Old Energy Is Doing Everything It Can To Stop The Rise Of Solar

[applegrove]

Old Energy Is Doing Everything It Can To Stop The Rise Of Solar

Tracy Rucinski and Byron Kaye, Reuters, Business Insider

http://www.businessinsider.com/r-taxes-fees-the-worldwide-battle-between-utilities-and-solar--2014-9

"SNIP.....................


"Those who protect the climate get penalized, those who harm it get cleared," said Carsten Koernig, managing director of German solar campaigner BSW.

"Instead of supporting solar power in its transition to become competitive, it is now artificially made more expensive."

Australia's Queensland has ruled out a solar tax but promised to re-jig energy pricing so that everyone - solar-reliant or otherwise - pays the same. But that removes the incentive to go solar, and leaves customers at the mercy of later price rises by the utilities.

"Distributed generation (DG) could be the end of utilities as we know them today," U.S. investment research firm Morningstar said earlier this year. "Utilities' centralized network monopolies break down when customers become self-sufficient competitors."


.....................SNIP"

[TheNutcracker]

1. Especially in Florida!

One company had to leave before it went bankrupt, as the legislature would do nothing to further legislation for them to operate. The other company DID go bankrupt!

Then I began to read articles in the Times that Shell wants in the game.

They just can't stand not controlling all of the energy.

[elleng]

2. Yes, it/they are.

[Half-Century Man]

3. In a weird sort of way, I can empathize with Old Energy.

I am not old (that's how I want to feel), but I'm definitely on the back side of middle age. I see those that are younger than me run around doing stuff I only dreamed about. I don't want to lose my relevance, and yet I will.
Because I'm not a sociopathic, money addicted, hive minded, legally constructed conceptual being; I'm okay with that. As an actual life form with actual knowledge and opinions, I know this is how life works.
Kinda fun to watch really.


Fossil fuel has to die. Every power technology which leaves a toxic residue has to be replaced. The.....emissions for what we have used before has to be cleaned up by us. We are to only ones here.
Solar, wind, wave, helium 3, Brown's gas, geothermal, hydroelectric, and anything else we can come up with has to be adopted. The workers displaced by the disappearing fossil fuel industry transfer into the emerging energy technologies (or the eventual massive clean up after fossils).

[NYC_SKP]

4. Rec, despite one self-evident lie in the article. I wish all could be honest.

There is no question but that existing utilities and energy providers resist change.

But this one line is plainly misleading:

Meanwhile, the price of solar panels has plummeted 80 percent since 2008 thanks to generous state subsidies aimed at promoting clean energy.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/r-taxes-fees-the-worldwide-battle-between-utilities-and-solar--2014-9#ixzz3EfSBwpbh

Not true, prices of modules has been plummeting absent government subsidies, not that we should end them.

Indeed, subsidies have helped promote residential and commercial growth in PV capacity, but are by no means the only driver behind plummeting prices.

The cost/watt of modules has seen nothing short of a continuous downhill slide over time. Anyone (like me) who has purchased PV and designed systems (including a 500kW system) knows that the cost continues to fall and unless they start to tax solar or DG there will be no stopping it.

Electric utility providers need to learn that their new market needs to become energy storage and reliability-- not primary generation.

K/R

[applegrove]

6. Good for you. I drive in the countryside every so often. You see solar panels there.

I always wish I had a house with some property so I could do it too.

[NYC_SKP]

7. Not my property. My neighbor has trees and my bill is too low to justify the install.

The 500 kW system was a favor to a nonprofit that will remain nameless.

The sad part was that it only worked out because Chinese modules were so affordable and between ground breaking and commissioning, the price would have been lower and today the same system could be had for less.

That's part of the magic, and I'll bet we could do it with domestic modules today for the same price.

[applegrove]

8. Good on you NYC SKP. My grandfather supported a few charities and it

gave him such pleasure his whole life.

[Needa Moment]

11. Georgia tech's Suniva 270W panels are somewhat competitive

And our company uses them for the need of slightly more generation of the same panel s.f. in lieu of the cheaper lower output kyocera 250W. I believe they have an assembly plant in Sacramento CA. as well

[NYC_SKP]

12. Suniva is a solid company, Kyocera is not a Chinese enterprise (Japan), but I love domestic!

In 2011 when responses to the RFP came in, there was no competition with Chinese modules like those from Yingli.

At least the contract required prevailing wages for laborers!

[hunter]

10. "energy storage and reliability"

Yes.

I live in a place where "no energy" would probably mean I'd not wash my clothes or bathe so often. Stinky human me, same as usual, like I'm living on Mars. And I've still got the solar power to post here on the internet.

Nobody in our community has air conditioning and many people survive without heat. The pipes never freeze.

My parents fled civilization to live in a rain forest. They drink, cook, and bathe in the water that falls on their roof. They eat local food. The apocalypse is just another day. I really ought to refresh my sailing skills if I ever want to visit them in a post-apocalypse world. I have a sextant, and an accurate timepiece, but no sailboat.

My wife's parents retired to a similar situation here in California. Water always in the river, and no chance of freezing to death.

But I'd never retreat unless there was no more I could do.

[NYC_SKP]

13. I can relate, grew up with river water only, a 40 gallon av tank for drinking water.

We had to tow a wood barrel tank on wood spoke wheel trailer to the nearest water well, this fed one spigot in the kitchen for cooking.

The toilet and bath water was sand filtered and a little bit brown. We never complained.

This is why I am outraged at water waste today in California.

People use drinking quality water to wash their SUVs and wash pitbull poop off the sidewalk.

[msongs]

5. corporate prostitute politicians will protect their obsolete dinosaur energy companies nt

[EEO]

9. I find it amazingly interesting...

that moderate Republicans in Kansas are fighting the Koch assholes so they can make Kansas a state that utilizes wind power for at least 20% of its energy (something Sebelius put in place). I am a huge proponent of solar power, but am a fan of all renewable energy (and a big fan of desalinization plants to solve the Western United States's problems).