Bought a Wind Turbine

[DSLTRK]

Just bought a wind turbine, 10,000 Watts. It was an awesome project. Since October we've made 5000+ kWh. If you have good wind, these are great

Here are the inverters and controller.

Its quite windy now, so we're near capacity. A little over 10000 watts. 5200 W x 2

The kWh Meter

And the most important, the wind turbine!

Another view

 

[DSLTRK]

Hear are some pictures summarizing the install.
The foundation is 15ft square and 6ft deep. 16 yds of concrete

Steel in

While the concrete was curing, the build began

Finished base

Long way up

 

[slopecarver]

I Like it, whereabouts do you live that you can have usable amounts of wind? Did you need to go through any permit hassles or feed in regulations? Costs? Monthly pay back?

 

[ishiboo]

VERY cool. I speak for many when I say more pics and more details please!

 

[DSLTRK]

I Like it, whereabouts do you live that you can have usable amounts of wind? Did you need to go through any permit hassles or feed in regulations? Costs? Monthly pay back?

We're in the high desert of SoCal. Strong steady winds from the South 3/4 of the year keep it turning.

San Bernardino county requires special permits. Planning was 30 days behind schedule. Our electric company(SoCal Edison) requires a certified turbine/inverter setup to interconnect.

$62,000 total -30000 rebate -30%fed tax credit= $11,400

Depnds on your electric bill. Our bill was $400 avg per month, so under three years to pay off. Has a 10 year warranty though.

 

[theoldwizard1]

Hear are some pictures summarizing the install.
The foundation is 15ft square and 6ft deep. 16 yds of concrete

Good Lord ! Talk about OVERKILL !

The tower would be a twisted bunch of metal and that foundation would not have move. 10x10x6 with that much rebar would have been less than half of the concrete and earthquake proof also.

BTW 15x15x6 = 1350 cu. ft. / 27 = 50 cu. yd.

 

[DSLTRK]

Good Lord ! Talk about OVERKILL !

The tower would be a twisted bunch of metal and that foundation would not have move. 10x10x6 with that much rebar would have been less than half of the concrete and earthquake proof also.

BTW 15x15x6 = 1350 cu. ft. / 27 = 50 cu. yd.

Edit in Red
Sorry, forgot to mention, it's on piers. Not a large block of concrete. The pad is 24 inches thick with three 2 1/2 foot thick columns. Good old California engineers don't want it to fail. Fine with me

 

[geologist]

I wonder how long it will last? It would be amazing if you could crank 30 years out of the turbine with simple servicing every few years. It's unfortunate that such a turbine is still insanely expensive if not for the rebates and tax credits.

 

[PrecisionTools]

Nice project...gotta love all that SMA stuff.

 

[DSLTRK]

I wonder how long it will last? It would be amazing if you could crank 30 years out of the turbine with simple servicing every few years. It's unfortunate that such a turbine is still insanely expensive if not for the rebates and tax credits.

These turbines are actually very reliable. My neighbor has had hers since 2002 and it still is running great. She's produced over 130000 kWh. The turbines have massive sealed NACHI bearings, around 6" diameter. I'll see if I can dig up a pic of them tomorrow. Its amazing how long those sealed bearings last, probably due to such a low radial/axial load based on their size.

Manufacturers estimate 20-25 years before overhauling(replacing bearings, painting blades). A neighbor 5 miles North of me has had his since 1996 and it still is running, but the inverter called it quits last year.

They also auto protect themselves from storms, the tail folds around the side. A few weeks ago we had a 100+ mph micro-burst and the tail did its job well. That also improves longevity.

 

[Falcon67]

Sweet. That ain't no Whisper 400 LOL. We have that kind of wind here, but not that kind of rebate or money. I'd be happy with a 3kV solar array.

 

[Jagmandave]

Explain 'the tail folds around it" please?

How did the get it up there, crane?

How much does that head weigh?

What is the blade span? Are the blades fiberglass, steel or composite?

Cool project!

Do you "hear" it running? Blade whoosh or other sounds?

