Well, the search function does not seem to work, so if this has been discussed before (and I'm sure it has), please provide links.

Texas always mentions the Nanosolar solar panels so I wanted to take a look. I came away impressed, though Wikipedia seems to indicate some controversy. But...

If they can SELL solar panels at $1/Watt and had some to sell (but I would want this for when I have my Volt so I still have time), then I would like to buy a 1 kW panel for $1000. Then I would need to add electronics, say another $1000 or two. Let's say $3000 with installation. Here in Texas, PEC is charging me $0.096/kWh. I think in Texas I could get 8kWh a day of electricity, making the Volt recharging free (except for the initial outlay). At the current rate I would get my money back (with no interest) in 11 years, not an awfully good investment. But...

1. If the power went out, I would still have 1 kW of power, at least during the daylight.
2. If the electric rates climbed, then the payback would be shorter.
3. Having already spent the $3000, I could delude myself of driving for free.
4. After the payback period, my delusion would be healed since I would truly be getting free electricity.
5. I could congratulate myself (and brag to friends and neighbors) of using clean energy (at least that part of it).
6. But if the equipment breaks down before the payback period ends, I could face expensive repairs.
7. Any other positives or negatives? I do not think the price of electricity is in any danger of falling much.

So, how good are my assumptions?
Would $2000 buy the electronics and installation for a 1 kW system (I would not want to worry about returning anything to the grid as I am using over 40 kWh per day).

Once installed, is it likely it would work for 11 years with minimal maintenance?

Any thoughts on whether Nanosolar can deliver on the $1/Watt price?

Would I really be able to get 8 kWh per day in Austin, Texas (on average)?

Austin, Texas? Don't they still have a rebate program? If you can get the rebate the decision to go solar is a no-brainer considering your home energy needs alone (as long as you decide to stay in your house for 5 years - approximate payback). I'm talking old technology that costs around $5 Watt installed.

With old technology, going solar often only made sense when you had a subsidy. With the newer stuff ($1 per Watt manufacturing cost probably $2-3 per Watt installed - darn inverters are still too expensive but will drop significantly as volumes and competition increases) people are going to be putting this stuff up as fast as they print them out(new technology prints solar cells like newspapers - www.nanosolar.com).

Personally, I decided a few years ago that the solar revolution was not going to happen until they got the cost of the panels down or the cost of electricity went up. I will have to see what price Nanosolar sells their residential panels before I change that opinion. I suspect they will be able to charge what others are charging and thus make bushels of money to build more manufacturing plants. This is a good idea and thus I don‘t think you will see the benefits for a while. Maybe they will price some panels very inexpensively to grab market share but that will be up to them. Thus, Once you know the prices and find out if you can get a rebate you can make a better decision. Oh, and you might not want to use 8 sun hours for your calculations. Maybe 7 or 6 sun hours would put you on the safe side. If you have a 2-axis tracking system, perfect conditions, always wash your panels, etc., you might get close to theoretical values but it has been my experience that it’s never as good as you hoped but usually good enough. ;) The more experience you get the better your cost estimates will be. Of course the solar company selling you the system will use the best values but... In short, solar for residential use is great (even using old technology) if you know what you are getting into. That’s why there hasn’t been a lot of people putting up solar panels on their roofs. However, it is slowly getting better as the costs come down. Unfortunately, the demand for solar panels, led by Germany, has been so great that the shortages have kept the prices very high. Nanosolar’s solar panels are an excellent technology jump that will be first seen in large-scale power plants (because they can get much closer to the actual manufacturing costs). It will probably take a few more years to see the cost of solar technology come down for the average home owner. Hey, You still have to wait 3 years for the Volt so maybe things will be better by then. It just might be a no-brainer.

My advice is to go out and get yourself a small solar panel and start to experiment with it. You will then get a good idea as to the actual energy you can expect as well as begin your love affair with solar energy. Be careful, once you get bit with the solar bug it’s extremely hard to shake. In fact, I never met someone who fell for solar who is not still hot on the idea. Yeah, maybe the costs were a bit high but the idea of collecting all that free energy from the top of your house gives you a feeling that is indescribable. Pure independence. Maybe very close to the feeling you will get when you plug your Volt in for the first time. ;)

No plug, No sale.
Got Solar?
Tiny car, big heart.

My 2 cents is when you can actually buy for $1 KW, spend another $2000 and power your whole house and sell the excess to the power company...assuming you can. The payback would be even shorter, as the Power company will be paying you.

That said, in the near term, Texas's advice is spot on.

And, when you use your solar to power a vehicle, if you look at the money saved by displacing gas purchases, the payback is exponentially faster.

I have to honestly say that if you plan on living in your home for a while and can wait a little bit (or get rebates with old technology) then the combination of solar panels on your roof combined with a reasonable plug-in hybrid is an almost impossible combination to beat. Any extra energy you produce is sent back to the utilities for credit (one of the coolest feelings ever) or you can choose to store it in your home battery station (again, waiting a little bit until the price comes down).

