed generation fee.
its you are tied to a grid thats normal maintenance fees
I am in Pennsylvania I get 1 to 1 net metering. Minimum $15.50/ month when I export more than I import (April-September). My export kW's are stored and I get credit for them in the winter which which offsets my usage and keeps me paying the minimum through December. Every 3 years I sell my Solar Credits (1 credit/MegaWatt around 60 MWatts) for $45/credit. This system works great for us even though PA is not near as sunny as further South. PA has no other incentives for installation. I got my system when the Feds had the 30% tax rebate.
This is really asinine. They knew that when they were incentivizing getting solar that only certain classes of people could/would be abke to afford it, now that their policies are failing they think adding another failure policy will fix it. They are daft. They should do like you said and just tell folks to get a battery, incentivize that and then the power that those folks return to or don't use from the grid can be sold to the less fortunate for a reduced cost. What do I know though, I'm just a country boy from Oklahoma. Lol.
I don't call passing a law in california --effective jan 2020-- that ALL new construction (residential) must have solar power "incentivizing". Not sure about the laws for new commercial buildings.
I have a home solar system that generates about 11MWhr per year. In total, this is almost enough to power my house and our 2 Teslas for the year. I live in the mountains of Colorado. Our local power company offers me net metering on an annual basis. It is different than any of the plans you describe but, yes, they act as my battery. When I look at the seasonal variation in generation and consumption I don’t see how batteries would take me “off the grid”. I generate as much as 1500KWh in June and as little as 300KWh in December, while my monthly consumption is skewed in the opposite direction ~1400KWh per month in the winter and 800 in the summer (roof heaters to prevent ice dams in the winter and no need for much air conditioning in the summer). I heat with natural gas and I know that it would be better for the environment replace my current system to replace my current system with an electric powered system…which would further increase my power consumption in the winter. Net…no matter what I do with batteries, I’ll still need the grid to cover my needs for 3-5 months of the year.
You’re absolutely right. You aren’t in the best area for solar. To be truly off grid you need effective t appliances, a schedule in when you you operate these appliances and batteries.
I guess for your home you could make it work with batteries if you had even more solar. Long story short. Off grid is pointless unless you’ve got money to burn.
How's the wind in your area?
@@lordgarion514 Most afternoons we have fairly strong west winds.
Use firewood heating system.
You need more PV and 132kWh minimum battery.
Just so you know , an in-depth review of Lumi found it was actually the #1 rank of non-effecient compositing machines .
We chose not to go net-metering , to many rules here in kentucky , even though your chart didn't include Kentucky , they offered it here when we inquired .
As far as the electric companies helping , they only help themselves , there's no genuine interest in helping anyone . they're interested in penalizing those which choose solar because solar users are independent and eventually hold no dependencies on the grid therefore significantly lowering their trillion dollar revenue .
There's only a few things in life corporations hold hostage , food , gas , heat , electric , water , housing & transportation . Their only interest is buying bigger yachts .
I can tell you now that this video is gonna get nice views because its impact and topic is directly related to people. I just mention that because I know you / your team has asked questions about content before and why it didnt resonate / get viewed.
This immediatley piqued my interested!!
Yo Ive....They feel like they have the right to tax our God Given right to live under the sun....
It's wild but nobody thinks it through when the gov is giving out money / subsidies.
Then charging just to have solar is WILD tho!! That's why I would never count on getting money back from the electric company.
Considering this, I may never do an IV grid system. I was never quite did on the idea anyway.
And good to see you!
Yea! I actually called the governor twice, signed the petition, and went to the protest to get this proposal pushed back!
Honestly, I have no doubts that the net metering program eventually needs updated but these changes were obviously made to crush the solar industry. We have to get solar 100% rolled out, but changing to a program like this will just destroy growth!
So glad to see big channels also reporting on these important topics!
These California laws seem bad but I've heard of worse - I know Arizona, Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky are all pretty bad and some places have made permits and inspections both harder to get and more expensive - and the worse might be proposed laws to charge you a not on grid tax.
@@billybobhobnob101 yea. As someone who primarily cares about decarbonizing the grid…I didn’t have to read past the first paragraph of articles where they said “these changes are projected to cut residential solar installs in half by 2030.”
Like I said, I’m all for tweaks to make the system more equitable, it I believe that we can do that while either maintaining our current install rate or even accelerating.
Dude many states don't require smart metering and as a homeowner you get NO credit for power you might put out on the grid. CA has a REAL problem right now with power generation and companies making enough money.
What would help more than anything else is companies/investors making large investments into solar FARMS in the state, and the state doing everything it can to minimize burden to getting this done. And this has to include the cost of grid storage. But not Tesla grid storage, instead ESS grid storage which is earth friendly and makes much more sense for places with plenty of land which is where solar farms would go. The investment is into better long range power transmission and the Fed. govt. is supposed to be helping with a grid upgrade, and CA BETTER be using that money correctly, or it's in for a world of hurt.
CA has never ending costs for the grid, it's called nuclear power, and decommissioning these plants is impossible. They are always in a state of being decomm'd. You can never get rid of the spent fuel because there's no long term storage facility in the US. The best you can do in CA is have ONE of those nuclear facilities upgraded to house all the nuclear waste from the different plants that have existed in the state, and at least you can minimize the cost, AFTER the investment to consolidate spent fuel.
@@johndoh5182 I agree with the upgrades that you want to see get done, but I don’t think that needs to be done at the cost of rolling out residential solar.
The only reason I dislike this proposal is because it feels like it is a way over correction. Why not just have net metering end after 5 years (when the average system is paid off)? If we’re worried about equity, why not start a program that specifically gives grants to poor people and apartment buildings to build solar?
This proposal seems crafted specifically in order to make people stop building residential solar and that’s what I take issue with.
Sounds to me like it's a battery sales program.
The problem is that there are so many market distortions packed upon one another:
1) electricity production and retail are not natural monopolies, they should be open to competition. Only the grid operation is a natural monopoly.
