OT: Solar Power for House
- Thread starter cocky67
- Start date
Check on the status of legislation where the utilities are trying to get you to have to pay a subsidy because you are not using their electricity. Seriously. I'm not making this up.
It's a shame. Lobbying at its best. They're doing everything to limit individuals from not putting money into the electric companies wallets. Also, trying to prevent profits being made by homeowners who are putting energy back into the grids.
Do you honestly think that any utility is going to provide back up power for no charge with metering to tell them how much you are putting back on the grid? If you are building a new home it might be worth looking into. Otherwise you are looking at a 20+ year payback.
These power companies are spending millions on lobbying for this, and our state is lagging behind big-time.
There is also archaic legislation that companies installing solar panels have to be registered as utility providers.
I have looked into this and I will be building a grid to supply and store power by law the utility has to buy excess feed to grid. The one thing you have to do is apply through your utility to set it up which will usually has a fee. There are several ways to go from what I call partial power which you supply some power from your panels and the rest comes from the utility but then again you can build a complete system with battery back up which supplies your power and feeds the excess to the grid. The type will also supply power when the utility goes down. Like during hurricanes snow storms ect.
check with your utility before you start as some have different rules.
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check with your utility before you start as some have different rules.
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I looked into it. Terrible deal. Very expensive and long return on investment. The only way it would make sense is to give huge tax credits, and I'm against that. I'm already paying for rich people to ride around in $100K Teslas. Not willing to help subsidize their solar panels so they can save money on their power bill too. And in the meantime, making power more expensive for like me who stay on the grid because I don't want to drop $30K on solar cells. No thanks.
Not a bad idea. We lose power where I live quite often. When the ice storm hit last year we went without power for a little over 6 days.
I have read that the cost is coming down. Something I have been thinking about as well. Power companies are fighting the hell out of it. If your solar power produces an excess amount of electricity, you can sell it to the electric company. Power company claims it isn't fair to them if you produce your own electricity. I'm all for it. Seems like the last time I looked into it, it would still cost me about 20000 dollars. It would take me 6 or 7 years to pay for that. Still, I would like to stick it to the power company. They are a monopoly that knows no bounds.
Hmmm....chances are good that if you have a 401K, you'll be "sticking it to" yourself.
I own stock in many power companies that pay excellent dividends -- to include SCANA, Southern Company, Avista, etc. Instead of wasting your money on solar power, buy the stock of power companies -- you'll subsidize your own power bills more effectively.
I own stock in many power companies that pay excellent dividends -- to include SCANA, Southern Company, Avista, etc. Instead of wasting your money on solar power, buy the stock of power companies -- you'll subsidize your own power bills more effectively.
This post is so full of miss information. I work for a NON Profit electric cooperative in SC. I am happy to have your excess energy back and pay you for it. I am just not going to pay retail for it. We will buy back your excess at wholesale same as we buy the rest of our energy. Otherwise the rest of our members are subsidizing you. If you want your power costs to stabilize you need to fight against carbon taxes and the EPA in general regarding CO2.
I have seen a lot more situations where solar companies sell systems to people that can not afford them on the false promise that their electric bill will disappear. That only happens if you ask us to disconnect your service. No one, no matter how much they have invested in a solar system, has requested to be disconnected. We send $5.00 checks to 15 or so solar people who we buy wholesale energy back from. I do not believe the costs work out even with purchase subsidizes.
Well, the "monopoly that knows no bounds" isn't true. I'm pretty sure the big utilities and their pricing are regulated by the Public Service Commission. And I think many of the co-ops are non-profit.
Co-ops got started because the for-profit companies (SCE&G, Duke Energy, Georgia, Power, etc.) felt it was not cost-effective to stretch the grid to rural areas, i.e., too few customers per square mile. My guess is that cable companies rarely service rural areas for the same reason.
I think some of the co-op have little or no generation and get all or some of their power at a reduced price from the big boys like Duke and SCANA.
I would like to get more information for solar power. I have a 3,600 sq foot building for a business. Do the power companies have any sponsored solar programs or incentives? Or are they against individual solar? I will check with my power company Santee cooper and let you know what they say
True about cable companies. In fact, Verizon and Time Warner cable lobbied to prevent the equivalent of Internet co-ops to extend service to rural areas even though they had no plans to.
I'm sure they are. They have to be in order to attract investors like me and many others. Otherwise, every expense would fall on customers. I can't imagine what our rates would be now in order to pay for those new nuke plants without private money pitching in. And you can blame a lot of that on the push for green energy and the hatred for coal. I don't know the exact numbers, but I think SCE&G just shut down a bunch of coal plants because they were too expensive to keep running because of the greenies.
