How should net metering affect your electric bill? • Hacker News Board

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#201

Post by cool_dude85 » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:28 PM UTC

microfen wrote: post #59

People have seen this net metering problem coming from far off. I wrote a very unpolished undergrad thesis on this a while ago. Some standout articles from back then showed how net metering leads to a positive feedback of solar adoption [1] because of how rates are structured throughout this country (and the world for that matter), and it was time to consider modifying the rate setting process [2]. My conclusion was…

>My conclusion was that net metering ends up being a regressive tax on those who can't afford the upfront capital to install solar themselves.

This is the traditional conclusion in the utility business, but I'd say it's also almost meaningless. By the exact same arguments, any kind of conservation winds up being a "regressive tax on those who can't afford the upfront capital", e.g. insulation, fancy windows, high efficiency HVAC.

If I can afford a $2400 upfront cost to go above code on my HVAC unit, but it saves 100 a month, that savings is being subsidized by the people who can't afford it. The utility loses 100 a month in revenue but much less than that in costs, and the difference is picked up by the broader customer base.

Hell, turning your thermostat settings up in the summer is a "regressive tax on those who can't handle the less comfortable temperature" by exactly the same argument.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#202

Post by bick_nyers » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:31 PM UTC

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #25

giantg2 wrote: post #8

I only want solar/wind/etc if I can be off grid.

I can understand why it can be necessary, but why is being off-grid desirable? Having solar/wind/etc is great, but a grid connection gives you a bail-out in case things go south, e.g. an outrageously hot and windless summer night might create a demand that cannot be handled by your battery (if any).

I don't agree with the parent commenter, but in some states/countries net metering is being turned around to having to pay a flat fee per kWh of solar generators. For example, my electric bill is around $160, I can net zero it out with 8kWh of solar costing me (installing it myself) about $8k total, but then if I get charged the $8 per kWh per month that is being proposed, I now pay $80/month to maintain a grid I rarely use as opposed to $0/month. Shifting my ROI from 4 -> 8 years. If you get solar installed with an installer, you would probably pay something like $20k for that same array, so your ROI goes from 10 -> 20 years, where your warranty might stop at 10 or 15 years. If you instead threw that $20k lump sum on the stock market and got 5% per year, you would match the amount you would have saved on solar.

Edit: Math is hard, that's $64 a month and the numbers change slightly but the essence of what I'm saying still holds

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#203

Post by twoodfin » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:33 PM UTC

Dave_Rosenthal wrote: post #181

nostromo wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Since I easily generate more electricity that I will ever use (see above for why policies drove us to an installation larger that necessary) my household has no incentive to conserve at all. ... so? You're generating energy from the sun. Feel free to use it all. We don't conserve energy for fun, we conserve it to protect the environment.

You comment makes sense if I was not hooked up to the grid. But I am. So, if my family conserves, that energy we save offsets someone else’s coal-generated energy and helps the environment. But I have zero incentive to so do because of layers of bad policies.

It'd be interesting to know the "true" price of that energy. That is, what the utility would pay you for what you feed back into the grid vs. acquiring that energy from another source. Essentially impossible to calculate given all the regulations and subsidies, but my guess is that it would be quite low relative to your metered rate, and thus the actual "offset" of carbon-based fuels is small.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#204

Post by cool_dude85 » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:37 PM UTC

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #36

lotsofpulp wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why all subsidies should be in the form of cash. Give poor people cash rather than obfuscate prices, which then results in hampering of market mechanisms and results in inefficient allocation of resources.

Aside from the obvious problem (which poor people) it is a very interesting idea to remove all subsidies (explicit and implicit). Terrifying but interesting

Even in a single example such as your electric bill, this is absolutely impossible (or, maybe with a team of statisticians and accountants working on each customer's bill each month, and of course their associated costs).

The fact is, the utility does not know how much money you cost them in a given month and it's impossible to say. Some of your electricity is being generated from a plant planned and built 40+ years ago, long since paid for. Is that electricity sold at the cost of fuel and maintenance? Electricity generated from a new plant then has a corresponding capital cost component but how's it portioned out at the customer level? What if they had to go change your transformer 20 years ago but your neighbor's still on their old 50-year-old transformer next door?

Unworkable.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#205

Post by LadyCailin » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:42 PM UTC

phkahler wrote: post #39

>> Greenhouse gas emissions are a classic instance: polluters don’t pay for the carbon they emit. This is the ultimate distorted price: emissions have a high cost, but the price we charge polluters is $0. That price is a colossal lie. I always say if you want to make someone pay for carbon emissions, the easiest way is to tax its extraction from the ground. Tax coal, oil, and gas extraction (or import) and call it a…

That split bill thing is how it works here in Norway. The nettleie (infra part) is regulated like a utility, because it’s a monopoly in the area serviced, but the actual electricity is fully free market, because you can choose whoever you like to actually provide the electricity.

