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by reducesuffering
1934 days ago
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Hardly. My "access" bill is $20/mth, but my panels give $350/yr more to the grid than I use. PGE gives me like $30 of that back at the end of the year. So that $12 / $20 doesn't tell the whole story. They are also likely giving a lot more renewable energy to the grid that isn't compensated and is more like another $30/mth of cost. |
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You are likely confusing wholesale and retail prices of electricity. Even just considering solar, the cost for a utility to generate the power itself is likely between 2-4 cents per kilowatt. Most states require the utility to essentially pay the retail rate for electric power for any power generated by rooftop solar since it directly offsets the electrical usage. (Never mind that the electric power might have to be purchased when the utility doesn't want the power.)
Buffet has complained about how this issue:
>...His logic is simple, he wants to have to pay wholesale electricity rates for the energy generated by rooftop solar instead of the same price NV Energy is charging these customers since he says it will penalized customers without solar panels.
https://electrek.co/2016/03/01/warren-buffett-explains-his-l...
So unless you are using the wholesale price for the estimate for the value of the excess electricity generated, you are greatly overestimating its value.
Besides overpaying for the electricity generated by rooftop solar, your $20 access bill is another subsidy. One estimate is that the average yearly cost to maintain the grid is about $750 per customer.
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/plugged-in/the-u-s-elec...