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Why should any tax incentives be involved if it is so good?
Photo voltaic technology should be miles ahead of what it is currently. How long has the technology been with us and how far has it advanced in 50 years? The design they were Using at Solyndra was petty cool but they scrapped it. It still isn't as viable as hydro, nuclear or coal/oil/natural gas.
Windmills? I got a phone call from my power company asking if I would like to pay more for my electricity if I got more from wind power. I am getting 5% at present, how can they predict I would get more from the grid?
I laughed and hung up the phone. Pay more? Why?
Why should any tax incentives be involved if it is so good?
Do the homework. It would be cheaper to keep burning fossil fuels, but they're destructive of our eco system. Windpower doesn't emit pollution, but the technology wasn't advanced when the resource began to be used, so the capital costs were high, and incentives were needed to promote investment. Gradually, as the technology improved, the capital and operating costs have gone done, and incentives are being phased out.
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Photo voltaic technology should be miles ahead of what it is currently.
Says who? I mean, among people who are actually qualified to talk about the technology.
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How long has the technology been with us and how far has it advanced in 50 years? The design they were Using at Solyndra was petty cool but they scrapped it.
The company failed because a flood of cheap Chinese PV panels drove the consumer price down below the cost of production of Solyndra units. Essentially, they were a victim of product dumping.
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It still isn't as viable as hydro, nuclear or coal/oil/natural gas.
Hydro is great, but seriously... there won't be any more hydropower plants built in the US, and some are being retired and their dams removed because of fish and wildlife concerns. Nuclear raises safety concerns, and it creates waste that is toxic for 10,000 years. Coal/oil/gas are cheap but release carbon dioxide and other emissions that are harmful to the ecology and threaten our grandchildren's future.
Meanwhile getting wind and solar and geothermal power up and online so we can eliminate fossil fuel use is not an easy effort, because it's cheaper to just keep burning the coal/oil/gas and shove the accumulating problems off onto later generations.
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Windmills? I got a phone call from my power company asking if I would like to pay more for my electricity if I got more from wind power. I am getting 5% at present, how can they predict I would get more from the grid? I laughed and hung up the phone. Pay more? Why?
Some people are concerned enough about the future to want to support renewable, non-polluting energy sources, even if it costs them a little more personally. Fortunately the costs are falling, so in some areas renewables have already achieved cost parity with conventional sources.
Exactly... what if we just made the world a better place for no reason?
I have a different perspective than many of y'all may have... when I was child, growing up in the midwest, we heated our house with coal, as many of our neighbors did, and there was a stink in the air and my eyes would burn, and a fresh white snowfall would be black in a day or two from all the soot that would fall from the chimney smoke.
We're doing better now. There's more to go. Wind and solar energy are clean sources of renewable energy. Why WOULDN'T you want that for your grandchildren?
I never heated the house with coal. I can see why your opinions are so strong about alt energy/green living. At most I burned a "clean" manufactured log in the fireplace with the A/C on for Holiday affect.
I like alternative/clean/renewable energy, especially energy that I can control. I can control the panels on my roof, the windmill, and/or hydro electric generator in my yard. I run BioDiesel when I can in my Diesel truck and my wife's new car is a plug-in hybrid. Going to hang on to this truck for awhile and see if a manufacturer will make a plug-in hybrid pickup. (There is an aftermarket company that makes a silverado plug-in hybrid and as much as I don't mind being a first run tester I am not interested in a vehicle that isn't warranted and completely serviceable by a LARGE auto-manufacturer)
Interestingly enough, we have a courtesy conventional gas motor rental car while our volt is being serviced. For the first time in three months I had to fill-up with regular unleaded gas in a car. It left a gas odor in the garage after we got home. I didn't realize how much I hated that smell. Also, I remember having carbureted cars and the stench they had even with catalytic converters. Today's ICE vehicles run so much cleaner than the ones of yesterday as those would burn my eyes and throat. Also, Today's diesel vehicles no longer produce soot out of the tailpipe and belch black smoke/particulates. And the even newer ones produce less Nox than a gas vehicle.
We have a long way to go, but we have made some strides. What is neat about generating you own electricity and having an electric vehicle is that when you have a large power outage, you are not stranded. There are no fuel lines to you plugging in. I remember after Hurricanes in 2004 and 2005 there were long lines as most gas stations didn't have power and the ones that did couldn't get tankers to refill their tanks fast enough.