 

[Teken]

VERY cool. I speak for many when I say more pics and more details please!

Bring it on, along with more details!

Teken . . .

 

[tdkkart]

$62,000 total -30000 rebate -30%fed tax credit= $11,400

Depnds on your electric bill. Our bill was $400 avg per month, so under three years to pay off. Has a 10 year warranty though.

So your fellow taxpayers and utility customers are paying the other $50,000, or about 12 years of free utilities welfare for you.

Yep, sounds like a hell of a deal...........

 

[theoldwizard1]

Sorry, forgot to mention, it's on piers. Not a large block of concrete. The pad is 18 inches thick with three 2 1/2 foot thick columns.

Sorry I'm not following what you are saying especially when I look at your pictures.

The pic where the guy is digging the trench, does look like the pit is about 4' deep. That makes sense if the bottom "block" is 1.5' and the top of the piers are 2.5' above that.

With all that rebar, it is not going anywhere !

How long are the mounting bolts and are they mechanically connected to the rebar ?

 

[tdkkart]

Sorry I'm not following what you are saying especially when I look at your pictures.

Looks to me like there's an 18" pad in the bottom of the hole, with the three 30" columns being the only thing above the pad. basically got a block in the bottom with 3 30" fingers sticking up to grade level.

 

[DSLTRK]

Explain 'the tail folds around it" please?

How did the get it up there, crane?

How much does that head weigh?

What is the blade span? Are the blades fiberglass, steel or composite?

Cool project!

Do you "hear" it running? Blade whoosh or other sounds?

The rotor is Offset and the tail has a hinge. When winds approach 40 mph or more, the force on the rotor causes it to swing out of the wind. This is called "furling". It's very simple and reliable, one of the reasons I choose this brand of turbine.

Yes, a 75 ton crane was required.

About 1800 Lbs

23.5 Feet, blades are fiberglass.

Thanks!

At first, yes. The tail was loose and was vibrating at the cut in. I since climbed up and used some red Loc-Tite. No more vibrations. At higher wind speeds over 30mph I can hear the blades make a "whooshing" sound. We actually have 30mph winds right now.

 

[DSLTRK]

Sorry I'm not following what you are saying especially when I look at your pictures.

The pic where the guy is digging the trench, does look like the pit is about 4' deep. That makes sense if the bottom "block" is 1.5' and the top of the piers are 2.5' above that.

With all that rebar, it is not going anywhere !

How long are the mounting bolts and are they mechanically connected to the rebar ?

From the top of the 24" pad, the 30" columns rise up 4 feet.

 

[FXDawg]

Okay, that is really AWESOME!!! Nice job!!! And what a great price!!!

 

[Falcon67]

Do you "hear" it running? Blade whoosh or other sounds?

I've stood by the big turbines here - 200~300' swept and under a smaller Whisper turbine running at full song. The bitty one makes more noise than the monster, but you can barely hear either.

The Rosco wind farm is just down the road from here, largest in the world right now AFAIK.

 

[DSLTRK]

I've stood by the big turbines here - 200~300' swept and under a smaller Whisper turbine running at full song. The bitty one makes more noise than the monster, but you can barely hear either.

The Rosco wind farm is just down the road from here, largest in the world right now AFAIK.

That's cool, I hear Texas is the country's leader in wind power. Cali used to be...

 

[6768rogues]

Since October you harvested 5000 KWH. Here a KW costs less than 10 cents. At 10 cents, it would be $500 in electricity for a quarter of a year. That is $2000 per year. 30 years to pay off full retail value, 6 years with rebates. Not quite worth it in our area, but if you have more expensive electricity it could be worth it if you don't have to spend any additional money on it.

 

[DSLTRK]

Since October you harvested 5000 KWH. Here a KW costs less than 10 cents. At 10 cents, it would be $500 in electricity for a quarter of a year. That is $2000 per year. 30 years to pay off full retail value, 6 years with rebates. Not quite worth it in our area, but if you have more expensive electricity it could be worth it if you don't have to spend any additional money on it.

