In Texas, here, I'm only aware of two retail providers that will pay you for your excess generated electricity at current retail prices.

The most favorable is Green Mountain Energy.  They do have a 'cap' at 500 KWH each month.

There's no 'free lunch' though.  GM charges on average about 1.5 cents more per KWH than most others.  This makes sense.  Obtaining and paying for electricity from individual homes will be GM's most expensive source of electricity.

Kinetic Energy also pays for your excess generated electricity at current retail pricing.  Their 'cap' is simply that the bill can't go negative.  I.e., they'll credit to you whatever you generate up to a zero bill.

Best regards,

Bill

 

 

There's no 'free lunch' though. GM charges on average about 1.5 cents more per KWH than most others. This makes sense. Obtaining and paying for electricity from individual homes will be GM's most expensive source of electricity.
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Not necessarily that this is their most expensive electric. If the solar generation is happening during their peak hours. When you have to have high dollar turbines etc sitting around 95% of the time unused, that is very expensive electric.

The process of net metering is not that simple here in MA. All of the public utilities are mandated to provide net metering and exchange watt for watt. In other words what ever you produce in excess is credited to your account for later use. They never pay you for your excess energy. However 30% of the states utilities are municipal and they are not subject to the same mandate. Most don't even provide net metering services making it impossible to justify producing more energy than you comsume at any time. The municipalities that do offer net metering can set their own rate of exchange. Some only credit you for excess energy at the wholesale rate they buy it for, then charge you the demand and delivery charge when you need it later.
It seems that not only does the regulations vary from state to state but electrical supplier to supplier. A good national policy would simplify the process and help to make sense of the tangled web of different regulations. I am not a proponent of government regulations but this is one area that they could make some serious strides to converting our energy future into a renewable one.

Tom Pittsley
[email protected]
www.eebt.org

Sorry, I missed the fact that you want to sell power as opposed to reduce your power bill. I am not sure I'd want to put my fate in the hands of the state legislature even if I had a utility that would pay retail today.

BTW, NJ has the most generous incentives I've seen. In addition to net metering, NJ utilities pay PV customers annually for helping them meet the state's renewable energy requirements based on what the utilities would have paid for that generation -- checks in the thousands of dollars. But again, unlike GNMA bonds, the NJ legislature can change the rules tomorrow.

Here in Fla, FPL trades us watt for watt until end of year. If you have excess they do pay you, they paid me last year a couple of bucks :>)

I just heard that FPL also want to increase cost of power by 30%. Will thay also increase how much they pay to the consumer for excess power? Does Florida have any regulations regarding net metering or is this at the utilities discretion?

Tom Pittsley
[email protected]
www.eebt.org

I just got a $70,000 quote for a 10 K system, which I was told would cover 100% of what I would need most of the time after my new addition is added. Here on Long Island, NY., we pay .215 for our elec., so we're among the highest rate payers in the country. However, I'm not sure my needs are as high as the guy estimates. Rebates would drop the actual cost to $35,000, but the catch is our power company is about to stop them as of Sept 15th. So, if I want the rebates, I have to file a an application by then. I feel so crowded by the short time. There's no time for me to look into this. Apparently, the solar rebate program has worked so well that the power comany has decided to end it. Just got a call back from the installer who says that the manufacturer dropped the price a bit so my system would be $67,500. It also turns out that my utility may not eliminate the rebates, but will probably lower what they will pay back. I found that out on my own. Apparently, local solar installers are leaving that bit out of their sales pitch.

Sorry I don't have any idea  you better consult any electrician for the details you needed.





Solar panels for your home

I can offer an indirect example: my neighbor across the street just got what I think is an 8.2Kw system, under a lease arrangement in which he will pay $150/mo for 10 years. This was pretty attractive for him, since his electric bill was $400/mo before this.  This is in San Jose, CA.

This is interesting, because my own monthly electric bill only in the $60-$150 range (the sales person for that solar company didn't really even want to talk to me once I told him that!). We both have those "McMansion" style houses, about 3800 sq. ft each. He does have a pool, but says he's only running the pump a few hours a day. I don't know pool pumps, but even if the pump draws 1 Kw, at 2 hr/day that's only 60 Kwh per month; my own monthly usage is 400-700Kwh. Maybe he's using his AC a lot more than me? That might be it, because the same huge, west-facing roof area that they installed all the PV panels on would have served as a huge solar heat collector; my roof doesn't have that kind of configuration.

I suspect he could have done a lot more efficiency-wise before going to this huge PV system. However, the lease program made the pure-PV solution attractive to him, especially since it was a one-shot installation over just 4 or 5 days (spread out over 2 weeks). Interesting how that worked out.

I can offer an indirect example: my neighbor across the street just got what I think is an 8.2Kw system, under a lease arrangement in which he will pay $150/mo for 10 years. This was pretty attractive for him, since his electric bill was $400/mo before this.  This is in San Jose, CA.

