Time to stop charging my PiP?

even in new england, if you want to lease, there's a reduction in your kWh cost. doesn't get any better than that.

 

Well, consumption always off-sets production. My solar array will never pay for itself, but it goes under my own "consumption" to have paid for it, along with all the other things which don't pay me back, including restaurant meals, vacation trips, my electronic gadgets and even my Prius, which will never really pay for itself unless I put over 200, 000 miles on it.

 

I'm confused by your statement that your solar array won't pay for itself. Perhaps that's because your electric rates are substantially cheaper than down here in SoCal. We've calculated (and done detailed modeling with the two arrays) at least 10,000 kWh annually, which pens out to a savings of a minimum of $2,500/year. Based on installed (including everything) costs around $20K, that's an eight-year payoff. Every kWh after that is pure gravy.

 

Correction, it may pay for itself after I'm deceased.

 

Human biological systems do put a wildcard into the calculations.

 

The pricing in his area is much more complex than I'm willing to decipher this morning, but is very clearly far cheaper than your rates. One site is giving CDN$0.074/kwh for this month. Another is showing a floating variable rate option that varied between 3.8 and 6.7 cents most of last year, breaking into double-digits for only two months. But until he discloses his actual rates, we won't know for certain.

 

Not even close for me. I estimate my costs to be around 14 cents per kWh.

 

So your utility bills don't disclose the exact marginal rates for any billing period?

 

Last time I checked, that was the total cost. I ignore all the BS about service access fees and all the other extra charges on top of the stated kW/hr rate, factoring them all in to the final total.

 

I.e. you don't know your actual marginal rate, so we cannot compare it to the tiered rates others are paying in SoCal.

 

To tell you the truth, I can't recall, because I make a point of ignoring the nominal rate, because it means nothing, once all the extra charges are added.

 

Never mind the nominal rate, just what is the actual marginal rate (taxes and surcharges included, even if approximated) after the fixed charges and lower tiers are removed. Without knowing this, most comparisons and payback computations mean nothing.

And if your solar system won't pay back in your lifetime at $0.14/kwh, then I must also question the circumstances of your particular installation. Something pushed it to a higher cost than many other folks will find necessary.

 

Sure it means something. It tells you the incremental cost for using one additional kwh. As a PIP owner, isn't this an important fact to know?

Mike

 

Not so much in my life. The only meaningful measure of what it costs me to charge my Prius is how it affects my monthly power bill. I charge mostly at work, which is on a flat-rate, and I don't believe our rates change at various times of the day. I didn't buy my PiP for electric commuting, and I consider myself an opportunistic charger, which means I take advantage of a charge when I don't have to go out of my way to do it. The 40-odd-cents of benefit it gives me is rarely worth the extra effort in my opinion, but I'll take it whenever it the opportunity presents itself to me.

 

My system was about $24k before any incentives. I live in MA.
$1k MA tax credit...30% = $7.2k which can be rolled over every year, we had "Solarize Mass" which cheapened the price of KW (my system is 5.3 KW System SunPower) - solarize mass also has another rebate based on mass purchasing of the solar cells and that was $2.5k - in the end with a loan of 13.3k at 2.75%.

Of course everyone's situation is different and productivity of solar is different. 0.17 cents/KWh here and the effectiveness of the solar panels are kind of bad in the winter, but in the fall it was great. SRECs I believe are at a floor price of $265 - same as you.

So...what's the payback? Well less with the loan, but summer months will tell. And what's nice is knowing your (our) bill won't rise above $80. The worse of the months have already passed...

Bill would have been around $60 but we're charging the PiP like crazy.

 

New Jersey right? What about home equity? Get your town/state to finance Solar! It's a success when it's financed...but it's tax payers money too :\ Can't do win-win on Solar just yet (win taxpayers and win on owners). But prices have gone down dramatically.

Here's to hoping Ford figures out solar trickle charge for their Energi line, I'd buy it!

 

Here's another option that we considered: Admirals Bank's Solar Loans | Admirals Bank

They allow 30% of the loan for the 1st year interest free (might be 15 months) - but the idea is you get the federal credit and pay that back. Their loans went as low as 6% if I remember (w/ good credit).

Worth a call if you might be interested!