CA rebates lead to installation of almost 60 GW of personal solar.

[Jason M. Hendler]

EDIT: I apologize for the thread title, I meant to say 60 MW

CA rebates lead to installation of almost 60 MW of personal solar so far this year:

Link

If you just create the right policy, the collective efforts of individuals will outpace any industry scale installations.

[Texas]

CA rebates lead to installation of almost 60 GW of personal solar so far this year:

Link

If you just create the right policy, the collective efforts of individuals will outpace any industry scale installations.

Hold on there cowboy! I think you meant 60 MW of power. California only produces 63.2 GW of electrical power in peak summer conditions! Here is all you ever wanted to know about California energy production:

http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/state/state...les.cfm?sid=CA


So, Let's put the 60 MW in perspective. It's more than 16 times smaller output than a nuke or coal power plant. The solar is only producing that power for an average of around 6 hours a day compared to 24 hours a day for a fossil fuel power plant. Thus, drop that number down another 4 times and you get an idea of how tiny that is. It would take over 4000 years to equal the energy production (not power) California uses today. Oh, it's population is growing fast.

Does that sound like it will get us out of a jam anytime soon? I disagree with you that companies alone can get this problem solved in the shortest amount of time. Companies, individuals and governments need to work together on this massive and looming problem. Thankfully we have lot's of coal here in America to tide us over. We only really have to attack the oil use problem with war-like aggressiveness. Lucky! Just look at other nations that use oil for everything, including electrical production. Ouch.

[Jason M. Hendler]

Doggone it, I read and understood 60 MW, but mistakenly typed 60 GW, and of course you can't correct a thread title.

[Jason M. Hendler]

Regarding the size of the 60 MW compared to a nuke plant isn't a good metric. You should compare it to the typical solar thermal installation size of 65 MW, like Nevada Solar One.

My point is, that in just 6 month's time, this was achieved, and is accelerating. Certainly, utility and government cooperation has the potential to do it quicker, but CA is wisely unleashing the power of the individual and individual enterprises.

[OPEC SUCKS]

Texas took the words right out of my mouth. I am speechless.

Edit: And that is a good thing.......

[Koz]

There is only good here. Nobody said this the only thing that can, should, or will be done. This points to what was done. Perhaps it should be looked at in conjunction with the growth percent from same period one year earlier.

Seems to me, the point is Solar MW installed are accelerating along with wind. Capacity is going through the roof. Solar implementation has been paced by production capacity for some time now and so has wind. Factor in production coming on, being built, and being planned. It is clear that implementation will ramp up much faster than even optimistic predictions for a year ago.

As has been discussed ad nauseum, solar and wind by themselves do not cure all of our power ills. They will play an important role, however. There development also has tremendous synergy with stored electric energy solutions for transportation and in particular battery based solutions. Got to love a market that will add significant value to an EOL battery pack. The is one big, if not the biggest, factor being overlooked in most people's financial analysis for the Volt. The assume $0 residual value at EOL.