All that is needed now to make this concept a reality is political commitment and appropriate investments and funding for building many more solar power systems, solar farms, hybrid solar-natural gas plants, solar thermal storage and advanced battery-based grid energy storage systems. Development of solar power needs a reboot to take a more rational and less subsidized approach.
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On October 13, 2015 it was announced that the Hawaiian Public Utilities Commission was ending the Net metering program whereby customers with solar panels received a credit for any electricity they returned to the grid. Does this make sense? Under state-mandated net metering, if annual production exceeds usage, the energy supplier will issue the homeowner a check for the excess at the end of the year. Vehicle fuel from solar energy is what provides the quickest payback for solar panels.
Solar power has huge potential.
The electric industry makes an appealing argument that utilities should charge net metering customers for all these energy deposits and withdrawals.
Adding to the distributed energy/net metering debate involving utilities and solar panel owners, New York State for now has lifted the cap on net metering. In other cases, proposed fees would de-incentivize the transition to residential solar altogether.
According to the latest data from Australia’s Clean Energy Regulator, there are now more than 1,464,000 small solar power systems installed across the country; with a collective capacity exceeding 4,479,000 kilowatts.
So which logic is more compelling? That and the fact that it’s such a large state with a lot of open land. Utilities avoid short-term costs of purchasing expensive peak power from other sources. It can even go up by over 1,000% within the same day or week. A few utilities have begun to take note of the relatively low risk nature of solar energy projects. Everyone always said batteries were the solar industry’s Holy Grail – and the visions produced by the advocates’ crystal ball prove it was true.
But how would we quantify the full value of solar? The best way is to analyze the impact of solar that is not already priced into the market.
NV Energy claims the departure of the major casino companies would reduce its sales by 5 percent, forcing it to raise prices on its remaining customers.
Keep up to date with all the hottest cleantech news by subscribing to our (free) cleantech newsletter, or keep an eye on sector-specific news by getting our (also free) solar energy newsletter, electric vehicle newsletter, or wind energy newsletter. This would create a noticeable decrease in the current daytime demand for electricity and a corresponding decrease in the price of electricity during these daytime hours.
“The investment we’re making in renewable solar energy will help to ensure a sustainable future for Austin, which is a core priority of the Imagine Austin plan established in partnership with the community”, said City Manager Marc Ott.
“I’m confident we’ll be able to continue the dialogue to move toward what we think is the right direction”, said Beaton, who has seen the House’s draft. The results so far have been impressive: Roughly $140 million in local projects have been funded and about 6,000 projects completed. Grid parity has been reached in every part of the world if solar systems are looked at over the 25 year useful life of the systems. The use of electricity will extend support of travel of short distances by electric vehicles, vastly increasing the quantity of electricity generated.
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An electrical engineer, Charles Ameh said that the introduction of off-grid solar electrification was one of the best ways of expanding energy access in the country. Those savings would shore up the casino industry at a time when many casinos are having difficulty meeting their operating expenses and retaining employees.