2) the cost of pollution is not priced in enough.
3) Net metering to compensate for 1 and 2.
4) a fixed charge to compensate for 3.
In the UK, energy providers have started introducing variable electricity rates so if people get batteries they can optimise the time of day they extract energy and sell energy to the grid. A massive distribution of household batteries can thus be used to stabilise rather than destabilise the grid.
Ya, the tier two net metering is the way to go. No one should have to pay for the privilege of providing electricity to the grid.
then who pays to upgrade and maintain the grid ?
@@ryanhayes9008 The utility, from the money they make selling the electricity they got from rooftop solar providers (customers).
@@williammeek4078 but if you and every one else supplies to the grid what to do with power stations , cheaper batteries is the answer i think . and lots of people who cant afford solar have to buy power from those who can , yeah nice one .
@@ryanhayes9008 sell power to the east coast. They will be at peak duck curve just as California solar is peaking.
I don't know if this will "kill solar as we know it, " in California, but that's exactly what a similar program change did in Nevada.
I'm new to your channel and enjoying your videos. I'm in Utah. I saved up and did DIY solar a few years ago with a battery in a zero-export setup, but I leave a lot on the table. I probably only yield half the available kilowatt hours from my panels because It typically only takes ~4 hours to charge the battery on top of my day load. With my current setup I have the ability to even sell stored energy to the grid with time of day, but for me, after having dealt with the city inspector in the past, I decided to avoid dealing with it all together.
I think the regulation of the equipment and of the install needs to be examined, because it seems to add a lot of red tape and expense.
Also, like the main topic of this video, how residential solar is integrated into the whole grid needs to be re-examined. It needs to be in effect a marketplace for electricity where you get paid or pay according to the ongoing rates, and the infrastructure needs to be paid for in proportion to how much energy you transfer i.e. if you live in a mansion with a large grid-tie only solar array, you can zero your bill for the amount of energy purchased, but not for the heavy use of your grid connection. You would be among the heaviest domestic users of the infrastructure and should pay a fair piece in maintaining it.
However, you have energy storage, and buy low and sell high, now you are an active participant in balancing the grid and you get a certain amount of energy freedom separate from the grid. I could see in the future where every home has PV and battery and sunny cities end up as net exporters to the rest of the grid.
Even those that don't have access to their own PV could have their own participation in the marketplace with energy storage while also have their own energy backup.
I live in northern Florida (panhandle) and have 40 panels installed in 2019. I have net-metering. Last year I made an excess of 5.5 MWh which is generally enough to power a home for 5-6 months. The power company bought that back at the end of the year for 3.3 cents per KWh for only $180. Just this year I have generated 3.1 MWh and used 748 KWh for so far a 2.3MWh credit. I pay a base rate to use net-metering in the teens$. The problem about the powerwall is that is has a 5 Kw output max. My central AC uses just about that and the dryer is over 7 Kw. Electric heating is about 12-13 Kw so to heat a house you would need at least 3 Powerwalls just to heat. A house would drain a powerwall in just an hour to heat a house. My Enphase app on my phone can shows me exactly how much energy each device uses when a baseline is established. Also I had to get a million dollar additional liability policy for the house/system before the town would allow it to be used. It is only $240/year. Max output for my system is 9.6KWh per hour. The most I have ever generated in a day is just below 80KWh which is enough to charge over 6 powerwalls. Cost was 42.5k and after tax rebate I paid around low 30's. The most power per month at least here in Fla max's out in April/May because after that the afternoon clouds and thunderstorms limits production during the summer and more humid months. I recommend home solar highly!! BTW I retired on Tesla stock and a huge fan of Elon and Tesla but I am a net metering fan vs a Powerwall fan. Love your channel.
Get a heat pump. Make sure your home is properly insulated. If you are still using that much energy to heat and cool your home then there is a problem.
Solutions: 1. A dryer with heat pump only use 800 W peak and 1 kWh for a 8 kg load.
2. A heat pump for heating gives SCOP around 4-5, so 1 kWh in gives you 4-5 kWh out on seasonal average.
The max power required is usually only 1-3 kW. The rest is taken from air, or the ground.
Powerwalls can be daisy chained, so installing multiple is mostly a matter of upfront cost.
There's cheaper ways of heating other than just pure electrically, heatpumps(some AC's also allow to function as a heater!), wood stoves etc.
That's why I want to build an underground house which stays at about 60-65 degrees year-round regardless of surface temperature. Go with all LED lighting and high-efficiency appliances. The electronics would generate some heat and it would not take much to warm it another 10 or so degrees. During summer months you would simply need to pull in a little of the outside warm air.
As an addendum, I'll also lay out the problem that the CPUC is trying to correct. Right now the main problem is net-metering for solar customers (being able to deliver power to the grid in the middle of the day and net it against power taken overnight after the sun is down) is extremely unfair to non-solar customers because it allows solar customers to zero-out their bill even though those customers still depend on the grid to operate as a big virtual battery for them. At a minimum, then, it is obvious that all customers should pay for grid maintenance.
There is a way to make this fair while still promoting home solar and storage solutions, and goes something like this:
* All customers pay a fee roughly according to their average peak consumption on the daily cycle. Take peak consumption each day for the whole year, average those peak numbers, and pay a fee according to that number.
* $/kWh prices to customers should drop to basically wholesale levels (with reasonable regulatory limits so we don't wind up in the same situation Texas customers were in), or something close to wholesale levels. Actual wholesale levels, not the utility's mangling of wholesale vs transmission vs distribution which intentionally pads the transmission and distribution side of the equation (in my opinion anyway). That breakdown of costs has to be right-sized as well. $0.04/kWh for generation vs $0.40/kWh for transmission and distribution makes no sense.
* Power sent to the grid by a home solar or solar+battery customer should also pay the customer the same $/kWh that the customer would pay were the power going the other direction. That is, a NET-TOU style tariffs that works the same in both directions.