Yes, you're right. But electricity is much more expensive here. SoCalEdison uses a tier system, and the lowest tier is 13 cents. It increases as you move up each tier, tier 5 is over 30 cents per kWh. So these and solar systems pay off very quickly here. I think California is #1 with residential solar and wind systems.

 

[Charles (in GA)]

Explain 'the tail folds around it" please?

Instead of the tail sticking straight out the back, which keeps the prop facing directly into the wind, the hinged tail folds 90° to the side. The tail then continues to streamline into the wind, and in doing so, turns the prop blades/propeller disc, edgewise to the wind. I would guess this leaves the prop "idling" as there is going to be some action on the blades but not enough to create any amount of speed/power.

Charles

 

[DSLTRK]

Instead of the tail sticking straight out the back, which keeps the prop facing directly into the wind, the hinged tail folds 90° to the side. The tail then continues to streamline into the wind, and in doing so, turns the prop blades/propeller disc, edgewise to the wind. I would guess this leaves the prop "idling" as there is going to be some action on the blades but not enough to create any amount of speed/power.

Charles

You hit the nail on the head.

 

[Marshall2u]

Since October you harvested 5000 KWH. Here a KW costs less than 10 cents. At 10 cents, it would be $500 in electricity for a quarter of a year. That is $2000 per year. 30 years to pay off full retail value, 6 years with rebates. Not quite worth it in our area, but if you have more expensive electricity it could be worth it if you don't have to spend any additional money on it.

Wind energy is great. I love it. Solar? Love it too. The issue I have is, why did I (and the rest of you) just pay 80% of the cost of this installation (over 50K dollars)? Rebates and government credits don't happen in a vacuum. The supplier gets paid the full amount now, but the balance gets charged to me, you, and our grandchildren. This is not political...it's financial. If these purchases made sense, the actual purchasers would pay for them. The entire amount. The sellers wouldn't be able to keep up with the orders, because demand would be so high. But that's not what's happening. These things don't make financial sense. They are too expensive, as return on investment is horrible. 30 years for return on investment? We have no clue what technology will be in 5 years, let alone 30. And that's not including costs to maintain the equipment, which could be quite extensive. I think it would be a good idea to just step back and re-evaluate what's going on here.

 

[geologist]

So your fellow taxpayers and utility customers are paying the other $50,000, or about 12 years of free utilities welfare for you.

Yep, sounds like a hell of a deal...........

Personally, as a taxpayer myself, I would rather see my tax dollars spent subsidizing clean energy here than trickling into the oil war.

 

[ishiboo]

If these purchases made sense, the actual purchasers would pay for them. The entire amount. The sellers wouldn't be able to keep up with the orders, because demand would be so high. But that's not what's happening. These things don't make financial sense. They are too expensive, as return on investment is horrible. 30 years for return on investment? We have no clue what technology will be in 5 years, let alone 30.

The issue is that without these subsidies, you have FAR fewer companies in the mix working only off research dollars given to them. This means progress on solar and wind comes to a near stop.

People know affordable, practical solar is not around the corner, and it's a process of improvements like engine efficiency, not a sudden breakthrough that suddenly makes things a reality.

One of the only ways of doing this is for a company to start producing the products now, and that company (and others, based off their work) to continue to refine the technology and process until one day it's at a level where we would all be buying it.

Modern energy is not like the cure for cancer, where people work vigorously and invest away on it knowing it will be a boom to science and humanity, and a HUGE jackpot, so there needs to be incentive to make things go on a faster scale so we can see the improvements we'll see in our lifetimes.

A lot more at stake here than your neighbor getting a big rebate from your tax dollars for saving a couple bucks on energy. Looking at it from the other side, they also made a big up-front investment in something real.

 

[DSLTRK]

The issue is that without these subsidies, you have FAR fewer companies in the mix working only off research dollars given to them. This means progress on solar and wind comes to a near stop.

People know affordable, practical solar is not around the corner, and it's a process of improvements like engine efficiency, not a sudden breakthrough that suddenly makes things a reality.