Actually though, now that I’ve typed this out, the nettleie is charged per kWh drawn (as well as peak demand), and I’m not sure how that changes if you have solar panels. Maybe another Norwegian can comment. In any case, splitting the infra and production makes sense to me, and definitely can be done.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#206

Post by jillesvangurp » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:42 PM UTC

FabHK wrote: post #163

jeppesen-io wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for saying this. I find in technical circles, like HN, it's often underappreciated how dramatically solar, wind and stored energy are becoming cheaper year by year while production capacity continues to grow

Question is whether batteries are getting better fast enough. Cost per energy stored might be coming down relatively quickly, but energy density (energy per volume) or specific energy (energy per mass) are improving only very slowly. As a consequence, I think long-range electric passenger jets, for example, are many decades off.

By "very slowly" you mean double the capacity per kg in the last decade at a tenth of the cost? Because that is more or less what happened in the last decade.

If you don't believe me, the Nissan Leaf originally had 21KWH of capacity when it launched in 2010. The smallest variant of the latest model has 41 KWH. You can also get a 60KWH version. And you can actually install new batteries into an original Leaf and double the range while slightly lowering the weight. And of course those batteries are now a fraction of the cost that they were in 2010. Back then replacing the battery would have cost tens of thousands of dollars. People are getting that done for around 5K now for a battery that is literally twice the capacity.

The discarded batteries typically end up being part of some grid storage solution.

Another doubling in the coming decade is likely. As is further reductions in price per KWH. Maybe not 10x. But probably more than 2-3x.

It's profitable now to buy expensive storage solutions for grid providers. Ten years from now that will be a lot more attractive.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#207

Post by cool_dude85 » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:43 PM UTC

StillBored wrote: post #102

krapp wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a deregulated market, no one forces anyone to guarantee anything.

Well power deregulation has a lot of meanings, here in TX, in which is considered a "deregulated" market (because the producers, transmission and retails are different orgs, and there is an energy market) normal generators have to file servicing/downtime requests, which can be rejected, when they won't be able to deliver their nameplate capacity. That is to assure there is sufficient grid/transmission capacity, they…

>In the US it just generally means that there aren't integrated municipal power companies

Huh? There are plenty. The second biggest city in the US has one.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#208

Post by nomel » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:45 PM UTC

Bilal_io wrote: post #145

hunterb123 wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not really accurate. I've lost power 4 times total in 30 years here. Usually big Texas thunderstorms, never heat. The 100 year winter freeze I lost power for two days, that was the longest ever. Haven't lost power since then, didn't lose power for a couple years before that. We have the cheapest rates because of the way distribution and providers are setup. The problem with big user bills were SV companies lik…

I am not denying your experience, but I was talking about my own. I lost power for over 3 hours just 2 nights ago. And since the horrible experience we had in February 2021 we (me and everyone I know) have been living in fear it might happen again. A quick look at Centerpoint's own outage tracker[1] shows outages everywhere in different parts of Texas. 1. https://gis.centerpointenergy.com/outagetracker/?WT.ac=OC_Im..…

I don't see why "fear" is necessary. Power has never been a constant. When I was a kid we had a box of candles under the sink and warm blankets stacked in the garage, and some emergency food/water to last a week. Now that I'm an adult, I still have the same. I don't understand this trust and expectation of flawless infrastructure, where "fear" would come into play. Inconvenience, sure. You should be able to easily remove the fear aspect, with minimal preparation.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#209

Post by Bilal_io » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:48 PM UTC

nomel wrote: post #208

Bilal_io wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not denying your experience, but I was talking about my own. I lost power for over 3 hours just 2 nights ago. And since the horrible experience we had in February 2021 we (me and everyone I know) have been living in fear it might happen again. A quick look at Centerpoint's own outage tracker[1] shows outages everywhere in different parts of Texas. 1. https://gis.centerpointenergy.com/outagetracker/?WT.ac=OC_Im..…

I don't see why "fear" is necessary. Power has never been a constant. When I was a kid we had a box of candles under the sink and warm blankets stacked in the garage, and some emergency food/water to last a week. Now that I'm an adult, I still have the same. I don't understand this trust and expectation of flawless infrastructure, where "fear" would come into play. Inconvenience, sure. You should be able to easily re…

"fear" is necessary because I was stuck at an apartment for 3 days and nowhere to go with no heat and no water when the weather outside was -17 degrees.

Re: How should net metering affect your electric bill?

#210

Post by woodruffw » Thu, Feb 03, 2022, 7:56 PM UTC

bick_nyers wrote: post #191

woodruffw wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I can tell, only Florida makes it actually illegal to disconnect from the power grid[1]. It seems to be legal in every other state, subject to doing paperwork. [1]: https://off-grid-home.com/is-it-legal-to-disconnect-your-hom...

What if I just didn't pay my bill and the utility company disconnected me from the power grid? Would I be subject to fines and jail time? Absurd, but hey, that sure sounds like Florida. Edit: If you follow the link in the article, it sounds like this was all because of disconnecting the water hookup and has nothing to do with solar power?

Purely speculation on my part, but I think the power company disconnecting you for nonpayment probably wouldn't count: they don't physically take the line down, which is the condition that Florida seems to be concerned about.