This post was edited on 3/13 3:00 PM by Carolina Bo
The links points to an article about the SC solar law passed last year. It passed without opposition is the house and senate. This obviously has the support of all the power companies in the state to pass unopposed. Solar helps the grid as long as certain issues are taken into consideration. If solar customers don't pay a higher service charge and expect to be credited at retail rates for power put back on the grid they are expecting non solar customers to subsidize them. Our net rate is used by 26 of our 45,000 accounts. We have had this in place for a couple of years.
Same reason the collective cooperatives in SC gave away 1,000,000 CFL light bulbs. The cost to build new power plants is massive. The cost of transporting coal is massive.
Our experience with most of these 26 accounts is even with the purchase subsidies they feel mislead regarding the benefits they actually received. Most did not even want the excess credited back and were expecting their power bill to disappear based on what they invested. That is what I personally don't like about solar. Too many of the people marketing it are not honest about the true returns.
Sorry for the long and delayed reply. BTW, not offended and thanks for the reply that was probably more civil than my earlier post.
2014 Solar Law
USC92EEPE thanks for the reasoned response. Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't solar cover a little more than half of a person's utility bill. I also believe I read that when compared to some of the "green" states our law passed is relatively weak as far as tax breaks for switching to solar. This was according to the Washington Post. Before someone calls me liberal for reading The Post, understand that I am not a liberal and am for companies making a profit. Hell, I own stock too. That being said, the Washington Post is very informative.
I would have to spend time I do not have now to give you an accurate answer regarding our members and how much they have saved. I am confident they have lower power bills. I see it similar to the value of a 18 seer air conditioner vs a 15 seer. I am confident the 18 seer is more efficient and will save one money. But having a payback is a whole different thing. Some of our members don't care about payback, they want to be green. That is their choice. Same as buying a King Ranch F150 vs an XL. Both trucks do the same function but the KR is a lot nicer but payback is not a consideration.
I will elect not to discuss how green SC is as that gets into small talk areas real quick. Green and politics can not be surgically separated.
Weak tax breaks? Why should I help pay for anybody else's individual, private-use solar power installation.
Here's what I see happening with these tax credits. If enough people, which will be mostly high income folks, take advantage of the credits, that tax money will have to be made up somewhere else. Since poor people don't pay taxes anyway, that puts it's on the middle class.
Then, as more and more people leave the grid, the fixed cost are spread across fewer and fewer people, raising the cost for everyone on the grid. Guess who pays more? The poor and the middle class. And if it gets to expensive for the poor, taxpayers will be subsidizing them. Guess who pays more again? The middle class.
If people want solar for their own personal use, let them pay for it with their own money. I could easily afford to install it, but it doesn't make financial sense, and I don't consider my bill an issue anyway. I pay about $225 a month to run everything in my house. Cell phone and satellite prices are far more out of line for what you get. I don't have a car payment, but the national average is about $470. Even with gas prices low, my wife and I pay around the same price for gasoline every month. Maybe a little more. Definitely more when gas was $3.50 a gallon.
I've looked into it and could afford it if desired, but personally, I don't want to have to deal with another maintenance item around my house when it won't save me money on something I don't really consider overly expensive to begin with. If people want to get their warm and wuzzies on over green energy, the can have it. But they need to pay for it and not me.
Conway, you probably would get greater financial benefit from a geothermal heat pump for your business. You also get a direct tax credit from the feds as well as SC so the final cost will be in the 50% range. Check out Carolina Temperature Control in Murrells Inlet.
Weak tax breaks?
If the government truly wants people to go green, then tax breaks are the way to jump start it. A person would be foolish to turn down a tax break. Carolina Bo, I am relatively certain that when you do your taxes, you take advantage of every break you can. I know I do. If SC wants to be considered a green state, we will offer tax breaks to achieve the desired results. I'm impressed that your electric bill was only 225 last month. Mine was closer to 450. By using your reasoning, and I can't argue with it, we should not have a penny sales tax increase because this adversely affects the poor on a much higher scale than the more well to do. Their pain is much higher than mine.
If the government truly wants people to go green, then tax breaks are the way to jump start it. A person would be foolish to turn down a tax break. Carolina Bo, I am relatively certain that when you do your taxes, you take advantage of every break you can. I know I do. If SC wants to be considered a green state, we will offer tax breaks to achieve the desired results. I'm impressed that your electric bill was only 225 last month. Mine was closer to 450. By using your reasoning, and I can't argue with it, we should not have a penny sales tax increase because this adversely affects the poor on a much higher scale than the more well to do. Their pain is much higher than mine.