* Low-income and other economic programs for Californians would simply reduce the peak consumption fee for those customers.
And that's it. This is what NEM 3.0 should have been. Instead, we got a set of tariffs that were heavily corrupted towards the utilities and extremely detrimental to all customers, and in particular to solar and battery installations. I'm sure the utilities were salivating at the prospect of being able to charge customers an additional monthly fee for installations that the customers paid for out of their own pockets. The result was an unethical and frankly illegal set of tariffs and the CPUC was about to vote 'YES' to that monstrosity, which also demonstrates just how corrupted the CPUC has become.
-Matt
I agree , some one has to pay to maintain and expand the grid .
Longest dumbest statement on this thread is your rant
A minor charge to be connected to the grid is one thing. $8/kw of installed solar is crazy. I have 4kw of solar and a Power Wall and have a NG backup generator. If they want to charge me more to be hooked up to the grid than what I used to spend for full service I will just drop the grid. Last year there were only 20 or so days when I used more electricity than I produced and every month I generate at least a 200kwh surplus. Last year my solar generated ~7500kwh and I used ~3000kwh to power my house. What keeps me connected now is my limited reserve capacity but either a BEV with VTH charging or expanded storage will alleviate that.
@@matthewhuszarik4173 does your city regulate that you have to be on grid or no?
@@CariMachet No you aren’t required to be hooked up.
Awesome! I never thought of just getting the battery portion, since our sky/roof situation isn't ideal for solar cost.
This is part of what I like about the idea. You can get a battery now and then still upgrade with panels later if price/efficiency gets to where you need it!
The suggestion to install battery and use it on peak rate hours sounds great in theory but… I recently installed a solar system with a battery and found out later that there is no way to program the specific hours during which you want the system to use the battery instead of the grid. The specific controller my system has was made by SolarEdge. I don’t know what other manufacturers have, but I recommend to anyone that plans to install a battery to verify that the controller can be programmed to control the energy flow based on time of day, and day of week.
"War on residential solar" is an understatement... There are better ways to reward solar being sent to the grid, other than charging for the privilege. What a put-off...!
Whoever thought that one up is one brick short of a full load, and is as much use as a chocolate tea-pot... :)
I remember reading the first line of the article which said “we predict the payback period for the average array will go from 5 years to 15”.
And frankly, I was shocked that they STILL tried to make an argument for the proposal after that!
They are a pallet short of full load.
Many people think of that. In Germany we had a pv proposal 2 years ago, that was heavily influence by the energy lobby. They wanted monthly grid fees for every kwp of PV you build. The reasoning was that energy customers with pv take less energy out of the grid, so they pay less grid fees than other customers. But the idea is stupid. Nobody would build roof PV facing east or west anymore, because you need around 30% more kwp for the same production as south facing. Not only would you pay 15-20% more for the system, you would also pay 30% more grid fees, if your house's roof isn't facing south. From a grid perspective east/west is even more valuable production, because it produces energy earlier and later in the day.
One thing that's always puzzled me about feed-in tariffs is that a sufficiently ambitious system could concievably pay nothing to the utility. This would mean paying nothing for the upkeep and maintenance of the grid which the homeowner would depend on for power when it gets dark. This might be workable at first to get PV installations started in your region but it's not sustainable. A base fee to cover grid maintenance works as long as it's A) fairly calculated and B) applies to everyone, not just PV owners. The first charge on your bill should be the monthly grid maintenance fee and THEN the charge for the kwh's you used. This would incentivise peope who don't have PV's to also consider batteries.
It's somewhat misleading in this case. While not all customers can do this there is certainly a possibility that a customer that can completely scale their demand down to zero at any time is actually a negative cost to the utility. The base fee concept being put only on EV owners suggests lack of investment on the part of the utility operators to make their grid adaptable to renewables.
@@Furiends us solar guys power ourself at night with battery. Not sure what he means that we are dependent on night grid. We are not.
So to be fair, the utilities should be paying solar users for the upkeep of THEIR systems too. Right? I mean if your inverter goes down replacing it is out of your pocket. Solar panels last 20+ years and eventually need replacing. Does the utility plan on picking up the tab for any part of that? Of course not. They should be rewarding people for putting up the money for solar on their homes, not trying to impose a tax on them... because it is in essence a tax backed by the force of law... that gets passed on to the utility.
@@BeerIndependence4All Well if the utility doesn't own the power plant do they pay the company that does? To be fair it's alot easier for a utility to contract with a few 1+ GHz generators than with a multitude of small pv owners that only generate during the day.
We intend to invest in a PV system in the next year or two. We're probalby going to add a new heat exchanger for both heating and cooling to cut our gas bills by more than half. I'm hoping to put the money we don't spend on hydro and gas into an account to save up for a battery system that we'll use to charge our next car that will be at least a hybrid.
If your thinking twenty + years ahead you should be banking and/or investing the money you save.
Dude your crappy panels are worthless without nem. Nem blocks commercial competition, the second that’s gone you’re priced out
I got my solar system in 2014 its a 12 kw system but its leased for 20 years, can I add a battery to this system if it's leased?
Utility companies are basically monopolies and the only thing keeping them from screwing you over is government regulation. But what if powerwalls/powerpacks + autobidder can become a competitor for peaker plants and change the equation, at least for times of high demand?
Honestly, I think it’s an incredibly interesting idea. Plus, it leaves you open to adding solar later if price/efficiency gets to the point that you find useful.
sorry, but utilities and governments are working together to screw the consumer when it comes to electricity, especially in CA
The utility companies own the government. Why do u think the rebates comes from the government (our taxes) and not the utility companies? Grid tie home solar produces 3x what the home owner uses and that same home owner still have to pay for electricity. What a joke.
Oklahoma already has added rates for those who have solar, not to mention a huge tax on buying solar cells. It's also illegal to disconnect from the grid so even if you produce 100% of your own energy you have to pay an increased rate utility bill.
