[throwup238]

Financially it's kind of a no brainer at this point. Myself and a bunch of family members are customers of SDGE and the lowest price anyone is paying is now $0.50/kWh and the highest is $0.91/kWh.

The household paying the latter just installed 15kW of solar panels and a battery bank to cut their costs to the $16/mo hookup fee and it's not even the height of summer yet. It's almost to the point where their backup propane generator is cheaper to run than pay for utility power! The solar/battery installation will pay for itself in under five years assuming no price increases (hah!).

Everyone is building it at every level of the producer/consumer curve.

[gknoy]

Maybe it's that I'm not in as sunny an area, but all of the (battery + panels) numbers I've seen tell me I'll see a break-even in 15 years, vs in ~5 if I just have panels.

[throwup238]

They did the installation themselves so the only labor they paid for was roofers to reshingle the roof first. I think that significantly changes the calculus.

[matmatmatmat]

Yes, labor is the killer cost of these installations, IME. Labor can easily be 50% or more of the total cost.

[albrewer]

There was a US tax program last year that cut 30% of costs off of renewable energy projects. I took advantage of it - it brought the project from "will never pay for itself" to "pays for itself in ~3-5 years" due to the way the financing worked out with the tax credit.

[yencabulator]

I'm in a very sunny area and my break-even based on last estimate was 16 years, because the local electric monopoly charges a huge monthly fee from solar owners even if you consume nothing.

I'd probably be better off disconnecting from the grid fully, but that's riskier in a climate that still has serious winters and would need more planning than I have spare cycles for, and would have more up-front costs.

[greedo]

It's crazy how expensive your electricity is. I'm in the Midwest, and only paying $.08/kWh...