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  • Nevada PV Solar

    With the NV state gov passing AB 405 to restore homeowner solar, the intent is to bring
    back the industry after the utilities did their best to kill it. NV seems like a great place
    for it, plenty of sun and space for ground mounts. I wonder if the home PV industry will
    make a quick recovery? Bruce Roe

  • #2
    If solar and R.E. can grow up, stand on it's own without price supports and stop living in the government's basement like a 20 something house pet, it'll survive and perhaps find a niche in the energy mix. If it can't, it won't and shouldn't.

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    • #3
      Well down here in Oz the economics of solar both on a residential and commercial scale are at a stage now where we really dont need subsidies anymore and the current set up looks like it will be phased out in 3 years.

      I think the industry in NV will bounce back at an astonishing rate Bruce, people love the solar and it seems if you can get the payback time down under 10 years it will continue to be popular. Cheers.

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      • #4
        Originally posted by solar pete View Post
        Well down here in Oz the economics of solar both on a residential and commercial scale are at a stage now where we really dont need subsidies anymore and the current set up looks like it will be phased out in 3 years.

        I think the industry in NV will bounce back at an astonishing rate Bruce, people love the solar and it seems if you can get the payback time down under 10 years it will continue to be popular. Cheers.
        Pete: People in the U.S. at least, may love solar, but they love the feeling that the perception of lower bills brings more.

        I'd also respectfully suggest that while people in the U.S. may like PV, they're probably more fond of the hype and often overinflated claims of peddlers. A careful analysis based on reasonable assumptions will often show that, over the long term, in the U.S. at least, many systems will result in residential users paying more in the ling run for the solar plus POCO power more than the POCO power alone based on the common situation of oversizing and overpaying, both mostly due to ignorance.

        Users by and large know little and mostly, like automatons, repeat the hype that roped them in in the first place. Not to paint everyone with the same brush, but if many/most users knew more before the bought/committed, there'd be fewer residential installations. However, I'd also suggest those systems would be smaller and better designed. The level of ignorance is astounding at times. I've a hard time believing no one is taken advantage of by those with $ to make off the ignorance. Up close and personal observation tends to do little to disabuse me of that opinion.

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        • #5
          Originally posted by J.P.M. View Post
          If solar and R.E. can grow up, stand on it's own without price supports and stop living in the government's basement like a 20 something house pet, it'll survive and perhaps find a niche in the energy mix. If it can't, it won't and shouldn't.
          C'mon JPM, the Fossil Fuel industry has been receiving price supports for so long that its parents have died and it has inherited the house, moved upstairs, and started collecting welfare.

          At least keep the playing field level, even if it takes price support indefinitely. Fossil Fuels are still collecting $20 Billion dollars in Federal subsidies each year, and to boot they continue to contribute to climate change at a rate that we may not be able to reverse at this point (The National Academy of Sciences estimates that continued pollution from fossil fuel usage is costing us $200 Billion annually - see https://www.forbes.com/sites/ucenerg...never-heard-of)

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          • #6
            Originally posted by Spektre View Post

            C'mon JPM, the Fossil Fuel industry has been receiving price supports for so long that its parents have died and it has inherited the house, moved upstairs, and started collecting welfare.

            At least keep the playing field level, even if it takes price support indefinitely. Fossil Fuels are still collecting $20 Billion dollars in Federal subsidies each year, and to boot they continue to contribute to climate change at a rate that we may not be able to reverse at this point (The National Academy of Sciences estimates that continued pollution from fossil fuel usage is costing us $200 Billion annually - see https://www.forbes.com/sites/ucenerg...never-heard-of)
            I've heard that from lots of folks for a long time as saying tax breaks for energy companies like oil, gas and coal are an unfair use of taxpayer money. That may well be.

            But if that's true - and I'm not saying it's untrue - with a lot of such talk coming from those in favor of solar subsidies - how can those who cry unfair on subsidies for conventional energy sources, as you seem to be doing, turn around and say subsidies are OK for energy sources they favor, such as PV ? Where's the objective fairness in that ?

            Subsidies suck. They weaken the subsidized industries. And, if anyone thinks for one hot second that subsidies were or are meant for consumers or that such subsidies bring consumers lower consumer prices, if I had the chance, I'd sell them a bridge.

            Additionally, subsidies allow businesses that would otherwise fail because they are poorly run to survive in the higher price and margin environment that come with subsidies. That hurts R.E.

            Subsidies are mostly for mfg's. and business profits (Import tariffs, BTW, act much the same way for the protected portions of the economy). Consumers get crumbs, higher sticker prices with a bogus 30% save story, businesses reap most all of the 30 %, with less product development and innovation that true competition brings, and with the additional anchor to drag of way too many poorly run companies that wouldn't survive without the subsidy climate putting out a crummy product and poor service.

            Had the 30% fed. tax credit never existed, the solar industry would be smaller, a lot stronger, and a lot healthier, or it would cease to exist. As loosely translated after Nietzsche: "That which does not kill us makes us stronger". If it did survive, my guess is PV would cost close to 30 % less than it does now with a better product to sell, and energy companies would have real competition. Energy prices would be lower for all as a result. If it didn't survive, then it couldn't compete and didn't deserve to survive. Life's tough.

            I've got a pretty well developed libertarian and existentialist streak that make me believe things like subsidies, tariffs, and using the tax code to shape moral and societal behavior are not good, and that such things are, in the end, bad for consumers and for society. I also think such attitudes are becoming anachronistic, but that's off topic stuff.

            Instead of keeping subsidies - get rid of all of them - ALL of them - including most of the IRS tax code, but that's more off topic. However, with respect to energy subsidies, I'm a realist and believe fossil fuel and nuke subsidies will be with us for a long time. In the meantime, I see no benefit to solar and R.E., much less consumers, from mucking about in the same cesspit of subsidies. To want to do so also sounds like some sour grapes to me that solar might not be allowed to pull off the same public tit that other industries are condemned for doing.

            Since, IMO only, the subsidy trough is doing no good - stay way from it, or better yet - get rid of it.
            Last edited by J.P.M.; 11-23-2017, 10:20 AM.

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