Slavery. Great incentive to build a parallel system with a transfer switch and just not use anything off the grid.
@@Patrick_Cashman slavery lol. Ok.
I am looking forward to the day when I can buy power directly from my solar neighbors. I would be happy to pay more than what the utility is paying my neighbor for their solar electrons, understanding that it will be significantly less than what the utility currently is charging me for the same power. Besides, why do I have to pay for electricity, destination and hundreds of miles of transfer charges when the electrons are coming from across the street from my solar neighbor and I have to pay full price for it?
good luck managing that
@@joecoolioness6399 : Software can do anything!
Brilliant idea-it would be like Turo for power!
Love to see the battery solution comment explored, cost compared for just adding a battery and charging off electricity and use during high use periods
This additional charge was proposed in Nova Scotia Canada. There was vigorous push back by the solar installer industry and solar users. As a result the power company removed that section from the requested rate increase. There is talk now about making bi directional EV charging units mandatory in the building code for all new homes. The idea is - we tell the power company how we want to charge our car and they use our battery as storage for the grid. They say there are not enough batteries to supply home and EVs right now now. All battery material is designated for EV batteries. This is from a webinar discussion with Jeffery Dahn (of Tesla / lithium ion battery / Dalhousie university). The selling feature is you can integrate your car battery to power your home when power is out. I’m still leaning to the far side of “no. Not comfortable with someone else controlling my charging”
Not questionable crops, crops with questionable laws infringing on them.
It used to be that going solar without batteries was cheaper. Interesting thought that going battery without solar might now be the best option.
The real problem is that our utilities are monopolies and any power produced by us is power not sold to us. As such, the utilities need to produce less and therefore make less revenue. And like any government entity, all they care about is revenue. The more we save on electricity consumption, the more they will find a way to charge us. They are incapable of seeing lower production as a good thing. Our buying less power means they make less money, period. And they will always find a way to legislate around that.
And as always, those left behind will be those of less means, that will be stuck paying ever higher rates for the same amount of electricity.
The real problem is that as we reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, the reliability of our electrical grid is impacted. Off grid solar is quickly becoming a question of survival.
Only the grid is a natural monopoly, production and retail can easily be opened up to the market.
Reminds me of when Santa Barbara county asked it’s citizens to reduce their water consumption during the drought. Then they reduced it “too much” so the water company raised everyone’s price so their bill was essentially the same as before.
It costs $0 to produce electricity, yet the utility needs $X to pay salaries, maintain the generating plants, grid, and pay back loans. Less current going down the wires just means they have to charge more for what does to cover the fixed costs.
@Sean Houde:Government entities are the ones who only care about revenue? Strange concept, especially in today's Capitalism.
Will they charge this fee if your system is not grid tie? I'm currently testing a system that is entirely load-side, essentially off-grid. How it works is that behind my panel there is a transfer switch that switches individual branch circuits to a solar inverter and battery bank system. The switchover is about 20ms and barely noticeable. I currently set it to consume from battery and solar from 6am to midnight, and then switch back to the grid between 12am to 6am. It works remarkably well and my daily grid usage is around 5-6kWh with a 20kWh battery system and 2kW solar. The system will be scaled out to 6.6kW solar and 48kW battery, with the full system built out to 10kW solar. I suspect if this solar tax takes root, people will install this kind of system.
I feel less screwed by power company now thank you for the education! My utility in Colorado limits my installed solar production capacity to 120% of prior year consumption, they pay about 40% of retail rate back to me (usually around $100 per year) for my excess production and they charge $300 per year for access to the grid and their retail rate has been dropping past couple of years. After viewing first part of your video this now seems like a decent deal to me. I really want a battery system but the grid here is ultra reliable and with the net metering I see zero financial reason to invest in storage.
Over the last few years, the cost of solar panels have reached to less than $1 USD per watt. Thus to produce, at least theoretically, 10,000 Watts would cost $10,000 (in reality though, a 100 Watt solar panel outputs under the best possible conditions 90 Watts). The expensive part has been, until recently, to cost of storing electrical power. When the Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiPO4) battery technology went into production and neatly packaged with inverters and control systens, yielding 5000 Watts of electrical storage for less than $3,000 or 18,000. This capacity in electrical production and storage makes being off-grid possible. It also means when the grid is down, power continues in those homes with solar energy production and storage. These units have at least a 10 year warranty due to the battery chemistry.
It heavy investment upfront, but with the average annual electric bill at about $2000 and tax rebate incentives, in a few years the system will pay for themselves
Absulutly spot on with battery advice! In the UK on peak electricity prices are about to go way above 45c a KWh off peak 9c a KWh. So a house battery make 100% sense and is a no-brainer.
What's caused that 🤔... The push for renewables.
We are in northern Australia and have had solar/battery for 2 years - big investment but we are really saving money. We run the pool pump, dish washer and washing machine during the day and use battery power for lights, tv etc in the evening. Our ducted AC had to be connected to the grid as the power draw caused the battery system to overload.
I live in North Texas where we installed 14.6 kWh solar system with 2x Tesla Powerwall 2.0 in February 2019 and enjoyed generally $0 electric bill earning credits and even got paid for our excess energy production during 2020 and 2021 when we didn't drive as much of our electric car due to pandemic lifestyle changes. During that time, retail electric plans that we started with went out of style, so in 2022 when my original plan would no longer renew, I could still find 1-1 plans without fixed fee components that would accumulate credit (ex: during fall-spring) and then use those credits during under production (ex: summer), but none that will pay for overall over production at end of term. I expect the next time I have to renew or get a new retail electric plan, I won't be able to find one that doesn't have a fixed cost component like many of them already had when I got my current plan.
Reasonable or otherwise, while the price of solar panels and batteries might be going lower, the attractiveness of the retail electric plans to go with that are becoming less good.
