big solar
 

Once or twice a year, the Ontario govt announces approvals for big renewable energy projects. This time is is for 123.5MW of mostly PV projects mostly on schools, industrial and commercial building etc. Most of these projects are 100-500kw in size and they will be paid somewhere between $.25 and $.40/kwh for 20 years. One school I am involved with (I was on the board for the project but not anymore) got approval for a PV 60kw system.

Very nice..
That is a lot of solar. Where does that premium price come from?

Very cool. That is quite a bit of solar. :thumbup:

In Canada, almost all the power companies are publicly owned (all of us) and are controlled by the govt. to some extent. The govt set a feed in tariff to promote solar and started it at $.80/kwh years ago and as install prices came down so did the FIT price. This is what Germany did to get their market going.

Currently residential installs of less than 10kw get $.4/kwh for 20 year contracts.

Big installs have to go through a major process to get approved but once they are in, they also get the 20 year rate.

What a great way to encourage solar.

Here in South Carolina they are debating how much under retail they should give use for our solar and on top of that how much they should charge us for the grid use each month.

I hope the US wakes up and try’s to promote solar like some of the other countries are.

If you think of it, a utilities highest cost power is at peak periods which is right when solar is best. There was a time when utilities would have to pay $1/kwh on the spot market so paying 1/2 that is a bargain.

This is very good and very nice, a great project for renewable energy. Quite a lot of solar energy there!

Action alert!
 

LISTEN UP EVERYONE!

Any of you who have installed or who may potentially ever install or want the choice to have any kind of substantial personal-use generation system need to speak up now. Call, email, or write your local, state and federal lawmakers and power utility officers and let them know how you feel about solar power.

As you read this, the powers that be are busy sealing our fates for us. Large power utilities and cooperatives are twisting laws against solar power in general, just because it is an alternate power source. In many areas, it is no longer economical to run a grid-tied system whether or not you have any surplus. New electric codes and utility regulations are being devised just to make it difficult to own an approved working system on your property.

New taxes and tariffs are being invented to compensate for the lost revenue that existing solar installs have displaced. If you don't believe me, just look at a modern electric bill...what the heck are all those extra charges anyway? Electric DSM is a common one. This is an integral part of the "smart grid" plan. You are paying every month for the power utility to install "smart meters" that snoop on your usage and charge you by the hour for the power you use, as well as install equipment that will cut off your air conditioner and/or water heater whenever they see fit. It also allows your local power utility to buy "peak" power from a third party, rather than starting up their auxiliary power plant(s). Unfortunately, customer generation (aka net metering) programs are not part of electric DSM.

As far as the government and major industrial powers are concerned, solar power generating citizens are robbing them of valuable taxes and profits! Subsidies are being shaved or terminated completely as a preliminary measure. Another big trend in the industry is to raise the fixed "meter" or "usage" fees while lowering the price per KWH. This seriously skews the return on investment for the worse. Power utilities are also forcing customers to actually own their homes and solar systems, preventing renters and homeowners that would lease or finance their solar equipment from "operating" or "possessing" a system in general!

Federal law requires public utilities to accept power generated by independent sources like solar. However, there is next to no public policy on how the utility companies should obey this law. As a result of this vacuum, the monopoly infrastructure have written their own policies to follow. Since around 2005, a control-freak symposium of corporate think tanks have been churning out policies and by-laws with next to zero opposition or criticism. This is bad for us.

With no one to argue with or stop them, these monopoly leaders will continue to make it more and more difficult (and expensive on your utility bill) to own or operate a useful solar power rig. So if you ever might think about operating a home solar power generation rig, please rise up and resist the injustice that is being done to us today. For some (Hawaii), it's already too late....

OK, I'm done now.

This makes a good case for public owned power distribution. We the public can vote out of office the govt that acted that way. Our distribution system is non profit so that motive cannot be exploited.

... And the band played on... ;)