One of the only ways of doing this is for a company to start producing the products now, and that company (and others, based off their work) to continue to refine the technology and process until one day it's at a level where we would all be buying it.

Modern energy is not like the cure for cancer, where people work vigorously and invest away on it knowing it will be a boom to science and humanity, and a HUGE jackpot, so there needs to be incentive to make things go on a faster scale so we can see the improvements we'll see in our lifetimes.

A lot more at stake here than your neighbor getting a big rebate from your tax dollars for saving a couple bucks on energy. Looking at it from the other side, they also made a big up-front investment in something real.

Thank you.

 

[cadunkle]

Wind energy is great. I love it. Solar? Love it too. The issue I have is, why did I (and the rest of you) just pay 80% of the cost of this installation (over 50K dollars)? Rebates and government credits don't happen in a vacuum. The supplier gets paid the full amount now, but the balance gets charged to me, you, and our grandchildren.

Thank you for saying this. While it's a really cool project, socialist and fascism don't work. I can hardly afford any of my own projects, in large part due to being taxed so heavily... Why should I have to pay for someone else's projects to they can save even more money while I pay through the nose? It's not right at all, and in most places I believe they call it theft. I refer to our government when I say that, not the OP. The OP is doing what is right for him given our crappy government and every one of us should get as much of the money stolen from us back as we possibly can. OP got a couple years taxes free for a minimal out of pocket cost and will be saving money soon.

 

[Charles (in GA)]

I don't agree with the government taking money from us wholesale and throwing it away on all the crazy programs that it has................. buuuuutttttt.......

In some ways, its like the space race, we spent billions for what? to put a man on the moon? what did we get out of it? we got lots of things invented in a short period of time (I think Teflon is one example) that may have taken much longer, years, before it would have been created without the space race.

A little closer to home than the moon, the government has spent billions over the years to build such projects as the Hoover Dam and the Tennessee Valley Authority. What did someone who is not in areas supplied by power from those facilities get out of it??? nothing? those are government subsidized facilities that generate electricity that utilities SELL to the public. I see little difference in the Hoover Dam and the wind generator that the OP has, both were paid for (substantially) with government (meaning taxpayers) money and everyone gets access to reasonably priced electricity as a result.........

We don't have wind here in 'Jawja (Georgia) not like they have in the west, so wind generators don't work well here, but we have a growing population that demands electricity, and a power company that can ill afford to build more large power plants to provide it, given the governmental regulations involved. It has been mandated to the POCO's that they consume power provided by small generators like the OP. The power companies have balked at this but are finally embracing it, as they see the ability to have extra power when they need it, but not have to spend money to get it. Power plants that burn slash pine, chipped tires, and the like are springing up here in the south and that will be, in part, our new electricity.

Of course, population growth far outstrips the production of small wind and solar and alternative fuel power plants, so we now have the first new nuke plants approved in over 30 years, right here in Georgia.

Enough ramblings, back to the garage.

Charles

 

[Krusty]

Don't think that you aren't subsidizing the fossil fuel economy as well. With our tax dollars, and our fuel costs, and our soldier's blood, we all are paying for oil wars, corruption both inside the US and overseas, tax breaks for the oil companies, lobbyists, oil speculators, and a huge transfer of US wealth into the hands of people who hate us.

I'd go out to the garage, but I don't have renewable heat out there.

Krusty

 

[Falcon67]

The other idea is to reduce the load on the grid where possible. A subsidized neighborhood of solar assisted houses might well be cheaper in the long run big picture than adding or upgrading an XYZ-fired power plant. IMHO, if there was a bigger push on research to improve cell yield, the costs could very well come down enough to terminate the rebates. Also - lots of the wind power here is subsidized too. There is about 2600 megawatts of nameplate wind generating capacity in a 30 mile circle from our house. That's nearly 4 coal fired average plants. Aside from the potential environmental niceties, these things bring in bucks to farmers and ranchers that have been virtually wiped out in the drought. They employ 1000s here that might otherwise not have a job. There are towns that continue to exist that might well have blown away in the wind - Trent got a brand new high school and playing field out of the wind deals. Trent has 375 people - the school would have been shuttered by now and the kids bussed elsewhere (like several small towns have had to do lately). The average home valuation there is $33K - no way to generate enough tax revenue to move ahead. That's just one example. And if those dollars paid to employess turn over 3-4 times in the local economy - well, you get the picture. Just to say there are a lot of secondary benefits well past the rebate thing.

