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Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

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Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#71

Post by patrickk »

martin_a wrote: post #48
JanSt wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany already has extremely high energy prices (~0,29€/kwh) of which nearly 0,07€ is just for renewable energy subsidies. More investments will not increase jobs, because China produces solar panels at way lower costs. While I agree that coal needs to be phased out, it's not so much about the 20k jobs but more so about base-load. You either need massive storage (which comes at massive cost) or some other form, i.e.…

No doubt that we can't produce solar panels cheaper than China. I would look more into inventing and developing storage technologies. That is a world wide market, not dependend on any specific type of renewable energy. That's probably where Germany could "shine" if you want to phrase it like that. And if we got that going for us, neither coal nor nuclear are needed anymore. Probably. (Although I'm all in for new nucl…

I wonder if the announced VW EV factory battery investment will have a long-term impact on lithium-ion battery knowledge and supply chain in Germany, especially for grid storage. Lithium ion batteries initially became popular for laptops and smartphones, and by a nice coincidence made it cheaper to build EVs. We need the same to happen for grid storage. Germany has the manufacturing know-how and high electricity costs, so it would be an ideal place to come up with a solution.

> (Although I'm all in for new nuclear technologies I think our aging reactors are nothing to be proud of. Maybe we could create new jobs in fusion reactor research and development, too. I'd like that.)

I think nuclear will be too expensive by the time new plants would be built - 10+ years judging by the projects in the UK and Finland. Germany would be at least as slow as them, especially with the strong anti-nuclear sentiment locally, which would probably lead to ongoing protests and lawsuits.

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#72

Post by imtringued »

martin_a wrote: post #15
perfunctory wrote: post #2

> “There’s also the fact that companies just can’t be bothered a lot of the time – there are roofs all over Europe where solar could probably save money, but people are not jumping to do it.” That's why believing in market forces alone is a little naive. There has to be a little nudge from the government.

Installing solar panels has become more and more uninteresting, at least in Germany. In former times there were generous subsidies for installing solar panels: You got, I think, a fixed amount per kWh that you installed on your roof and you also got a better price for the electricity that you put back into the grid. In Germany it's called "Einspeisevergütung" if I remember correctly. This program was limited though,…

Germany doesn't have a high enough renewable share for storage to make sense. The fundamental problem with Germany is that it doesn't deploy enough renewables. It's barely hitting 75% renewables on record days. Where exactly is all that excess energy supposed to come from?

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#73

Post by big_chungus »

perfunctory wrote: post #2

> “There’s also the fact that companies just can’t be bothered a lot of the time – there are roofs all over Europe where solar could probably save money, but people are not jumping to do it.” That's why believing in market forces alone is a little naive. There has to be a little nudge from the government.

> a little nudge from the government

Like the subsidies they've had for years?

Regardless, what are they going to do, come forcibly put solar panels on your roof? Keep them maintained? Repair them if a branch falls?

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#74

Post by GarrisonPrime »

perfunctory wrote: post #2

> “There’s also the fact that companies just can’t be bothered a lot of the time – there are roofs all over Europe where solar could probably save money, but people are not jumping to do it.” That's why believing in market forces alone is a little naive. There has to be a little nudge from the government.

It’s the government that often prevents market forces from taking advantage of such opportunities.

Most regions limit how many competing providers may operate in the same area, requiring that they possess a license - of which legislation allows only a few or even just one to exist.

Vested interests, of course, won’t want to make serious investments in new infrastructure until they absolutely have to. Especially if they’re still making payments on their debt for building the current architecture.

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#75

Post by benj111 »

ollie87 wrote: post #53
piotr1212 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a large apartment building in the Netherlands, during the last home owners association meeting we discussed installing solar panels. The problem is the huge uncertainty the government creates. At the moment it is allowed to just deduct the amount of power you create from the amount you use and pay for the remainder. This way the government does not collect energy tax on the energy you create from your solar…

A climate change denial party in the NETHERLANDS OF ALL PLACES?! Wow, I hope they like being under water.

The Dutch are quite good at dealing with that though, or else they'd already be underwater.

