“It’s these subsidies and unfair billing credits–coupled with the intermittent nature of solar energy–that has utilities, utility customers, and taxpayers questioning the expansion of solar power. Until the solar industry can effectively operate in a free market and not burden consumers who cannot or choose not to install rooftop solar, this debate will continue.”
Solar power generation in the U.S. rose nearly 600% from 2000 to 2010 (NREL), and this trend is continuing. Fueled by an array of federal, state and local subsidies along with utility-bill credits, the economics of photovoltaic (PV) energy might seem too good to pass up. This is especially the case with residential or rooftop solar systems.
However, a closer look at industry subsidization, the unique properties of PV, and controversial billing practices for solar users, such as Net Metering, show that solar power is not as great a deal as its supporters would have you believe.…
Solar power has one major advantage over its more ubiquitous cousin wind power: electricity that is generated during peak demand hours (hot, sunny, air conditioned afternoons). Such makes solar attractive to utilities that value such capacity for peak shaving, cost aside.
The problem of wind is shown by this example. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) leads the nation with more than 8,000 MW of installed wind capacity, yet their resource planning–tasked with keeping the lights on–“counts 8.7 percent of wind nameplate capacity as dependable capacity at peak.”
The limited usefulness of wind and solar is reflected by their low system capacity factors. For example, the capacity factor of a typical utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) or concentrating solar project (CSP) is still limited to about 25% compared to the average for U.S.…