 

[Tscott]

Just as a point of information. The whole renewable being good because it allows the existing grid to remain without being upgraded thing is ****, power grids are built to handle peak system loads. Solar and typically wind have generation peaks at the complete wrong time of the day. Most power systems peak around 8am and 6pm (when folks get ready from work and come home at night), these are times when solar and wind are typically at their low point in their generation curve. These renewables peak in the middle of the day when the system peak is typically at its lowest because everyone is at work. What does this mean? Typically it means this power is wasted because you cannot just spool up a coal fired plant on a whim, it takes time to get everything up and running so you are essentially dumping potential onto the grid that is not needed because the big generation plants are still running because they will need to be ramped up for the evening peak. I have no experience with nuke power, but I have read it can take up to a week to spool one of those bad boys up.

On the financial side of things, ask yourself what the rate is your power company pays back the KWH produced by these types of installs. Most pay a discounted rate for power dumped back onto the grid, but all lose the KWH usage at full price. What most don't realize is that the cost you pay for a KWH is not just the cost of producing the power. It also covers the cost of getting the power to you and maintaining the facilities. So when you run a zero bill, or produce more than you use, the power company is actually losing money. So not only are these generators being tax subsidized, but they are also adding cost to everyone else's power bill because the lines still need to be built and maintained.

Renewables are not ready yet. It's like the government buying a Prius for anyone who wants one it is stupid and totally against the free market system our country is based on. Oil companies are subsidized as well and that is **** too. If you can't pull your own weight, then you should be allowed to fail.

Tom

 

[Tscott]

The other idea is to reduce the load on the grid where possible. A subsidized neighborhood of solar assisted houses might well be cheaper in the long run big picture than adding or upgrading an XYZ-fired power plant. IMHO, if there was a bigger push on research to improve cell yield, the costs could very well come down enough to terminate the rebates. Also - lots of the wind power here is subsidized too. There is about 2600 megawatts of nameplate wind generating capacity in a 30 mile circle from our house. That's nearly 4 coal fired average plants. Aside from the potential environmental niceties, these things bring in bucks to farmers and ranchers that have been virtually wiped out in the drought. They employ 1000s here that might otherwise not have a job. There are towns that continue to exist that might well have blown away in the wind - Trent got a brand new high school and playing field out of the wind deals. Trent has 375 people - the school would have been shuttered by now and the kids bussed elsewhere (like several small towns have had to do lately). The average home valuation there is $33K - no way to generate enough tax revenue to move ahead. That's just one example. And if those dollars paid to employess turn over 3-4 times in the local economy - well, you get the picture. Just to say there are a lot of secondary benefits well past the rebate thing.

See my post above, the loading on the grid will not change due to peak usage and generation times being at different times.

If you want to help people who are on hard times then perhaps it would be more efficient to give them money directly as opposed to flowing it through the government and then a power company. I guarantee you would get more dollars in the right hands if this were the case since everyone in the supply chain will take a cut of the pie.

Tom

 

[Tscott]

I don't agree with the government taking money from us wholesale and throwing it away on all the crazy programs that it has................. buuuuutttttt.......

In some ways, its like the space race, we spent billions for what? to put a man on the moon? what did we get out of it? we got lots of things invented in a short period of time (I think Teflon is one example) that may have taken much longer, years, before it would have been created without the space race.