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#76

Post by GarrisonPrime »

lhnz wrote: post #11
iagovar wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a flat, as most europeans do. I'm not even the owner, so how I am supposed to push for that. Even if the owner did I don't think the surface of the roof is enough, not to mention that it has shadows from other buildings, antennas and so on.

It's likely that you would need to get planning permission to put solar panels on the roof of a building. This generally requires you to be the owner. Therefore it might not be best described as a market failure. It could be better described as a failure due to planning regulations that only give power to land-owners. This is big problem in Europe, since as you point out: many people rent.

So...you think regulations should allow renters to modify someone else’s property, even if against the owners wishes?

If a proposition for solar panels is actually realistic and a net positive, the owners should be easily convinced without resorting to force.

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#77

Post by gdhbcc »

piotr1212 wrote: post #62
sergiosgc wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no tax involved, other than VAT, which applies to both prices.

Are you sure? Does electricity in Portugal cost 10 to 20 cent before tax? Why is it so expensive? We pay 6 cent/kWH before tax in the Netherlands.

Because we had a government owned company with a monopoly that the EU forced us to sell. So now we have a private monopoly instead of a public one.

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#78

Post by piotr1212 »

krageon wrote: post #58
piotr1212 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a large apartment building in the Netherlands, during the last home owners association meeting we discussed installing solar panels. The problem is the huge uncertainty the government creates. At the moment it is allowed to just deduct the amount of power you create from the amount you use and pay for the remainder. This way the government does not collect energy tax on the energy you create from your solar…

The amount of years it takes for solar to pay for itself is not set in stone. The ten year prognosis is extremely conservative and frequently untrue, especially if you start to load most of your power-heavy operations (washing, dishes, etc) into the daytime when the generated power is sufficient to support those things. Given that there is not yet (as far as I'm aware) a tax on kWh used entirely from solar panels (ie…

You are correct that if you use your energy before it gets on the grid you are fine.

But that is quite hard for most people to accomplish, most people are not at home during daytime when the panels generate most. The time my washing machine actually consumes energy warming up the water is relatively short.

The largest part of the power consumption of my home owners association is spent on lighting, the other part on the elevator which is most of the time just idling and peaks when someone uses it.

Batteries are inefficient and still expensive. You could warm up a boiler for hot water during day but I think that is done more efficiently with a heat collector instead of pv->electricity->heat. You can warm up your house, but you have to have very good insulation otherwise most energy is lost by the time you get home.

Anyway, in practice the change in policy can have a huge effect in return on investment time.

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#79

Post by benj111 »

lhnz wrote: post #11
iagovar wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a flat, as most europeans do. I'm not even the owner, so how I am supposed to push for that. Even if the owner did I don't think the surface of the roof is enough, not to mention that it has shadows from other buildings, antennas and so on.

It's likely that you would need to get planning permission to put solar panels on the roof of a building. This generally requires you to be the owner. Therefore it might not be best described as a market failure. It could be better described as a failure due to planning regulations that only give power to land-owners. This is big problem in Europe, since as you point out: many people rent.

It is a market failure.

The incentives of the owner need to be aligned with the incentives of the tenant, that is the failure.

Either, as you point out, tenants need to be given powers to install solar panels, and given security of tenure to take advantage of the long term investment, (which seems to me would go further than mere planning regs). Or incentivise the owner to install solar panels, this seems more straight forward, although might not necessarily benefit the tenant.

Re: Solar now ‘cheaper than grid electricity’ in every Chinese city

#80

Post by JoeAltmaier »

iagovar wrote: post #9
perfunctory wrote: post #2

> “There’s also the fact that companies just can’t be bothered a lot of the time – there are roofs all over Europe where solar could probably save money, but people are not jumping to do it.” That's why believing in market forces alone is a little naive. There has to be a little nudge from the government.

I live in a flat, as most europeans do. I'm not even the owner, so how I am supposed to push for that. Even if the owner did I don't think the surface of the roof is enough, not to mention that it has shadows from other buildings, antennas and so on.

And rooftop solar is like the very definition of Not Scalable. A building with 6 or 60 families has the same roof area, but 10X different demand.
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