Space Age Energy in the Suburbs?

[beetiger]

Solar energy for the price of your regular utility bill?

-Ignoring for the moment the fact that this is a startup that may or may not be able to do what they promise,

-Understanding that if I actually put in my own solar panels, it would be free to get energy and I wouldn't be kind-of-arbitrarily paying the price my local utility charges,

-Acknowledging that this means I'm paying for the energy my house makes, semi-unrelated to the amount of energy I end up using,

-And recognizing that this would probably make my house uglier and harder to sell to a mainstream family, and not in fact save me money, just make me feel a little better about my footprint on the environment...

....am I missing something else, or does this look like it might be worth doing?

Comments

[goodluckfox.livejournal.com]

I have affan in this sort of thing.

Solar is ALWAYS more expensive than landline with current technology. The only reason to use solar power is if your residence is so far from a current electrical line that it's more cost effective to generate energy yoursefl than to pay to have a line strung through several miles of mountains, swamps, and forests. Ok, speaking of mountains, swamps, and forests, you might use solar "on principle" out of some earth-loving treehugging hippie reasoning or something.

You don't get a CREDIT AGAINST FUTURE CONSUMPTION if you produce more than you consume... you get MONEY. At whatever the rate is that you're paying now, I believe. I pay 6 cents per kwh, that means I'd get 6 cents per kwh I produced over and above what I consume. At that rate, modern panels have a pay-for-themselves time of a few years.

It looks like what this company's game is is that they get YOU to pay for the panels (via the rental fees) and THEY get the money from the electricity fed back into the system, cloaking the entire affair in a green, vegetarian, I-recycle-everything sort of way. When you've doen this for a few years, you will have paid for the panels (which are good for 20+ years), which are still the property of the company, and the company has gotten the benefit of using your roof as a generation location for the electricity they sell.

Your electricity is prolly hydroelectric anyway, so even that is a questionable reason for doing this.

(I'm gonna buy a 50 watt panel of my own to keep my radios and deep cycle battery charged... solar has its uses).

[beetiger.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm an "on-priciple" type, which is why I've been poking at it.

So if I put in panels myself, and they produced more than I used, my utility company would pay for the energy? The biggest risk to me there is that I'm unlikely to be in this house for 20+ years.

My current energy is supposedly wind-based, for which I pay a kind of small random green tax.

[mmsword.livejournal.com]

How about "The creation of solar panels themselves require a good bit of petro chemicals and cause industrial pollution on their own." ? Also, though fairly long lived, you need to replace panels about every 25 years or so. Unless, you know, that's what you're paying the solar energy folks for.

[beetiger.livejournal.com]

Are panels recyclable/reconfigurable after that time?

[mmsword.livejournal.com]

Photo Electric cells aren't particularly recyclable, as far as my knowledge lies. The chemical compounds eventually break down into other forms and I don't think it's recoverable. The glass and metal in the framing, wiring and paneling aught to be recyclable though, if they were able to be seperated from the cells. Disposal of Solar cells is a lot of work though, as they do contain arsenic and cadmium bearing compounds.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

This or last month's Mother Earth News did something about how it is easiest and cheapest and most efficent to heat your water with solar power.

Just more stuff to think about, I'm gonna check this out too. I'm also looking into a corn stove since I'm surrounded by it. ;)

[quoting-mungo.livejournal.com]

We've got solar thingys on the roof of the house we rent out -- it basically heats up stuff (a lot. My dad was a moron and opened the pipes, and he got scalded really badly) that then heats up the houses. It's possible it also makes hot water for the tenants to use, I don't recall.

If I understood it correctly, this is a more effective use of solar energy, as the sun heats stuff up anyway, and thermal energy is difficult to use for much except heating.


-Alexandra

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

kathrynt recently investigated the same folks, I think (there's a recent post in her journal) and found that while solar energy is a nifty idea, these people were not.

But I didn't come here to write you that depressing bit of news. I came here to thank you, and huggle you gratefully, for the gift you sent me. :)

*huggles*

[beetiger.livejournal.com]

oh, you're welcome! And that news isn't depressing at all, really. I put that there because I wanted to work on debunking it, actually. I'm right now paying my utility folks the "wind power surcharge", which is kind of a scam I'm willing to live with, but I've been thinking about other options, and someone threw that at me with a really high level of excitement, so I thought I'd throw it to people on my flist with more energy sense and less random stupid hippieness than I have myself.

power... POWER!

[ben-mouse.livejournal.com]

The mouse is off the grid! At least as far as keeping all his mobile devices charged is concerned. However, during the summer, My little 60-watt panel generates enough power to trim the lawn and hedges once a week, as well!

http://wildwolves.homeip.net/RicksSolar/html/index.htm

Re: power... POWER!

[beetiger.livejournal.com]

That's cool. Not sure it would make much of a dent in my energy usage, but it'd probably let me learn a little bit about arranging this sort of thing and maybe be a fun project to work on with the little guy. thanks for sharing!