A little closer to home than the moon, the government has spent billions over the years to build such projects as the Hoover Dam and the Tennessee Valley Authority. What did someone who is not in areas supplied by power from those facilities get out of it??? nothing? those are government subsidized facilities that generate electricity that utilities SELL to the public. I see little difference in the Hoover Dam and the wind generator that the OP has, both were paid for (substantially) with government (meaning taxpayers) money and everyone gets access to reasonably priced electricity as a result.........

We don't have wind here in 'Jawja (Georgia) not like they have in the west, so wind generators don't work well here, but we have a growing population that demands electricity, and a power company that can ill afford to build more large power plants to provide it, given the governmental regulations involved. It has been mandated to the POCO's that they consume power provided by small generators like the OP. The power companies have balked at this but are finally embracing it, as they see the ability to have extra power when they need it, but not have to spend money to get it. Power plants that burn slash pine, chipped tires, and the like are springing up here in the south and that will be, in part, our new electricity.

Of course, population growth far outstrips the production of small wind and solar and alternative fuel power plants, so we now have the first new nuke plants approved in over 30 years, right here in Georgia.

Enough ramblings, back to the garage.

Charles

Many inventors and entrepreneurs have done a great many things without the assistance of the government and our tax dollars. I contend those that do it unassisted are better off in the long run anyway due to less "entanglement" with legislators.

The Space Race was done as a matter of national security to assist in the Cold War. It could be argued that becoming energy independent is also a worthwhile goal for national security, but if that were the goal, then why do we not pursue more domestic sources of oil so we can limit our interests in the bad parts of the world, namely the Middle East, as fast as possible. Alternative energy would be part of this plan if it existed, but we would be seeking to exploit all other natural resources as well to speed the separation from foreign energy. Renewables would be seen as the R&D stage of the project not the immediate solution.

Tom

 

[Tscott]

The issue is that without these subsidies, you have FAR fewer companies in the mix working only off research dollars given to them. This means progress on solar and wind comes to a near stop.

People know affordable, practical solar is not around the corner, and it's a process of improvements like engine efficiency, not a sudden breakthrough that suddenly makes things a reality.

One of the only ways of doing this is for a company to start producing the products now, and that company (and others, based off their work) to continue to refine the technology and process until one day it's at a level where we would all be buying it.

Modern energy is not like the cure for cancer, where people work vigorously and invest away on it knowing it will be a boom to science and humanity, and a HUGE jackpot, so there needs to be incentive to make things go on a faster scale so we can see the improvements we'll see in our lifetimes.

A lot more at stake here than your neighbor getting a big rebate from your tax dollars for saving a couple bucks on energy. Looking at it from the other side, they also made a big up-front investment in something real.

2 problems with this philosophy. One, these companies are still failing even with government assistance because their profit model is broken. You cannot produce a good no one wants and be successful in the long run.

Two, Funneling money through a manufacturer to do R&D just wastes money it would cheaper, easier and faster to fund a Manhattan style project to find the solution to the problem or even award a large monetary prize the the first company or individual to come up with the solution. It seems to be working for the X Prize people and D.A.R.P.A.

Tom

 

[Tscott]

Personally, as a taxpayer myself, I would rather see my tax dollars spent subsidizing clean energy here than trickling into the oil war.

This is good in theory, but you are actually doing both since they are not mutually exclusive. I say we do neither and call it a day, what do you think?

Tom

 

[ishiboo]

Just as a point of information. The whole renewable being good because it allows the existing grid to remain without being upgraded thing is ****, power grids are built to handle peak system loads. Solar and typically wind have generation peaks at the complete wrong time of the day. Most power systems peak around 8am and 6pm (when folks get ready from work and come home at night), these are times when solar and wind are typically at their low point in their generation curve. These renewables peak in the middle of the day when the system peak is typically at its lowest because everyone is at work. What does this mean? Typically it means this power is wasted because you cannot just spool up a coal fired plant on a whim, it takes time to get everything up and running so you are essentially dumping potential onto the grid that is not needed because the big generation plants are still running because they will need to be ramped up for the evening peak. I have no experience with nuke power, but I have read it can take up to a week to spool one of those bad boys up.

