Solar, solar, everywhere, so bright it makes you blink

Solar, solar, everywhere, so bright it makes you blink By Guest Columnist Sunday, June 4, 2017 By Tamera Minnick Xcel Energy sends me a check every month. Naturally, I also transfer funds to them for heat and service charges, but it is exciting to cash that $8 to $12 check. I am an energy producer because of the solar panels on my roof. This rebate is due to the foresight of Coloradans passing Amendment 37 in 2004, the first Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) enacted by ballot initiative in the U.S. This amendment, along with subsequent updates, requires utilities to meet between 10 percent and 30 percent (depending on their size) of electricity production from renewables by 2020. Most of that renewable electricity production, in Colorado and nationwide, will be met with utility-scale projects such as wind farms and concentrated solar plants. However, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, 37 percent of solar production is from small-scale systems, with more than half of this coming from residential rooftops. Small-scale production is known as distributed energy. Colorado’s RPS requires a portion of the renewable production be from distributed generation. Distributed energy projects avoid the land-use issues that occur with large, industrial solar installations (which is still a smaller footprint than that of a coal power plant supplied by surface mining, and it uses very little water compared to coal, natural gas or nuclear plants). Utilities must use “net-metering” for these distributed systems. Forty-three states require net-metering. Because of net-metering, the little round plate of the old, analog meter ran forward or backward depending on my electricity consumption or production after installing solar. Watching this was electrifying on the first of those sunny days. With new digital meters, little dots to the left or right on the face indicating production or consumption are less satisfying, but the result is the same. Most months I pay only the service charge for electricity. One of the indicators that incentives for emerging technology works is the dramatic drop in prices for a residential solar installation, before any tax credits, over the last decade. Compared to our old house, the solar system on our new house cost 50 percent less for a 50 percent larger system. Prices will continue to decline as economies of scale come into play. Costs to the consumer are further reduced by federal tax credits. There is a 30-percent federal tax credit for installing a solar system on your house through 2019. This credit is scheduled to decrease to 22 percent by 2021. Unfortunately, our state-level programs have not kept pace with other states. We are barely in the top 10 states for distributed solar now. Even New Jersey and Massachusetts, states not well known for their solar resources, surpass Colorado on many measures. The final cost for the system on our new house was $11,900. I estimated the payback time to be about 10 years if electricity costs remain at $0.11/kwh, an unlikely prospect since it generally rises every year. Not everyone is able to afford this kind of investment. However, according to Andy Whipple of Atlasta Solar, about 40 percent of their customers choose a financing option through a company like EnerBank in Salt Lake City. Basically, you get a solar system for no money down and pay the loan back over 12 years by sending the bank a check instead of sending it to the utility company. This is akin to a personal loan, meaning that there is no lien on your home, but with a very low interest rate. A second indicator that incentives work is that renewable electricity production in the US has increased from about 9 percent of total electricity production in 2000 to about 14 percent now. Much of this electricity is from hydroelectricity (44 percent), but wind is advancing (37 percent). Solar is 6 percent of renewable energy production and is growing quickly; solar energy is now the top source of new electrical production nationwide. While the number of jobs in coal extraction and electrical generation has declined to 160,119 nationwide, the number of jobs in solar is increasing rapidly — 373,807 jobs, according to the Department of Energy. It is difficult to mechanize solar-industry jobs since each system requires people for project design and equipment installation. Another reason for increases in renewable energy production is investment into research, including at Colorado’s National Renewable Energy Lab. In 2011, the Department of Energy’s SunShot Initiative set the goal of decreasing the cost of residential solar energy 75 percent by 2020, from $0.40 to $0.09 per kilowatt-hour, by working with various federal agencies and private businesses. Progress was made on these goals so rapidly that in 2016 they were updated to $0.05/kwh by 2030. Combining public policy and incentives to the private sector has been successful for gaining momentum in the transition to renewable energy. Poor policy choices may slow the inevitable progress, but the future (for wind and solar energy) is so bright, I need to wear shades! Tamera Minnick, Ph.D., is a professor of environmental science and technology at Colorado Mesa University. She is an enthusiastic supporter of renewable energy; she received no compensation from any of the businesses mentioned here.