This is interesting, because my own monthly electric bill only in the $60-$150 range (the sales person for that solar company didn't really even want to talk to me once I told him that!).
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wonder why your small electric bill turned the salesman away. Do you not have net metering. As long as you pay him his $150 per month, why does he care what your electric bill is?? If Ca is like Fl, you would get reimbursed at the end of the year if you made more electric than you used!

Your neighbor needs to do or have someone do an energy audit on his house, that's a big discrepancy from yours.

"wonder why your small electric bill turned the salesman away."

I think he assumed that if I have no economic incentive to sign up for the lease he was offering, then I wasn't going to be a sale for him. And actually, as it happens, he was right. I won't be ready for PV for another year, or probably two -- my plan is (1) further improve my house's efficiencies; (2) move my natural gas usage over to electric (heat pump, active solar collection, induction cooker), and hopefully get an electric car; (3) then, once my "real" electricity usage is established, I'll finally know what size PV system I really need.

"Your neighbor needs to do or have someone do an energy audit on his house, that's a big discrepancy from yours."

Why should he?  That's the rather perverse thing about this: with the easy, leased PV system, he no longer has no incentive to do any efficiency improvements, at least in terms of electricity.

The math escapes me. Your neighbor's electric bill approaches $6oo and he maybe generates $150 worth of electric a month but he pays the PV company rather than the utility company. Why would he not be interested in lowering his usage and saving money??

Do you have net metering?

My understanding is that he's paying the PV company $150 flat, and that's all he's paying for his electricity per month, regardless of his usage. So with this deal, he's saving $250/mo, and won't save anything more if he improves efficiency. I don't understand where you got $600/mo from.

Net metering is time-of-use metering, right? No, my bill is just the regular type, with tiered rates for total monthly usage. I know that if someone installs a PV system (that they own themselves) they would normally go to the time-of-use metering, so that they can get credit for the higher price of the peak-time electricity that their panels would be providing. Though my power company (PG&E) is installing "smart meters" everywhere, so theoretically they might force everyone to go to time-of-use payment at some point.

Hmm, now that I think about it, I wonder if requesting time-of-use metering would make sense for me already -- since we generally don't use the A/C much, and have little else during "peak" time other than the TV, we might already come out ahead. The biggest usage is usually in the winter, overnight and in the morning, driving the fan for the furnace. Something to look into I guess...

My bad regarding 600 number, don't know where I got that ??

Net metering here in florida means, that my meter basically runs backwards during the sunlight hours when I'm putting power on the grid and at night it goes forward when I'm using more than I'm obviously generating. They actually changed the meter to a digital meter and it adds to the positive number when I am using some grid power and the negative number increases when I am adding power to the grid.

At the end of the month, if I've generated more than I used (spring and fall with my 5kw system), the utility carries the balance forward and credits me the next month. If at the end of the year, I have a surplus, they write me a check.

I installed my system with $25 k worth of parts in 08 and got a $2k tax credit and a $20k rebate from the state. So my system cost me $3k and it had generated over $1.5 k so in another year and a half, I'll pretty much have a zero electric bill and my house is whole  house electric. I live in a rural area and have a well and septic. Pretty inexpensive living expenses.

It hurts my head that your neighbor went from $400 per month to the payment to the PV company. Who is paying the 400 worth of electric and the cost of the PV system. FUZZY MATH

On a rolling 12 months average basis, my consumption was 2441 kWh/mo before installing a solar PV system.  At a monthly rate of 10.1¢, my average monthly bill was $246.  Climate is Dallas weather.  House size is 3400 sf.

In Feb of this year I entered into a lease/purchage agreement for a solar PV system.  No out of pocket costs of any kind.  Size of the system is 8.1 KW (DC) - 36 panels @225 W each, and one 7000 W inverter.

Five months later, after installing the solar system, I've produced 1088 kWh on average per month.  I'm able to use 79% of what I produce - the other 21% I have to export.  I'm using 683 kWh / mo on average.  This has been a 35% reduction to my utility bill.

With respect to the solar PV investment, I'm cash flow positive from day 1.  My utility savings have averaged $68 / mo.  I'm additionally receiving about $14 / mo. for exported kWh (no net metering agreement available).  Total savings is about $82 / mo.  My outgoing lease payments have averaged about $61 / mo.  Net cash flow on the solar PV investment is thus about $21 / mo.

My lease payment is proportional to what my solar PV harvest is.  Thus the leasing company has incentive to optimize the performance of my system, and to keep all equipment in good operating order (they own all of the equipment).  I pay a kWh rate to the leasing company for what's produced each month equal to 70% of my prevailing retail rate.
 
In summary, a net savings on investment of $21/mo. is not a lot of money, especially for an 8.1 KW solar PV system.  On the other hand, I'll always be cash flow positive versus having to wait a decade+ to break even.

Best regards,

Bill

I would check switching from natural gas.  NG is usually very efficient and keeping your major appliances gas will reduce the size of the PV system you will need.  Also, if you plan on charging your electric vehicle at home over night that may require more energy than you can store during the day.