The one cost analysis components that people often forget is the security that comes from knowing your payments for the next 25 years. Who knows what the price of gas will do. It sure doesn't look good. Anyway, I'm bullish on solar and it just looks better every day. Everything started with the sun and will end when the sun goes out. Why fight that beautiful ball in the sky?

So I looked into this a bit more and realized that at this moment it is still too expensive for me. First, I get my electricity from PEC, not from Austin Energy, so the rebates do not apply to me. Second, it looks like 1 1kW solar panel system would cost around $8000 just in parts.

I do think this is a goal I would like to get to, and the articles I read state that the cost of solar is dropping, so I will look into this again in a couple of years.

So I looked into this a bit more and realized that at this moment it is still too expensive for me. First, I get my electricity from PEC, not from Austin Energy, so the rebates do not apply to me. Second, it looks like 1 1kW solar panel system would cost around $8000 just in parts.

I do think this is a goal I would like to get to, and the articles I read state that the cost of solar is dropping, so I will look into this again in a couple of years.

You might want to drop by your bank to see if they will lend you the money to install the solar panels. If you can show them how much money you save, which can then be used to repay the loan, they may finance it. I don't know if you have a Regions Bank in your area, but they seem to favor "green" endeavors.

So I looked into this a bit more and realized that at this moment it is still too expensive for me. First, I get my electricity from PEC, not from Austin Energy, so the rebates do not apply to me. Second, it looks like 1 1kW solar panel system would cost around $8000 just in parts.

I do think this is a goal I would like to get to, and the articles I read state that the cost of solar is dropping, so I will look into this again in a couple of years.

Probably a wise decision. For those that can see solar power in their future please keep researching and doing a cost analysis EVERY YEAR. The cost for other energy sources will most likely continue to rise while the cost of solar technology will continue to fall. It's only a matter of time before you will give your solar project the thumbs up. Please check back when you do. It'll be a great day.

KariK wrote: If the power went out, I would still have 1 kW of power, at least during the daylight…

KariK, why don’t you have a UPS together with the solar panels? By using the 16kWh Li-ion battery pack for the Volt you can have the energy after sunset. While the efficiency of solar cells is getting better and better (Mitsubishi’s 18.6% and UoD/DuPont’s 42%!), not having practical means to store the solar electric energy is one of the major impeding factors (cost being another) for wider use of rooftop solar panels among general home owners.

1) Even today’s price I think you can put a solar panel system on your rooftop (200sf, about 2.4kW nominal) for about 20,000 dollars including associated electronics. A 16kWh UPS should cost another 20,000 dollars or so.
2) Combine this with the reduced rate off-peak hour grid energy to charge up your Volt and the UPS and you can be off-grid for a good portion of the peak hours and beyond.
3) Suppose the cost involved is some 50,000 dollars altogether, it is about 10% of a house price in today’s market, which I think is tolerable, especially to those who are willing to purchase the Volt or Prius knowing they will not bottom line so easily.

You can forget about selling the solar generated energy back to the utility company. First of all, they do not need it most of the time. They need it only when they reach their max capacity during hot summer days. If you are off-grid at that time, you are reducing the burden on the grid by 2kW or so. Second of all, thousands of micro generators trying to send back energy to the grid are actually nuisance to the utility companies because of the Ferranti effect. The idea of buying energy from home generators is very politically motivated by the utility industry.

Utility companies might feel threatened by the notion that the UPS will eventually make millions of households independent of their energy most of the time, but in the meantime the energy shaved from the peak demand should be welcomed by them since they do not have to build more controversial power plants, nuke or fossil fuel fired.

A UPS is an interesting alternative, and I do not understand why a UPS, with batteries, is half the price of an inverter. Nevertheless, a UPS would be difficult to use as a whole house power supply, so an inverter makes more sense. Hopefully the inverter prices will fall with the solar panel prices. Getting a battery backup system would be expensive, and I think most power outages are during the daytime heavy usage hours.

I do not want to spend $20K, or even $8K, and getting a loan just means having to add the interest cost to the equation. Around $3K I could have just plunked down as cash.

As I mentioned, I was not planning to send anything back to the grid. Since I use over 40 kWh per day, until my system is bigger than about 4 kW, it just does not make sense.

"Since I use over 40 kWh per day, until my system is bigger than about 4 kW, it just does not make sense."

Sure it does, unless your power drain during the daytime is always over 4KW. Sell the excess.

UPS is an inverter with batteries. Price of Eaton’s 7.5kW (good for 8 minutes at full load) model is about 5,400 dollars. You can buy a 3 to 6kW inverter for 3 to 5 thousand dollars. We do not know the price of 16kWh Li-ion battery pack for the Volt yet. But the A123, the most probable suppliers to GM, started offering a retrofit Li-ion battery pack with associated electronics for Prius for about 10,000 dollars. Its capacity is 5kWh. Extrapolating from this the volt pack will have to be more than 30,000 dollars. This, of course, is not realistic. Probably GM is looking at less than 20,000 dollars to start with.
At Mitsubishi Motors they are also getting ready for launch of their i-MiEV model with 16kWh Li-ion pack. Since the car falls in the “kei” class of automobiles in Japan, I think they will price the whole car at around 25,000 dollars (30,000 dollars max).