I didn't say it was $225 last month. I said it averages $225. Big difference. Still, 3 cell phones on Verizon aren't far from that.
And I didn't mean anybody should give up a tax break if offered, just feel like expensive private solar setups and $100k Teslas are luxuries that don't deserve tax credits. And while I can deduct my mortgage interest, the end savings don't come anywhere close to the $75000 tax CREDIT for a Tesla. That's absurd.
And if this government wants to be serious about solar, maybe it should remove the tariff on cheap Chinese solar. That's right, our government intentionally make solar from China more expensive to protect the U.S. solar manufactures. Then credits wouldn't be needed.
No one's talking about the bottom line: Strip away all the makeup, tax breaks, politics, etc.......
Yes, I have done extensive research into it. The bottom line is what the utility companies charge per Kwh, compared to what it costs you to produce a single Kwh is farrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr cheaper.
I love the idea of being able to produce my own power and not having to "pay the man." However, no matter how much I hate it, the math does not lie.
If you could set up a solar system that would run your entire house and nothing ever went wrong.....Ie, no replacing dead battery cells, no replacing defective panels, no replacing wiring that's getting long in the tooth etc.....you'd still be paying out the nose for every Kwh of power you produced.
You take those costs, even if the system was perfect and never failed, and looked at it from a pure cost per Kwh standpoint....it's a no brainer. Not even remotely close. The power companies can produce that energy MUCH CHEAPER than you can. I still hate it though.
If you're serious about saving $ then I suggest you buy a gadget called Kill-A-Watt and find out what's eating your energy production every month. Using that gadget helped my wife and I find out our power hogs, do some real math, and we managed to cut our SUMMER electricity usage from roughly 1,200 Kwh per month down to less than 500 Kwh per month. On good days we have been able to use only 7 Kwh. Usually it's between 8-12 per day though. Changed all our lights to those Cree bulbs, unplugged that fridge downstairs we don't use, etc...... If you're concerned about the environment, then never mind.
Yes, I have done extensive research into it. The bottom line is what the utility companies charge per Kwh, compared to what it costs you to produce a single Kwh is farrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr cheaper.
I love the idea of being able to produce my own power and not having to "pay the man." However, no matter how much I hate it, the math does not lie.
If you could set up a solar system that would run your entire house and nothing ever went wrong.....Ie, no replacing dead battery cells, no replacing defective panels, no replacing wiring that's getting long in the tooth etc.....you'd still be paying out the nose for every Kwh of power you produced.
You take those costs, even if the system was perfect and never failed, and looked at it from a pure cost per Kwh standpoint....it's a no brainer. Not even remotely close. The power companies can produce that energy MUCH CHEAPER than you can. I still hate it though.
If you're serious about saving $ then I suggest you buy a gadget called Kill-A-Watt and find out what's eating your energy production every month. Using that gadget helped my wife and I find out our power hogs, do some real math, and we managed to cut our SUMMER electricity usage from roughly 1,200 Kwh per month down to less than 500 Kwh per month. On good days we have been able to use only 7 Kwh. Usually it's between 8-12 per day though. Changed all our lights to those Cree bulbs, unplugged that fridge downstairs we don't use, etc...... If you're concerned about the environment, then never mind.
I have a kill-a-watt meter too. Awesome little device. You will be surprised what some of these devices that you leave plugged in to charge pull all day long.
I also did the Cree swap out when they were on sale recently. Every light in the house. They are supposed to last forever and are far more efficient than incandescent bulbs. And the 2700k version looks just like regular incandescent instead of horrible white fluorescent. They aren't cheap, but you will easily save money in the long run. My wife laughed when I said I would take the bulbs with me if we ever moved.
But I really don't get the hate for the power company. For what I pay and what I get, I don't feel like I'm getting ripped off. Not a bargain by any means, but I just remember what it was like when the power has been out for a few days, and I'll gladly pay what I do for all the convenience it affords me with zero hassle or maintenance.
I also did the Cree swap out when they were on sale recently. Every light in the house. They are supposed to last forever and are far more efficient than incandescent bulbs. And the 2700k version looks just like regular incandescent instead of horrible white fluorescent. They aren't cheap, but you will easily save money in the long run. My wife laughed when I said I would take the bulbs with me if we ever moved.
But I really don't get the hate for the power company. For what I pay and what I get, I don't feel like I'm getting ripped off. Not a bargain by any means, but I just remember what it was like when the power has been out for a few days, and I'll gladly pay what I do for all the convenience it affords me with zero hassle or maintenance.