The greatest challenge to be 100% off-grid isn't what batteries can provide to get you through night or through cloudy day to keep your home power needs met, but to be able to charge our electric cars when we drive over 40 miles each per day during cloudy / low solar days or have to charge after sundown. I think even 4x Tesla Powerwall would be insufficient for electric car charging while sun is out.
You have have to put a lot of solar capture capacity to collect enough energy during the limited sun hours and then have enough storage capacity to hold it or ability to send to grid so the grid is your "battery". Practically speaking, you can't really be off grid if you are also charging an electric car or two. Outside of need to charge EV, it is very viable and we have gone months without pulling any energy from grid with just the 2 Powerwalls when we just weren't needing to charge EV outside of peak sun hours.
It would be cool if we had neighborhood batteries that serve clusters of homes. Homeowners could simplify things by only having solar, and the battery might be cheaper if in the MW range.
I'm hoping future condo towers have a 'battery room.'
Would still have to hire someone to maintain it. Are micro powerplants more efficient than distributed energy? What happens when you come home late and your neighbors have drained all the juice out of the batteries.
The only way to reliably serve the "clusters of homes" is for the homeowners to exclusively own and operate the systems privately....The Corporate incentive, along with the Government control needs to be taken away from rhe equation.
We don’t have enough batteries for this. We don’t have enough material for batteries.
Dude you’re describing a grid ffs hippie
In some places your car battery can also be used as storage, if you have ev’s assuming you don’t use all the battery you can still then tarvel to work.
Using electricity to compost seems tone def. Love the show save the effort . interest is the brand that sells us? Keep Working
The question is how much electricity (negligible) and how much better is the compost (a lot). The device looks to be on the small side, though.
@@incognitotorpedo42
You do understand the amount of energy it takes to evaporate water right?.
Try boiling a kettle and see how long it takes to evaporate that water, they're around 2000w.
Or you can just watch thundef00t.
@@incognitotorpedo42
Compare dropping your waste on the compost pile vs. producing the unit, buying filters for it, powering it, a few kWh every time for a handful of "compost". Its not compost, its dehydrated green waste, not compost, that requires microbial breakdown to release the nutrition.
@@incognitotorpedo42 Sorry, but that's not true.
It actually uses a ridiculous amount of energy. Especially considering that it's doing that for no reason whatsoever.
As previously stated, it doesn't make compost. Just dehydrated waste.
Which then needs to have water added for the composting process to commence.
Just a question: Wouldn't residential solar energy offsetting 1 KWh at the residential rate being resold at the commercial rate offset the cost to the energy company? Where I live we have a difference in residential energy cost vs commercial energy costs. Here I think commercial rates are 5 to 10 times greater than residential, so they're getting more than the energy is worth unless I'm missing something.
I personally almost universally see commercial/industrial rates be lower than residential. And a quick Google search shows that Commercial gives me the “on average in America Comerica electricity is a bit cheaper”
I’ve been really interested in getting a good battery, as I live in an area where power is frequently cut (CA wildfire zone). They are very expensive though, and it’s difficult to know what to focus on and which company is best. Does anyone have a good info source for this?
I do consultation. But you can use chins battery. You need to start with 4. They are 12v 100ah non heated for 400$ each otd. You expand 4 at a time on a 48v system.
There are some startups focusing on using the battery in EVs parked in garages to provide peak power. It wouldn’t be for everyone but in our case (pretty much retired) we always have at least one car languishing in the garage. Would love to see a video on this topic.
Yeah I'm really hoping electric car companies start building cars capable of vehicle to grid. Not sure why tesla hasn't taken the leap yet.
Thanks Ricky, really appreciate your channel, and this episode in particular.
I do want to get backup batteries but am waiting of for the new, cheaper sodium batteries to come on the market. Hopefully once that happens you can do an episode on that?
I agree. Current battery technology is too expensive and will take way too long to pay back (well, for me at least, because I still have a somewhat favorable rate structure). I’m waiting for the iron-air batteries from Form energy who now have two large pilot utility scale project Underway right now. My only fear is that the utilities will fight tooth and nail to keep the technology for themselves just like they’re trying to keep cheap renewables for themselves so they can keep us hostage to their high prices.
@clot shots Clot Shots, I don’t know if you’ve been paying attention, but here in CA and quite a few other states, the utilities are using either the state legislatures or PUCs to kill rooftop solar. In CA, the utilities failed at trying to get state legislation passed. Now they’re going hard against rooftop using the PUC which is bought and paid for by the utilities. There are organizations fighting back, but I doubt they are as well-funded as the utilities. The utilities are deploying cheap renewables at utility scale for themselves so they can keep charging obscene fees to their ratepayers even though their costs will come way way down. The point of my comment is that they will try hard to keep the iron-air battery technology to themselves as well.
@clot shots Really? I never used the word ban. Seems like you didn’t actually watch this video. The criminal monopoly utilities are using “revisions” to NEM to make rooftop non-economical for homeowners to buy rooftop PV. I have a feeling you work for one of the utilities.
You've got a class act, Two Bit. Whatever you post I'll watch.
The underlying issue is storing the energy produced for high peak times. If every solar producer had batteries, they could potentially choose when to sell or use. This is overall better for the grid.
I consider batteries a fundamental part of home solar systems today. there are lots of choices, LiFePo4 being a very good one. My LiFePo4 are guaranteed 5 years with 7,000 deep cycles. They'll run my house 20 years. The days of filling lead/acid batteries are over, I sit at my computer and monitor my battery health with the push of a button.
@@mosfet500 nice 🙂
@@yodab.at1746 we do have batteries. 10kwh which is about 70$ worth a month on Cali grid
@@jameshughes131 sound like you need a lot more of them... and frankly they need to create a large non chemical battery...store the energy as energy... not as a chemical reaction
@@TheTkiller9999 no you only need 8 12v 100ah lifepo4 for enough power to run a tiny home with ac 24/7. Each battery is 400$. You buy 4 at a time and expand up to 16. 8 battery last 30 years and is 10kwh which is alot. It's 70-120. $ a month on the California electric grid
@2:15 Whenever I hear these “proposals” I immediately think of what will they do to desirable investment and customer behaviour? By adding this fee, are we going to see more or less Solar adopters?? If this bill passes the customer ought to have the right to simply check out of the grid. Admit that they may “run out of energy” but still retain the right to support themselves on solar and battery storage while not contributing or taking from the grid. You always need the option of walking away with the client. Anything else is forced and not truly free.
we used to call it slavery.