On the financial side of things, ask yourself what the rate is your power company pays back the KWH produced by these types of installs. Most pay a discounted rate for power dumped back onto the grid, but all lose the KWH usage at full price. What most don't realize is that the cost you pay for a KWH is not just the cost of producing the power. It also covers the cost of getting the power to you and maintaining the facilities. So when you run a zero bill, or produce more than you use, the power company is actually losing money. So not only are these generators being tax subsidized, but they are also adding cost to everyone else's power bill because the lines still need to be built and maintained.

Renewables are not ready yet. It's like the government buying a Prius for anyone who wants one it is stupid and totally against the free market system our country is based on. Oil companies are subsidized as well and that is **** too. If you can't pull your own weight, then you should be allowed to fail.

Tom

The government has to look forward for the good of the people and make decisions which private companies/etc. are not., that's how just about every government program works including renewable energy.

Unlike things like welfare, social security, etc. which we all pay into and will never see a gain from, renewable energy is something either we or our future generations will all see a massive gain from. The Prius is a great example of why the subsidies WORK. The Prius wouldn't be where it is, and have spurred much development of the Volt and Leaf, without government subsidies. Now, alternate energy vehicles/hybrids are becoming mainstream and costs have come down and the vehicles compete right along side petroleum-based vehicles.

I'm not sure anyone misses the fact that the costs include distribution costs, power companies make that clear at every moment. But when they buy electricity FROM people in bulk, it's not just that they're paying out - it's that less coal is needed to produce energy. The power grid operates as a whole - one person producing 400 watts is not going to reduce their costs, but it adds up.

So what if they're paying you 8 cents, they're charging 10 or 12 to the people buying. Even if they pay you 12 and charge 12 (WI does not, CA does I believe), there are so few people producing electricity it doesn't matter in the scheme of things, and it is not financially advantageous for people to generate substantially more electricity than they need, because you can buy it so inexpensively.

 

[Tscott]

The government has to look forward for the good of the people and make decisions which private companies/etc. are not., that's how just about every government program works including renewable energy.

Unlike things like welfare, social security, etc. which we all pay into and will never see a gain from, renewable energy is something either we or our future generations will all see a massive gain from. The Prius is a great example of why the subsidies WORK. The Prius wouldn't be where it is, and have spurred much development of the Volt and Leaf, without government subsidies. Now, alternate energy vehicles/hybrids are becoming mainstream and costs have come down and the vehicles compete right along side petroleum-based vehicles.

I'm not sure anyone misses the fact that the costs include distribution costs, power companies make that clear at every moment. But when they buy electricity FROM people in bulk, it's not just that they're paying out - it's that less coal is needed to produce energy. The power grid operates as a whole - one person producing 400 watts is not going to reduce their costs, but it adds up.

So what if they're paying you 8 cents, they're charging 10 or 12 to the people buying. Even if they pay you 12 and charge 12 (WI does not, CA does I believe), there are so few people producing electricity it doesn't matter in the scheme of things, and it is not financially advantageous for people to generate substantially more electricity than they need, because you can buy it so inexpensively.

You missed the point. The renewables only reduce consumption by the end user, not the utility. The wind and solar do not make power when it is needed (during the peak system demand), and they never will it is just wasted power put on the grid that is not used. Even if every home in the U.S. had solar panels, the big coal plants would still run all day long because you cannot store grid power on any meaningful scale and the power plants cannot be shut down because they will be needed again in the evening when the solar and wind stop and the consumers turn on the TV and cook dinner.

The problem with this is that if you put power on the grid during the day it does very little good and is essentially a waste of power. Eventually if enough people go to home generation, your power company will change its rate structure to a flat rate and you will just pay for standby service. Your rate will not be influenced by what you use, but by the cost of the companies fixed assets and maintenance costs. There are no free lunches you will still pay the same either way in the long run and until someone can store vast amounts of energy for later use then solar and wind are a complete sham. Nukes are a good option since they can run anytime, but the holy grail is cold fusion but that is decades away at the earliest.


Tom