[thebmax]

Solar is not reliable without batteries and even with batteries in many parts of US, will not generate sufficient electricity to maintain our current standard of living. Nevada and parts of the south have lots of sun but most northern states will not generate enough power in the winter months. Furthermore this lack of reliability means you also have to build natural gas plants to power up when its cloudy out or at nighttime. This means twice the capital for the same end. When you see those listed prices for solar its for panels installed without batteries and usually in places with lots of sun.

There is also the mess it creates with the grid. The business model of electrical companies is that in your monthly bill you pay for both power and for the grid that delivers it to you. If everyone puts solar on their roof it destroys the business model of the electrical companies and in the occasions where you still want to use grid power (at night, cloudy days etc) your rates will inevitably be higher or someone else has to pay for maintaining the grid and your socializing grid usage.

I think most of the hype around solar is way overdone. Too much solar can really can do lasting damage to an electrical grid and cause massive economic harm. This has happened in Germany where they subsidized renewables so much that they pushed out reliable power from the grid and now they are having the subsidize gas/coal generation so the grid will remain reliable. Furthermore, electricity prices have gone up enormously causing large industrial companies to move abroad or scale back operations. Electricity is the lifeblood of an economy and arbitrarily raising prices and messing with how electricity is delivered and managed can have large unintended consequences especially when decided by politicians who know nothing about the science or business.

[ZeroGravitas]

I'm continually amazed by what Americans can be convinced is the free market at work by vested interests. Wanting to stop politicians messing with the electricity grid is "Keep your government hands off my medicare"-level disconnect from reality.

[thebmax]

I'm continually amazed by people who think government bureaucrats make better decisions than consumers. Or people who think they know whats best for everyone else. You don't think renewable energy companies also hire lobbyists? Are you so sure of yourself that you know what everyone else in the country should use for power?

You're right electricity is heavily regulated and has been for quite some time. Despite the regulation however most companies generally operate as a lowest cost to consumers basis. Consumers ask for the lowest prices and electricity companies tend to oblige.

When politicians decide they very often have some vested interest as a priority and try to raise rates by handing special favors to certain industries.

What makes you think when politicians make decisions based on whats best for consumers vs. whats best for whoever donated to their campaign? If you think renewable energy companies don't hire lobbyists you suffer from a disconnect from reality.

Also, you didn't argue my main point which is solar isn't competitive to other sources. Should everyone pay more for electricity?

[ZeroGravitas]

Yes, people should pay more for electricity that is generated by heavily polluting sources like coal and gas, since if they don't pay directly, they pay indirectly for health care etc.

The obvious, standard, free market answer to this (which it seems you'd be in favor of given the political elements of your argument) is some kind of carbon tax. With externalities accounted for wind and solar are the obvious market choices for new generation capacity (and efficiency is rewarded with correct prices too). They're often the best choice now even without this market correction, and continually drop in price to make this more common. That's why we're at some kind of tipping point and the old vested interests realise they're in danger.

(Note in actual implementations of this they often either return the money raised directly to consumers, or cut other taxes to compensate, so you pay more for some things, but still come out aheadahead overall).

You can see Elon Musk sigh every time he mentions this as it's so obviously the right answer, but politically toxic in the US, for no logical reason, despite it being the market friendly, small government answer. A tax specifically designed to phase itself out over time. Instead we've got a strange web of government subsidies and regulations because the democrats like those kind of thing, and the libertarian side of things has been bought off by the vested interests.

[thebmax]

I see your points and agree a carbon tax is the most market friendly way to account for environmental externalities. However, my main point is that wind and solar are NOT economically viable despite what Elon and every other silicon valley expert seems to believe. Even with carbon taxes priced in they can't match the price of natural gas and coal. The reason is that they are not reliable sources of energy and with both of them you need batteries of some other type of storage to smooth out production. This essentially doubles the costs. Everything you read about the 'cost' of solar and wind doesn't take into account storage or the overbuild required to have backup power for cloudy days. The type of grid that uses 100% solar/wind would be a completely unreliable grid and cost considerable more for everyone. Solar and wind aren't being adopted because they are worse for consumers, not because some cabal of special interests are keeping them out.

In fact the opposite is true. The only reason solar is being adopted at all in almost every region in the world is because of government subsidies.

(Source: I build solar and wind farms for a living).