Well I do t live in Cali any longer. I think that everyone should start to make their own home a power station. Collect and store your own energy to be conscious of how much a household uses. I now live off grid and have slowly grown my system myself. It works great and was a great learning experience.
This, X1000. Not that hard to do, so worth it.
Also protects you against brown/black outs or load shedding when the grid fails.
We've had solar for 20 years. Last year we got a $26 rebate. Those days are probably gone. We have a small system and AGM batteries, but they are only for when the power goes out. I have a question though. We got a used Chevy Volt that goes 50 electric miles before the gas kicks in. Should we charge it during the day or the non-peak hours? If my panels are making electricity, does it first go to my houses's needs and then to the grid, or will it go to the grid and come back to my house?
Thanks for the clarification on this subject.
Those who pay for a solar system should not have an additional fee.
We, as individual households, need to move toward electrical independence with solar generation and energy storage at our own homes. Cut ties from the electrical grid completely.
Good luck with that
@@budders9958 I'm not going to argue with you, but I think living off-grid is more of a reality as the years go by. What is more likely is a smart-grid where our house has energy storage and software that buys/sells electricity, hopefully to benefit the homeowner. But for utility companies to charge a flat rate fee (penalty) for having solar.? That's ridiculous.
@@marcdenlinger5282 Mark utility companies have a lot of overhead that is completely decoupled from the actual per unit cost of energy that they're selling. Furthermore they're not allowed to increase the rate because they're regulated. This basically means that we have a responsibility to make sure that they survive so that the electrical grid doesn't fall apart. This means that a flat rate is going to have to be charged no matter what the point is who is going to pay... Should that flat rate charge really be spread over all the customers. Power goes both ways well guess what you have to pay to send your powers out on the wires too since you don't technically own them or do any of the operation maintenance or design of it.
If you were selling power at wholesale rate...i'd have a different opinion but your not and that's the point. Retail or distribution rate has a slew of other stuff baked into it that has nothing to do with the actual per unit cost of electricity.
@@budders9958 thanks for the reply, I enjoy hearing your perspective. Solar is not cheap and I don't think homeowners should be penalized for solar production. It comes with its own overhead.
I personally don't like how in Pennsylvania I have to play the "electric choice" games and switch distribution companies every 12 months to keep from paying higher prices. Like everything in life . . . I just want the best price up front. No sales, no freebies, no gimmicks.
So, are the electric companies suffering? I don't know the answer to that question.
@@budders9958 with net metering here you sell at the wholesale rate, not retail. I'm sure it's similar in many other places.
Great video! Good information. Thank you
Never thought of getting the battery first. Can you recommend a battery system that can accept solar later. Thanks!
I’m happy you made us aware of this in Ca, so we can vote no. It’s greed! I’m contemplating solar now because I had large pines removed from South side of home(Tahoe). Thinking of getting solar to feed my new F-150 Lightning that has a build date in May, instead of my home, since my rates are low (.17 peak)and my truck can feed my home. What do you think? I’m thinking this will be more important for emergency.
You are overestimating the output of solar system .
@@M13x13M Sounds like you have no idea what you're talking about.
@@M13x13M My main concern is my ability to power my truck in an emergency, that will for sure be able to power my house. If I installed an off grid system to solely to power my truck and not connected to the grid, I will have 130 kw battery at my disposal. I plan on a 10k panel system that will produce an average of 7.5 kw an hour for an average of 5 hours. That’s 37.5 kw. I average less than 10k a day use for my house. So in one day I can receive enough power for my home and left over for adding to my truck. If I’m tied to the grid, I am reliant on the grid. That’s why I’m leaning on not tying my solar to the grid and everything should work out fine, especially with the brown outs we have in California.
@@mariomarez2223 That is a good idea to use the truck for power instead of a house battery. I’m moving to Maryland and the rebate deal is on the house battery ( not the panels) . it makes the Tesla deal very attractive. I’ve have solar panels since 1983 and tried several. The Enphase system is
Far superior. I have a small Enphase system now. I have had an order for the Cubertruck for a couple years but as of this week the Tesla dealer could tell me nothing about it. My brothers solution for power is a propane powered generator. Gasoline goes bad unused in a gasoline generator and propane has zero starting problems. BTW in reality the average is more like 4 hours not five . But I have had a system that had south and south west facing panels if mornings tend to be foggy.
@@tom8437 Common remark by the type that "thinks" solar but has never installed a solar system. I've had PV and hot water solar systems since 1983 and install them for a non-profit solar company.
This isn't isolated to CA. This is a national effort by electric utilities to severely curtail rooftop solar. Here in FL the utilities are ramming through bills to add a "base" charge on top of the base charge that was just approved, cut the rate from 1-1 to "avoided cost" which is less than wholesale (maybe 2 cents per kWh). They make the same claim that it's to protect lower income rate payers (whom they just petitioned to charge 25% more before all this).
So rooftop solar must be a big deal in FL right? I wish. We only have 90,000 solar roofs in the entire state!
nationalize energy production like we do roads, boom problem solved.
Here in Florida are power company one just one FPL is lobbying to get rid of net metering. And they are half way there. The house just pass the bill 741 by a vote 83 to 31. those mother fucking are not looking out for no one. It’s all a big fat lie “ we are going green “ as long as the big company keep raping your pocket and giving donations to their campaign witch they steal and put it in their pocket Politicians are the biggest pice of shit on the earth.
Apartment dweller in San Diego here. I think I pay for energy generation AND DELIVERY for every kWh I use. I don’t see how it makes any sense to also charge the solar customers for using the grid as well - this feels like double dipping.
