Google to Finance Home Solar Systems

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As part of Google's commitment to renewable energy, the company is investing $75 million to help 3,000 homeowners install solar panels.

The plans allow homeowners to install a $30,000 solar electricity system on their house for little or no money up front. Instead, customers pay a monthly fee that is the same or less than what they would otherwise be paying their local utility for power.
 
I love news like this. good for them... and us!

Solar Panels FTW!!!
 
since you dont own the panels, but google does, it doesnt sound all that attractive. how will that work when you want to sell the house? will the new owner be required to pay for it then. and if your house gets repo'd are you still on the hook for those payments even if you dont live there?

and i like how google is the one getting all the tax breaks, which will ensure they will make a tidy sum
 
When I read "home solar systems" I thought "Damn! I want gas giants!"
 
I would plant my back yard in AZ full of panels to generate them money long as I don't get a monthly bill for fair use rights of the electricity.
 
Google isn't doing something new. Years ago when I was looking into solar, other companies were doing the same thing.

I just want a solar kit that I can install myself, for a few grand. It shouldn't cost more then 10,000 worth of equipment. I'll do the installation myself, so I can start saving money myself.
 
I'm not sure I'd go for this.

I'm all for solar, but part of its appeal is that once you are done paying off the panels, the power they provide is free.

Under this arrangement it looks like you'd continue to pay Google for the power indefinitely.

I think it would be a better solution to take out a loan and do it yourself so you - not Google - can reap the long term benefits.

The problem with Solar today though, is that the up-front investment is so large, and the technology is improving so fast that any panel you get today, will be hopelessly obsolete by the time it is paid off...
 
Google can do what they want with thier money, but this is another example of why tech like Solar will continue to be a niche option for a long time.

The market is not healthy when a company (or government) has to completely pay for panels to be installed on people's houses. The upfront costs are way too high to ever hope for mass adoption. Unless that changes, it will be the cheaper alterntives that succeed and not Solar, despite Google.

At least this isnt the government doing it, although its funny that Google will get tax breaks and other government funding becuase of this, its not quite as big a hit to the tax payers.
 
I've felt for a long time that eventually most large flat surfaces will be solar collectors. Solar paint, solar pavement, solar tiling is not far off.
 
Google can do what they want with thier money, but this is another example of why tech like Solar will continue to be a niche option for a long time.

The market is not healthy when a company (or government) has to completely pay for panels to be installed on people's houses. The upfront costs are way too high to ever hope for mass adoption. Unless that changes, it will be the cheaper alterntives that succeed and not Solar, despite Google.

At least this isnt the government doing it, although its funny that Google will get tax breaks and other government funding becuase of this, its not quite as big a hit to the tax payers.

Did you see the thread with the Best Buy ads of $5k PCs many years ago? This is like that. Adoption rates and tech ++ will help out tremendously.
 
Google can do what they want with thier money, but this is another example of why tech like Solar will continue to be a niche option for a long time.

The market is not healthy when a company (or government) has to completely pay for panels to be installed on people's houses. The upfront costs are way too high to ever hope for mass adoption. Unless that changes, it will be the cheaper alterntives that succeed and not Solar, despite Google.

At least this isnt the government doing it, although its funny that Google will get tax breaks and other government funding becuase of this, its not quite as big a hit to the tax payers.

I think it really depends in where you live and how long you'll be living there. For example if you live in an arid southern environment your payback time on a system to provide for a large portion of your electrical needs has a payback time of half or less than a comparable system in a more northers latitude with a higher incidence of cloud cover.

The thing that's really annoying is there are at least 2 companies claiming less than a dollar a watt manufacturing cost for completed panels, but will not sell to anyone but utilities.
 
Did you see the thread with the Best Buy ads of $5k PCs many years ago? This is like that. Adoption rates and tech ++ will help out tremendously.

But unlike computers, solar has it's enemies. Free home energy results into free power for cars, and free lots of things. I doubt a decent solar panel costs as much as they do now. The manufacturing isn't taking off, and the prices aren't dropping.

What we need is super cheap panels, and solar will take off. Right now your best option is to buy some panels from ebay, get a bunch of car batteries to hold the charge, and a power inverter to generate the AC power from the DC batteries. The only thing I'm forgetting is a power regulator, so you don't over charger the batteries. With this setup you should be able to power most* devices in your home for about $3k. The more you spend on panels and batteries, the more your home can run off solar power.

It's a large investment even at that price, and it's not as smooth as a professional installation. Spending $3k it'll take a couple of years to make up for cost, and after that is when you start saving money. Even still, the batteries won't hold a charge for long, and in dark days you'll work off the grid. Especially with Fall and Winter.

I myself have switched to MXenergy as my provider, and I'm saving lots of money. PSEG is my power company, and I still get billed from them, but MXenergy is my power supplier. I pay nearly half as much as I would normally.