@flyingfish: I'm starting to think I may have misunderstood some of what my neighbor told me. I haven't had a chance to check with him yet, but it may be that there are two different $150 values here -- one for the lease, and the other being a cap on the amount he'd be paying the power company. He mentioned about the solar company offering a guarantee that he wouldn't be paying more than $150/mo, even if their electricity usage would otherwise push it above that. I think I confused that statement with the lease payment itself.

So, if that's the case, then he's paying $300 per month. I think the math works out a bit less "fuzzy" that way -- except for that guarantee by the solar company that they'd reimburse him for elec. costs above $150; I guess they're taking a bit of a risk there. But, my observation still holds to a degree: by improving efficiency, my neighbor would at most be gaining $150 per month vs. what he's paying now, so that's not as high a motivation as the full $400/mo bill was. I have a feeling he's going to be regarding this as a "solved problem."

@Sean_Campbell: Well, if the ongoing cost would be far higher than my current bill, then that would probably hamper my plan to move my NG usage to electricity. I agree that NG is "very efficient" in terms of raw BTU yield per dollar, as compared to taking electricity and turning it into heat directly.

But I'm hoping that I can come up with an approach that just uses the electricity for shuttling around collected heat, with perhaps some resistance-based heating as a rarely-used backup. Compared with such an approach, I think the notion that NG is "very efficient" needs to be re-examined:

- Fossil carbon output: true, NG gives 2x the energy per unit of CO2 released as does coal, but here in northern CA, coal makes up at most 1/3 of the power mix: PG&E has virtually nil coal in-state, but purchases about 1/3 from out-of-state. Also, of the 2/3 it generates in-state, half is non-carbon-releasing: hydro, nuclear, some geo, and a small but growing fraction of wind and solar. So overall it's maybe 1/3 coal, 1/3 NG, and 1/3 non-CO2-releasing. Over time, the renewables in this mix will only grow. Remaining locked into NG means that I miss out on the continued "greening" of the grid.

- Heating: if a solar collector is used, then we're comparing the burning of NG to provide heat vs. using electricity to circulate collector fluid, move the air for my house's central heating/cooling system, and run the compressor in the heat pump. Most of the time the load on the compressor will be light, as the "source" heat will usually be close to or above the desired room temp, if there is enough collector area and the storage tank is large enough.

- Cooking: currently I have a gas cooktop. If I replace this with an induction cooktop, then the energy goes to heating the pan/pot directly, instead of much of it going up and around the sides. So induction is hugely more efficient on that basis, plus of course avoiding the additional summertime cooling load from the wasted heat of the burned gas. It's also easier to keep the thing looking nice, with a single smooth surface that doesn't usually get so hot as to burn spills into difficult-to-clean deposits. My gas stove already has permanent stains beneath some of the burners. And induction just performs better, getting the pans hot much more quickly, with much finer control.

Basically, my overall goal is to eliminate my household's "carbon footprint," and that's impossible as long as I'm still burning NG myself. I'm willing to accept a moderately higher utility bill (or, rather, a bigger PV system to compensate for the increase in elec. usage) to accomplish this.

One last point: it's not guaranteed that NG will remain cheap. The current optimism about NG prices is, I think, based on the prospect of opening up of all those domestic shale deposits with hydrofracking. But if this process keeps ruining the water supplies of the regions where it is practiced, then something's going to come to a head sooner or later -- the cost of providing residents with imported clean water; class-action lawsuits; and/or direct legislative restrictions. Plus any carbon pricing that eventually comes about. I'm not going to bet that NG will still be "cheap" 10 years from now, and if it's not, then even the notion that NG is economically "efficient" may go out the window as well.

Forgot some points:

flyingfish:

At the end of the month, if I've generated more than I used (spring and fall with my 5kw system), the utility carries the balance forward and credits me the next month. If at the end of the year, I have a surplus, they write me a check.

They will actually write you a check? Meaning, if you got an oversized system, you'd have net income from this, essentially becoming a power-generation company? If that's right, that's the first I've heard of this in the U.S. I know Gemany has been doing this for a while, with the result of e.g. encouraging farmers to shift some of their land to PV fields as a new income stream, but I thought that my company's policy of PV yielding at best a zero bill annually was as good as it gets here.

If you're correct, then this is a good sign!


Sean Campbell:

Also, if you plan on charging your electric vehicle at home over night that may require more energy than you can store during the day.

My EV power usage should be about 200Kwh/mo, on top of my current 400 to 600kwh/mo usage. I'm already saving nearly 200Kwh/mo just by switching to CFL lighting, and not having my older computer on 24/7. So you could say I've already taken care of that. :)

(When eventually I can replace the second car, I'd expect at most an additional 100kwh/mo for it -- it's bigger (a minivan), but used much less.)

http://sunelec.com/
I don't have any connection with them but I but I bought some panels that were damaged in shipment. I had to buy from UL solar at about the same price.