What if some one has pumped water storage? How viable will it be? Can you please explain.
I could definitely see the power company charging a delivery fee for both incoming and outgoing power.
well they do own and have to maintain that grid .
So we've gone from a system that incentivizes distributed solar installation (which worked with over a million rooftops installed) to a system which incentivizes utility production....
Batteries are not the answer. They are still freaking expensive and make your household electrical system far more complicated than the average homeowner can manage.
Batteries are about as complicated as extension cords.
@@drjswizzle8235 Absolutely not. When a battery is involved, the power flows go all different directions and you need to make decisions as to what time of day is involved depending on the rate plan. The power can flow from the array to the house, array to the battery, array to the grid, battery to the house, and battery to the grid. Each one of these involves a different power conversion. The battery is only capable of a small fraction of what your breaker panel's AC power is and can not drive your whole house so generally requires a separate dedicated load panel to handle a subset of the loads which confuses the home owner to no end, and many homes are difficult to rewire so that the loads to be dedicated to the battery are not in a common location. I'm a full time solar installer and we get twenty times the phone calls from solar customers that have batteries. Most of our new solar prospects ask for batteries because it is popular now and they think that they can be independent of the grid (don't we all?) not realizing the cost and difficulty involved. Solar systems should have a modest amount of battery that allows the solar system to help in regulating and stabilizing the grid and to load shift a little bit, but independence is not practical short of $50k to 100k and a technician on call...
@@gregcollins3404 that sounds really difficult and expensive. I set up my 9000 watt system with Trojan t105 batteries for waaaaay less. It's easy enough for my 10 year old to understand. Maybe not everyone is as smart as a 5th grader
@@drjswizzle8235 It's not rally about the complexity , it the the price. You can do it the DIY hacky way with partial coverage for a lot cheaper for sure (enough batteries for the average household is still $$$$$$), and I might be able to figure most of that out with my skillset and experience (an my electrician friend) . But most will need a professional install which means a new panel, new and name brand batteries boxes, new charge controller, permits and so on. I have done the math on my house with my current solar and I am looking at a ~10 year payback - after my solar is paid back. To phase it in like the video suggests still costs me $10,500 + tax (Tesla for reference) for the first battery and $6.5k each as you add more. My usage needs at least 4 packs (got a Kia EV6 and a Hyundai Kona EV and a 3.5k sf house with 6 people).
@@bradmathews You need a container size nuke reactor :-)
They can't say they aren't making enough money when they have been gouging customers forever
If they buy the electricity from the makers (homeowners with solar panels) at half the rate they are charging everyone else, then they are making a profit by not having to purchase energy at the going rate from wherever they get it from. This is a way for them to not only get that energy for free, but to charge you for giving it to them.
In my country one already pays yearly fees simply for being connected to the grid, which kinda makes sense as this money is used to maintain the grid.
Still it would be a lot better if instead companies are subsidized to build more windmills and solar farms, consumers are subsidized to install solar and battery system so they have a negative net use or at the very least don't pull energy from the grid to the extent as non-solar users would.
There should be a separate line showing the grid connection price and the actual power usage price.
One of the most significant things going on in the world at the moment is that battery technology is so good that we've reached a point where we don't need to burn fossil fuels anymore . Batteries for an average sized home should last at least 15 years , are very easy to acquire and the prices are dropping daily .
And what's even crazier is the fact that we will start seeing used EV batteries being used for this purpose as well. Used EV batteries will sell for a fraction of the cost of a new power wall and since weight and size are not longer an issue with stationary batteries. Even a EV battery that's only has 25% capacity is still economical for stationary use. Most EV batteries will be retired at around 60% capacity anyways.
Great video and love your channel! I'm not sure why California structures their rates like this, but having worked in the utility business for many years, I can almost guess it has something to do with recovering costs of maintaining the grid and the reliability / stability of the distribution system going to individual homes. Addition of solar (behind the meter) essentially erodes a utilities already set profit margin set by the PSC. It still costs tons of dollars to maintain the lines and reconfigure the circuits to work with other power sources - i.e. solar. Distribution circuits have always been designed and built as a radial design with one power source as the normal configuration.With the costs of batteries still very high, it's unclear what customers will do short term. Higher income people will more likely buy solar/battery systems. So, you don't want a situation where lower/middle income class is subsidizing/supporting the total costs of maintaining distribution circuits. Here in Georgia the price of electricity is still very low and we still invest in a robust T&D System. Plus we'll soon be putting online 2 of the nations newest Gen 3 nuclear reactors. We do have a robust solar program and it's growing. Not seeing much in terms of batteries yet. Your idea of pricing may or may not work. Could be especially painful for customers during the transition. Eventually, the costs of batteries will go down and maybe the distribution grid will become a thing of the past. But it will take time to make this happen. Thanks again for the video!
Technicaly speaking, even mississippi has solar for basic traffic lights and street lights. The problem is, many mississipians can't afford to go solar and there were significant fears over mass deforestation in order to make enough sustainable energy. Despite this, deforestation in the county of desoto happened due to mass expansion of housing and warehouses, much to the long time residents chagrin. You can see the diffirence between older homes and newer homes as older homes have significantly more trees around their houses compared to more modern houses. It broke my grandmother's heart to see that.
I am very glad you acknowledge the unsustainability of treating the grid like a free battery.
On the other hand I do not see pushing people off-grid as a good idea.
Off-grid benefits those who can afford it more than it benefits those who can't, and even when power companies are corrupt/inept it they can still produce more power and build more storage per dollar they spend vs a homeowner. Making it more efficient for them to spend it.
If someone can afford to go off-grid without subsidies than fine by me more power to them I guess. However from a legislation standpoint I think we should be advocating for changes that fix the corruption/ineptitude of those power utilities that have problems and increasing the ability to provide the service cleanly and cheaply.