The only benefit from switching to Solar Power is when the power goes out. I had to run a gas generator after Irene came here in Jersey, for nearly a week. Costed me $100 in gas, and the generator makes a ton of noise. If I had solar power, I wouldn't have to deal with PSEGs bullshit service, and just sit back and continue to enjoy having electricity.
 
To the person who wanted solar kits:

http://www.sunelec.com/

Also, on their site they have a list of incentives/rebates/programs per state. They also happen to have some of the cheapest panels/watt.

Solar is getting cheaper and much more viable every year. If you're serious bite the bullet and start making your own energy :D
 
Zarathustra[H];1037807290 said:
I'm not sure I'd go for this.

I'm all for solar, but part of its appeal is that once you are done paying off the panels, the power they provide is free.

Under this arrangement it looks like you'd continue to pay Google for the power indefinitely.

I think it would be a better solution to take out a loan and do it yourself so you - not Google - can reap the long term benefits.

The problem with Solar today though, is that the up-front investment is so large, and the technology is improving so fast that any panel you get today, will be hopelessly obsolete by the time it is paid off...

atleast around here a $30,000 system is not going to make up the cost in a reasonable amount of time. I dont know the details of this but it could be a decent option for some people.
 
Google isn't doing something new. Years ago when I was looking into solar, other companies were doing the same thing.

I just want a solar kit that I can install myself, for a few grand. It shouldn't cost more then 10,000 worth of equipment. I'll do the installation myself, so I can start saving money myself.

True. There's a company around me doing this. It's a lease with maintenance and upkeep included - the more you pay upfront, the less the lease costs. You really need to sit down and historically check your current costs to make sure it's worth it. Your location, average weather patterns, and surface area available for the system (among other things)all factor in.

I've felt for a long time that eventually most large flat surfaces will be solar collectors. Solar paint, solar pavement, solar tiling is not far off.

I've already seen solar roofing tiles. Nice, but the maintenance/repair if a tile dies is a real pain.
 
Solar systems are getting decent. The mistake most people make is they go "too big". A modest sized system w/ battery storage can cover over half your needs at a much reduced price. The same goes with geothermal.
 
But unlike computers, solar has it's enemies. Free home energy results into free power for cars, and free lots of things.

It's not free due to the large up-front costs. In most cases you would save more money by putting the money in the bank and using the interest to help pay your electric bill.

What we need is super cheap panels, and solar will take off. Right now your best option is to buy some panels from ebay, get a bunch of car batteries to hold the charge, and a power inverter to generate the AC power from the DC batteries.The only benefit from switching to Solar Power is when the power goes out.

Most solar systems do not include batteries, as batteries increases the complexity and the cost of the system. Also batteries wear out and have to be replaced. Without batteries, the system will not power your house when there is an outage.

Buying a few panels from ebay and connecting them to some car batteries and an inverter is not a cost effective solution. For starters, you need hardware to regulate the voltage an charging current to the batteries, and you need deep cycle batteries that can handle the full charge/discharge cycles (unlike car batteries).


For a typical household, you need more specialized equipment that will isolate your batteries
 
When I saw the title I immediately thought of having my own personal solar system too. A couple of gas giants and something nice in the liquid water zone. Not too used.

Reminds me of a graph I saw a while ago projecting the trends of personal energy and material use for 1st world citizens. It indicated that sometime in the future we'd all need a solar system each to supply our desires.

Graphs are fun. :)
 
To the person who wanted solar kits:

http://www.sunelec.com/

Also, on their site they have a list of incentives/rebates/programs per state. They also happen to have some of the cheapest panels/watt.

Solar is getting cheaper and much more viable every year. If you're serious bite the bullet and start making your own energy :D

Good link! I bookmarked the state incentive page.
 
The only benefit from switching to Solar Power is when the power goes out. I had to run a gas generator after Irene came here in Jersey, for nearly a week. Costed me $100 in gas, and the generator makes a ton of noise. If I had solar power, I wouldn't have to deal with PSEGs bullshit service, and just sit back and continue to enjoy having electricity.
Only if you have a battery bank, if you do grid tied solar (which is cheapest) your solar panels won't work (or more to the point the inverter won't work) if the grid gets disconnected.

That said $75M for 3K homes... that's $25k per home (less if you count administrative costs of doling out the money) which is a shit ton of incentive depending upon how you can qualify for money.

I did the same thing, California had like $0.65 per watt (pretty shitty actually), but San Francisco gave $11000 for me being low income (which is less than $70k/year) as a flat amount (irregardless of size), so I played with different sizes, eventually settled on a system that after the federal tax credit left me paying around $3K for a bit over 3kW of panels, professionally installed at that price too. Kind of hard to pass that up.
 
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