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Solar PV has gotten cheaper and cheaper which suggests it's more and more viable (subsidies aside). But there are no batteries that can store electricity in any meaningful way, so solar relies on being paid by the local utility/power plant for excess power when available. But it seems to me the economic argument only works while adopters are few. If we reach the point where there are many adopters, doesn't power inevitably become significantly more expensive for all? I am asking...
Initial situation
10 homeowners all getting electricity from their local power plant. Their monthly payments cover power plant capital assets-generation/distribution, labor, fuel & misc.
Early adopter
1 homeowner decides to install solar at home. PV panels on average generate enough to fully power the house BUT generation is intermittent - none at night, diminished when overcast, but generating twice as much power on optimal condition days as the home needs. The cost of PV panels & equipment is relatively high, breakeven more than 10 years out. Homeowner does not use power plant when solar PVs are generating, sells excess to local utility when available, but relies on local power plant when solar generation is less than needed or zero. Homeowner breaks even on utility bill, usage offset by reimbursement for excess solar power put back in the grid.
9 homeowners still getting electricity from the local power plant. Power plant on average generating 10% less power saving power plant fuel (coal, NG), BUT must be capable of producing full power for 10 homes, when solar home is not generating. So power capacity/capital assets cannot be reduced, and labor cannot be reduced. Power plant must now spread full capital asset costs and full labor costs among 9 homeowners, electric rate must go up. Rate of reimbursement to solar home reduced by almost 10%, higher fixed unit costs at power plant.
50% adoption
4 more homeowners, impressed, now install solar at home, with all the same results as first homeowner above. Reimbursement for excess solar energy starts out 10% less than first adopter, and drops about 50% when they are all online.**
5 remaining homeowners still getting electricity from local power plant. Plant producing 50% less power saving power plant fuel (coal, NG), BUT still must be capable of producing full power for 10 homes when solar homes are not generating. Power plant assets/labor cannot be reduced. **Power plant must now spread full capital costs and full labor costs among 5 homeowners, electric rate doubles (other than fuel). Rate of reimbursement to solar homes reduced by almost 50%, higher fixed unit costs at power plant. Payback on solar systems extended considerably.
100% adoption
You get the drift, but you can't have a power plant capable of supplying 10 homes on standby 50% of the time, and still deliver electricity when needed at a price anything like when everyone used the power plant.
Without ways to store the power generated by PV systems (not available yet if ever), we end up requiring the same conventional power plant infrastructure for nights and cloudy days and only save fuel and reduce emmissions. Solar reimbursement rates decline extending payback on solar systems, and everyone now paying for for power?
There is going to be limited solar until such time as the battery issue is solved. so, not an issue until then.
As for power plants, they will take plants off-line. Coal fired or diesel plants produce electricity on demand and electricity can travel for hundreds of miles before it is used. So a few smaller generating plants will still be left functioning.
The wind generation has issues, and is causing a problem already because it is not demand generated and electricity must be used as it is produced. There is no way to store large amounts of electricity.
The wind generators in Oregon are killing fish. Yes, that's right. They kill fish.
The amount of electricity they produced can't be controlled and the electricity must be used as it is produced. That means when the windmills produce too much, the hydro turbines must shut down. When the turbines are closed the diverted water stirs up silt and it kills the fish.
Too much of this alternate power stuff is just not well thought out, at all.
It's simplistic to ask the question as if there is only solar and batteries. There are many resources that a dispatcher can call upon to balance load. While solar doesn't always work, a substantial amount of load is driven by the sun so when solar isn't available, neither is that component of load. In some reasonable respect solar output and solar induced loads work in concert. Without solar resources the dispatcher will have to reduce output from some invariable resource to balance load.
It's simplistic to ask the question as if there is only solar and batteries. There are many resources that a dispatcher can call upon to balance load. While solar doesn't always work, a substantial amount of load is driven by the sun so when solar isn't available, neither is that component of load. In some reasonable respect solar output and solar induced loads work in concert. Without solar resources the dispatcher will have to reduce output from some invariable resource to balance load.
I'm not sure what your answer means, but other than air conditioning (which I can understand), what are significant examples of loads driven by the sun that would work in concert with solar PV?
Maybe you could answer the question more readily assuming 100% of homes using PV solar in the midst of a 3 day sub optimal period for solar power generation. I understand how solar will reduce power plant fuels, but I don't seen any reduction in capital equipment for generation and distribution, nor labor or any of the other operating costs for the power plant UNLESS there's a revolutionary change in battery technology (which could indeed happen, but not evident yet) or homeowners are willing to do without power all or in part for long periods (hard for me to imagine at least voluntarily).
I'm not sure what your answer means, but other than air conditioning (which I can understand), what are significant examples of loads driven by the sun that would work in concert with solar PV?
Maybe you could answer the question more readily assuming 100% of homes using PV solar in the midst of a 3 day sub optimal period for solar power generation. I understand how solar will reduce power plant fuels, but I don't seen any reduction in capital equipment for generation and distribution, nor labor or any of the other operating costs for the power plant UNLESS there's a revolutionary change in battery technology (which could indeed happen, but not evident yet) or homeowners are willing to do without power all or in part for long periods (hard for me to imagine at least voluntarily).
HVAC is the most significant solar related load. There are several reason why you don't need 100% redundancy for PV:
1. As I said a significant portion of the load is HVAC. On a cloudy day when there is less PV production, there's less HVAC demand so loads and resources can remain in balance.
2. While the sun doesn't always shine, it always shines somewhere. As more PV is installed over a geographically diverse area the reliable capacity approaches that of the average output for the day.
3. The system as it exists today is designed to allow loss of the largest generator on the system. That means that a control area is already able to deal with a loss of 800-1000 MW. Small fluctuations PV output are handled as a business as usual event.
4. There are a lot of things that can take an 800+ MW plant offline for months at a time. Utilities have to have contingency plant for replacing the output of these large plants, but there isn't a scenario where you would lose 800 MW of PV due to a single point failure.
The fact is few can afford it. Still 13k otehr essential products from crude3 with woud hae to replace.The pof course there are the ther thinsg people couldn't then afforsd to purcahse that would go under.
But it seems to me the economic argument only works while adopters are few. If we reach the point where there are many adopters, doesn't power inevitably become significantly more expensive for all? I am asking...
You're putting the cart way before the horse.
While you were sleeping.....special interest groups were busy lobbying for protective legislation.
How does going solar save you a dime?
It doesn't.
You might want to peruse some of the legislation and contractual agreements between the several States and utility companies, and that includes public utility companies.
In Ohio....for example...utility companies own the rights to electricity.
What is the implication of that?
Go solar if you want....you won't save even one goddam dime, because Duke Energy will come out and slap a smart meter on you solar panels (or your wind turbine) and bill you for your electricity at the going rates for kilowatt hours...whatever that might be.
Same is true for water. In some areas of the US people are installing catch-basins and such to collect water for use to lower their water bill, or have water available during periods of water restrictions.
That is illegal. The State owns the water, even if it falls on your property, the State still owns the water, and you are not allowed to interfere in the free movement of water.
Don't forget the revenues States, counties and cities collect off of utility revenues....that money has to come from somewhere, right?
Economically...
Mircea: I have no interest in "going solar," I was asking how (badly) the economics would work at higher adoption rates because I wonder if the early adopters positive $ experiences are NOT an indication of what would happen with lots of solar homes.
And BTW, if you look on the Raleigh subforum, you'll find a Duke customer who is paying next to nothing for electricity on his house.
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