I think too many people get wrapped up in the grandeur of a distributed system and never consider the increased cost of such a method for decarbonizing but also don't consider the equality/equity of such a goal in reality.
It's an indirect form of wealth transfer, plain and simple. On top of the already insanely high local CA state taxes, we're going to charge you more to subsidize costs for lower income residents that your taxes should already be paying for.
Great Review. Is it possible to connect a bank of the Eco Flow Delta Pros into the Enphase IQ System Controller 2? (Also grid and PV connected)
duke in Charlotte, NC just reached a deal where new installations will have a higher base fee and won't get the retail rate for net metering which is a crappy deal for anyone installing solar. It really sucks.
Thank you for the recap. Saving power at a low rate is quite smart to reduce energy strain. Solar hot water heaters magnification stream turbins are enhanced ways of savinh energy too. Overall, America needs to curb its power consumption.
If you look at a satellite map of Los Angeles, the biggest roofs with the most solar potential are warehouses and apartment complexes. They're the most cost-effective locations, yet their owners typically refuse to install panels. We can incentivize solar to death for homeowners, but if the legislators are sincere about helping keep electrical costs down for low income residents they ought to be targeting monetary penalties to those who REFUSE to install solar, rather than to those who, nobly, already have.
Base rates are criminal, nothing else. The best solution, like we did here in AZ, is to have wholesale metering, where the grid buys back solar power at a slightly lower rate then net.
Great video.
Do you have a video where you go over adding a battery to your home?
Can you get a Tesla Powerwall without the solar panels?
I feel it is dangerous and dumb to rerquest solar owners to also provide their own battery bank. It is more scalable to have utilities build up flow battery banks of shipping containers. Stack them up near the grid like lego blocks. I dont mean to hate on powerwalls and other lithium home banks, but we arleady have a huge EV battery shortage and wasting fresh cells on homes is a terrible use of supplies. Maybe bi directional car charging is the solution but only works if your vehicle is home all day or if you can steal free power from your workplace.
Let me get this right... because I spend my money to help myself AND help the environment, you want to tax me? While the poor, jobless, don't want to do their part, get free power. I guess I'm missing something? Ok, no solar for me then. I agree with fair, as long as it is fair. Not just fair for the deadbeats.
I live in Michigan, I want to get solar but what can I Expect to save if I do? I have a small house 🏠 about 1500 Square footage?
Question: What if you have solar but don't connect it to the grid? Are you allowed to in California?
yes I’m doing videos on it soon!
It should be noted, we have the stock market style energy system in the UK.
You can choose to have fixed price electricity, like I do, or have your electricity mirror the base cost.
Some people had their energy run into negative cost last summer! People were finding things to turn on at home, setting off the washing machine at 2 in the morning etc.
Hi. What is the name of the mic that you use for your videos?
We use an audio technica : Audio-Technica AT4053B... www.amazon.com/dp/B001TQ0RHU?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share
Without all the fancy metering and cost structure, I've heard some locals are crediting 0.75 kWh to the grid, 1 kWh out of the grid. Basically 25% fee for storage. Probably cheaper than a battery. Last I checked, battery kWh lifecycle cost was close to 70% of grid cost.
I love what you do keep up the good work
As an alternative to an electric battery, in the UK there is a company that has a smart hot water heater. It watches the grid prices and heats water only when it is very low or even negative. Costs much less than lithium but still works.
Nevada's PUC totally gimped the solar rebates and returns a few years back. They even made it retroactive, so those who had bought in got screwed because it changed their ROI. Pretty much killed residential solar in a usually sunny desert state.
It will be interesting to see what happens if Lake Mead quits generating power once the water level falls too low. The Nevada PUC isn't thinking about the welfare of the regular person.
I thought the base rate is for the privilege to connect to the grid? Like you can have a solar panel at home and not pay any bills. but if you want a connection to the grid, then you pay a fee for it?
and obsviously , after you are connected to the grid, you sell or use electricity at market rates?
Nice and short. You’re a good communicator.
Excellent video! Thanks.
Lol...."1pm - It's not that hot yet"...
Most of us live in the city, where we don’t have enough space for enough panels to charge a battery for daily use.
They are doing the samething in South Carolina. When we got our solar system put in in 2018 we had net metering. My power bill was sometimes $0. This past year the COOP stopped net metering altogether and now charge us $5 per kilowatt installed. My last bill was $180. My system may never pay for its self now.
A nominal base charge for on-grid connected solar makes sense for people living in climates where there may not be any sunshine for 2-3-4-5- days to support the cost of having carbon fuel generated electricity back up.
good info, thanks
holy shee.. $500 for the lomi?
sorry ill stick with my bucket in the kitchen.. and then plop it into the bucket outside. lol.
1 .Borrow against your mortgage or save up and get a small installation complete with battery and large charge controller.
2. Build your solar electrical system Separate from your Mains and put outlets where you most need them.
3. Try to only use solar as much as you can investing in LED lighting etc and avoiding unnecessary usage such as 'Vampire' energy. (Switch that TV and XBOX completely off from mains (buy a remote Mains switch if you can be bothered to go behind your TV every time to switch it off))
4. Use the money saved to expand your solar system until it rivals that of our solar system! :P
5. Consider buying an Electric car and powering it of your system if you can, save on fuel too!
can i charge a battery with a gas generator?
You need some compelling graphics that show how battery time shifting works. Having the Tesla solar+battery I see the goal of the system is to shift the "solar harvest" so i can use it when I need it and NEVER pay the peak rate (which is DOUBLE here in San Diego as you know). Best app ever!
You left out the part that they want to retro charge those that have solar and, yes, they did take advantage of the system to save or gain "money" providing power that wasn't optimal for usage/value.
That's why I want to build an underground house that stays at about 60-65 degrees year-round regardless of surface temperature. Go with all LED lighting and high-efficiency appliances. The electronics would generate some heat and it would not take much to warm it another 10 or so degrees. During the summer months you would simply need to pull in a little of the outside warm air.