After having this volt, I can't imagine going back to a conventional vehicle ever again. I think the same will be true once I start generating my own power too.
Its a nice fantasy. Unless your about wealthy, solar just isn't up to the job. People don't want to see solar farms near them also. Wind power? We would need millions of wind tower/turbines. For a small home/cabin with a small demand its ok.(a few panels and wind for powering a battery bank.) I had a bunch of wind turbines go up near me, then they raised our electric rates.
Its a nice fantasy. Unless your about wealthy, solar just isn't up to the job.
That isn't remotely accurate. Tens of thousands of average people have installed solar PV panels on their homes just this year alone, and prices have dropped 80% since 5 years ago. Then once they have passed their pay-back period, the money they save over paying a utility company can offset other expenses. And if you don't want to buy, you can lease entire systems.
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People don't want to see solar farms near them also.
Says who? The people I've talked to who leave near solar farms seem to consider them as no big deal. Really. I mean, why would they be a problem? The pretty much just sit there.
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Wind power? We would need millions of wind tower/turbines.
No, because nobody intends for wind power to replace all hydrocarbon generation, and viable locations for windpower production are not found everywhere. But they can provide a very nice slice of the total energy pie. According to the US DOE, "nine states now rely on wind power for more than 12 percent of their total annual electricity consumption – with wind power in Iowa, South Dakota and Kansas contributing more than 20 percent."
For a small home/cabin with a small demand its ok.(a few panels and wind for powering a battery bank.)
You definitely haven't been keeping up with the news. Not only are big homes being entirely powered by solar, but so are businesses. And large scale solar power installations are powering 100s of thousand of homes over conventional power grids. The future has already arrived.
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I had a bunch of wind turbines go up near me, then they raised our electric rates.
The goal is to eliminate carbon dioxide and hydrocarbon emissions from polluting our atmosphere. This requires new technology, and we're currently in a transitional phase that that requires a lot of new investment and higher expenses for the time being. It would be nice if improving our systems could be free, but for me it's enough to know that the costs have been dropping rapidly, and are projected to keep coming down. In a few years we won't be having these discussions any longer. Once a full transition has been made away from fossil fuel burning costs to consumers will stabilize, at lower rates, because there's no fuel expense with wind and solar power.
There are homes around me that have solar, it just looks like they have a different roof surface. Since we already have different colors of shingle, flat tile, barrel tile, copper, aluminum roof tops, it doesn't even look out of place. In fact, I bet I would have to point out which houses have solar arrays on them to you.
Windmills - I could careless if my neighbors have them. Unfortunately, down here we do not have enough wind to justify putting one in.
And I have got news for you regarding your extra fees - FPL is surcharging us to help pay for new nuclear power plants that haven't been designed or approved yet. One way or another the power companies will find a way to raise rates. I hope that once the windmills, hydro plants, and solar farms are "paid" for that the rates would drop. I just see it as a way for rates to maybe not increase. The only way to protect yourself is to generate your own power and/or use less. A natural gas, coal, nucelar plant always needs fuel which always costs money. A solar or wind plant doesn't need to be refilled with a substance, so the operating cost should be lower.
Many PV installers/companies finance the system. (Even a home equity loan might work) My personal goal would be to get a small scale one in and started. Then use the savings to grow it up to energy independence. Even if I waited until the 5yr -8yr ROI period was over and then put in everything it saves you . Since panels have a useful and warranted life of 25 yrs (for the most part) you have 15-20 years to build up until you replace the system you started with. Obviously since you didn't put in all of your panels and inverters at the same time, you now have a rotational replacement schedule that should be easy to maintain. Your cost savings should more than cover it. Yes, this means you need to have found your life home and it isn't for everyone. But I see it as practical and that you don't have to be a millionaire to do it.
Now to find my life home as the one I am in, isn't it.
I think you have bad information. For one thing, prices have fallen drastically, and Federal tax incentives are still in place.
I just ran a dummy calculation for a basic $20K solar installation in Wyoming, and it indicated a full cost payback of only 10 years.
This field is changing rapidly. Don't assume that a calculation you made even a year ago is still valid.
I have a friend that put in a Wind generator in Casper and he calculates his payback at 7 years.
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