Matches what solar liberty quoted, 23.1kwh vs 22.8
Said Nyseg is 1 for 1 in and out.
Not doing batteries as we have a whole home generac.
Quote is $53,698 before credits,$28,816 after.
18.86kw system w 41 IQ8X and micro inverters
This system is sized for 80% of our usage.
Price jumps to 40k if we want 100%.
Were going to do it, it has a 7 year payback for us, without any increases in electricty prices.
Thanks @JayS !
But this also raises concerns about potential “utility death spirals,” where as more customers leave the grid to save money, the ones who are left face higher electricity costs, prompting even more to leave until the utility is bankrupt.
It’s a good read. If utility companies want to shoot themselves in the foot and continue shifting their billing away from favorable net metering to nonsense with unavoidable fees then they may very well find themselves forcing more people over to full off grid. Batteries are only going to continue to drop in price. At the time I did my solar install the idea of going off grid with batteries was a laughably bad financial decision with zero chance of an ROI. If I were installing today though, with the new less favorable billing options from National Grid (that I’m grandfathered out of) I’d definitely be considering a fully off grid solution and I’ve seen how you could easily make the numbers work.
It’s crazy to think that at a time when our power grid is on the cusp of one of the largest demand increases ever (mandated electric cars, appliances, HVAC) that utility companies are being this short sighted. Here’s a crazy idea… instead of doing everything you can to discourage solar as a utility, incentivise it. The biggest complaint you hear from utilities about solar and 1 for 1 net metering is that solar pushes power into the grid, where they have no good way to store it, when their isn’t as high a demand. Solar’s peak output is 11am to 5pm as you can see from the attached graph of my production on a clear August day:
Peak demand however is generally 4pm to 9pm, as people arrive home and crank their ACs to cool their houses down, use more appliances etc. It’s a legitimate complaint from utilities that having to lower their production because of backfed solar then ramp their production up in the evening is not economically viable as more and more people optin to net metering. So figure out a billing system that HELPS put that battery in my house so you can store my excess power off your grid until that demand spikes and give me a bigger credit as you draw off my battery to cool my house and my 2 neighbors, or cool my house and charge my neighbor’s electric car overnight. As a utility you can now produce power at a more consistent and economical rate and use the stored excess power distributed across thousands of residential batteries as a reliable source for peak demands. Plus you’ve now locked people into your grid, basically as partners, instead of driving them off grid and losing them entirely.
This was a timely post from my YouTube feed. Goes into what power companies do to address surge demands and at the end touches on the future use of batteries. If you’re an engineering nerd or like scientific dissection of engineering failures Grady is definitely worth a follow.
I can’t wait to get a ticket for not allowing an electric police car to steal my charge because its cold out and/or they had to chase down some kid on a scooter while ignoring. " Low battery. Avoid pursuit"
