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California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

bloomberg.com

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Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#161

Post by mhb »

SteveGerencser wrote: post #152
bhickey wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A tax on carbon fuel would make more sense still. Polluters should pay for their pollution rather than foisting their externalities on others.

Except, how do you get to choose what type of power you buy? What if I live back east and would happily pay for wind or solar but my only option is coal or natural gas?

The same way you've chosen to live in a (cheaper) house without all the earthquake resistance requirements.

Part of the decision-making basket you evaluate in deciding to live somewhere includes the cost of energy with the cost of its externalities.

Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#162

Post by plussed_reader »

deelowe wrote: post #112
alkonaut wrote: post #23

Requiring specific technical solutions is rarely a good idea. For example mandating that all new cars have catalytic converters is a common but not very good requirement. The requirement should be formulated as a goal/limit, not a solution. Having one solution required means you can’t innovate to find a cheaper or better solution to the same problem. The answer in this context would be to require a total net power dr…

Is this not just a thinly veiled attempt to increase new construction costs by NIMBYs?

No; Nimby's need no justification to dig their heels into the ground.

Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#163

Post by ajross »

thinkcontext wrote: post #153
alkonaut wrote: post #23

Requiring specific technical solutions is rarely a good idea. For example mandating that all new cars have catalytic converters is a common but not very good requirement. The requirement should be formulated as a goal/limit, not a solution. Having one solution required means you can’t innovate to find a cheaper or better solution to the same problem. The answer in this context would be to require a total net power dr…

I tend to agree even though I have solar panels on my own roof. I have clear southern exposure but what about houses that are shaded? Maybe a better use of money in such a case would be better insulation or a geothermal heat pump. Perhaps a points system of some kind, with different energy reduction strategies getting different points. I also think there should be a progressive component to the requirement. The stand…

> I have clear southern exposure but what about houses that are shaded?

FWIW: very, very few houses (especially in CA where the overwhelming bulk of homes are built in arid biomes with very short trees!) have roofs that are actually shaded. A "shady house" means a house with trees nearby that shade the yard and the periphery of the roof. Take a look at Google Maps for your neighborhood for proof of this. The roofs are sunny almost always.

Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#164

Post by esaym »

lev99 wrote: post #134
blang wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just in case anyone was curious (I was) $1500 in 1983 is $3758.34 in 2018

That means the real cost of installing a septic tank increased 4x. Although, we don't know how similar the two projects are. Maybe one has more rock to dig through, the tank is farther away, or new tanks are better than 1980s tanks in some ways. There are many possible answers other than the cost of installing a septic tank outpaced inflation.

>Although, we don't know how similar the two projects are

They are similar in that the requirements for tank size are the same and the dirt is the same (same property). What is different is caused by the regulations. The style put in in 1983 is a traditional 1000 gallon tank going out to a leach field with about 100ft of perforated pipe (known as a 'traditional' system').

But traditional systems are now banned for this soil type (clay content > 50%, even though they still work fine if designed right). The current price for a traditional system is now about $5500. But since it is banned, I have to install a 'Evapotranspirative (ET) system' which involves digging two 20'x80' pits and filling it with a special 'sandy loam' soil (which is not native to the area and has to be trucked in) and then running the perforated pipe in that. It's two to three times the work and an extra $2k - $4k in soil costs.

Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#165

Post by Bjartr »

philipkglass wrote: post #40

I'm having a hard time finding a news article with links to the actual standard, and secondary sources like this Bloomberg article are omitting important details. Does this represent the standard that was adopted: http://docketpublic.energy.ca.gov/PublicDocuments/17-BSTD-01... ? In particular, I wonder what the minimum system size is, in kilowatts. Reporting household system size in "dollars" is a poor metric because…

> Can anyone explain what's required to comply with Title 24?

I help write software that implements calculations related to Title 24 compliance, so I'll give answering this a shot.

It's described in this[1] 289 page document (only like a fifth of it applies to residential construction). It covers a lot of things, to say the least.

At a very simplified and high level, it works like this: There are two overall ways of meeting the energy efficiency requirements. One says "meet these material specs" (prescriptive). The other says "be at least this efficient" (performance).

The prescriptive approach has requirements describing things like all walls must be at least this well insulated and any heating/cooling system fans must be at least this efficient.

The performance approach does a performance simulation for both the proposed house design and for that same design, but built to the prescriptive spec. The design passes if the proposed design uses less energy in the simulation.

The document you've linked says both approaches will now require solar panels (so you can't "just" be energy efficient).

My guess is that you'll have to add at least as much solar as the current minimum required to get credit for doing so, which is described in section 2.2.3 in this document[2].

[1] http://www.energy.ca.gov/2015publications/CEC-400-2015-037/C...

[2] http://www.energy.ca.gov/business_meetings/2016_packets/2016...

Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#167

Post by esaym »

gascan wrote: post #113
esaym wrote: post #7

Good night. Once upon a time in 1983, my grandparents bought a mobile home and put it out on rural property. They paid $300 for the water company to install a water meter and about $1500 for a septic tank install. Now I'm trying to do the same thing (and on the same property). The water meter is $5,000 (cash only in full), and the septic tank is $15,000. If I was also required to have solar, I'd really be screwed...…

If I was also required to have solar, I'd really be screwed... So, what do you do for electricity then? Most people developing rural property near where I live love solar, they can't get enough, as it lets them go off-grid and avoid paying electricity hookup fees.

I'm not that rural. The price for the electric run is $350 for new poles and the service is about $0.10 p/kwh. I'm fine with adding solar. I simply don't have the money right now. And I am not getting a mortgage as the 'just add it to your mortgage' attitude is what has lead to so many (non protested) price hikes in the first place.

So adding 'just another' $10k to the price means I get to wait so many extra months to save money before I can even build.

Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#168

Post by 11thEarlOfMar »

I live in a planned community of about 100 homes. There is a homeowner's association that is responsible for, among other things, maintaining unused land on the development. There are probably 10-20 acres of unused and unusable space.

About 20% of the homes have rooftop solar. It's ugly. So I've been considering contacting a solar firm or two and asking about installing a full up solar plant with battery system so the whole development can go off-grid, and not have those ugly panels, plus the installation and potential roof damage, maintenance, etc.

Re: California Votes to Require Rooftop Solar Power on New Homes

#170

Post by mchannon »

trey-jones wrote: post #140
alkonaut wrote: post #23

Requiring specific technical solutions is rarely a good idea. For example mandating that all new cars have catalytic converters is a common but not very good requirement. The requirement should be formulated as a goal/limit, not a solution. Having one solution required means you can’t innovate to find a cheaper or better solution to the same problem. The answer in this context would be to require a total net power dr…

The first thing that popped into my head was that this really bones homes that only get 1-2 hours of direct sunlight per day.

Almost all solar power works just fine off indirect sunlight too.

Consider that Germany has plenty of locations lucky to get 1-2 hours of direct sunlight per day and yet it has outpaced the US for many years.

New construction surrounded by redwood trees would probably still be able to justify solar thermal panels on the roof in addition to PV's, because it might make off-grid construction possible.

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