The overall price slope is downward and rapidly downward.   At the same time manufacturing capacity is rapidly increasing.

There’s little doubt that the industry sees lots of sales ahead and good profits to be made even at lower unit prices. 

Another article posited that the Chinese solars were victims of the general wave of mistrust about financial transparency and misdeeds of other sectors. 

Seems like the decline was partly due at least to a confluence of bad news in general. 

Subsidies continued past the time needed to get a technology to market scale can be sucky.  Sometimes we need them to continue, but more often they play a role in creating political power where none is deserved.

Long ago we should have cut subsidies for oil.  We should have put that money into transportation solutions which reduce our need for oil.  Now, as oil becomes critically scarce, we’re having to scramble to cut our oil needs.  We should already have high speed rail and light rail in place.  We saw this problem coming long ago.

As for solar and “greenies want solar no matter the cost” let’s assume you’re vastly ignorant of the history of solar technology.  Because we’ve subsidized PV solar the price of solar has fallen to ~$80/watt to now under $1/watt and will continue to fall until PV solar is The Cheapest Method to put electricity on the grid.

Right now heavily subsidized wind power holds that title.

(I’m speaking about new generation, not power from paid off coal/nuclear plants.)

Wind and solar, both made workable via subsidies are our hope for a workable future. 

Used appropriately subsidies make good things happen.  When it comes to financing new technology the free market fails.

i don’t see fossil fuel & nuclear subsidies being cut anytime soon in the
U.S., so until then the claim that solar & wind are getting massive
subsidies is just completely LUDICROUS and a horrible distraction to what
the goal should be — not favoring any of these energy sources with
subsidies (including unchecked externalities that cost us at the doctor,
insurance company, etc).

Utilities deal with variable supply and load 24/365.  Stuff is always coming on and going off line.  Nuclear plants and coal plants go off line with no advance notice and utilities deal with it. 

We need exactly zero storage to make solar a significant supplier of our grid energy.  We just need other types of supply (and load) which can be switched on and off as needed to allow us to take advantage of the sun when it is shining.  Hydro and gas turbines comes to mind,  EVs are going to be a great dispatchable load.

Solar is very predictable.  We know when the sun will be high enough to produce power and when it will drop too low.  We have a pretty good idea a day or two ahead whether clouds will or will not be a factor.  We know damn well what role clouds will play an hour or more before.

We make those types of adjustments all the time in reaction to the load side.  We know the day before if it is going to be hot or cold and get our ducks lined up.  We know at what time big plants are going to start up and what time shopping malls are going to shut down.

We build our utility systems to handle the peak-peak hot afternoon of summer and idle a bunch of that capacity when demand is low.

All we need is an attitude adjustment.

OK, enough about your “top guy”.

Now, your situation.  Yes, it might take you 14 years to recover your investment.  That would be a 5.1% return on investment which is not bad when you look at other low risk investments (bonds, Treasuries).  And the number of years is likely less.  Did you calculate in an inflation factor for the electricity you won’t be buying over those 14 years?

At 3% inflation you hit $14k in savings in just under 12 years.  At 6% it’s slightly more than 10 years.

Personal storage, I wish.  I’m about due for a new set of batteries and they are  not cheap.  We need affordable ultracapacitors so we could make a once in a lifetime purchase and pass them on in our wills.

In Georgia, where I live, utilities must (by law) buy my solar PV electricity from me (subject to caps) and so I can sell it.  But would they buy from me in a free market?  “No,” said my utility’s top guy, “because people want their alarm clocks to awaken them in the morning,” and that can’t happen with variable power sources like Solar PV.

Solar PV can compete when its electricity can be feasibly be stored.  NO ONE is pointing to cost-efficient electricity storage heading our way anytime soon.  So sure, we may see prices falling as masses of people (and I’m betting the majority using subsidy dollars) invest in Solar PV, but at some point people will do the math and wake up.  My 10KW array, at $1.4/watt installed (65% subsidized), makes/saves me $1000/year. 

That means it will still take me 14 years to recover my investment.  Know many people who’ll wait that long?  Get me a feasible electricity storage system, however, and now it starts smelling sweeter to me. 

I’m projecting, by the way that a 7-year payback cycle will get EVERYONE into solar because that’s the longest car loan or lease deal (hence, it’s a mass psychology benchmark) and it’ll put free wealth in their pocket — so they’ll feel crazy NOT investing in a solar array.  Until then, I warn fellow greenies to do the math  before jumping into solar.

on variability and price, with massive growth (combined with serious upgrades to our grid), variability becomes less of an issue and price drops. costs have been dropping tremendously for years and will continue doing so as it scales. getting solar deployed is as good as investing in R&D at this point on that front.

of course, not just for solar but for many energy sources, we need much improved grid and storage options.

In the case of PV companies I suspect they see huge growth ahead and are putting their cash (and everything they can borrow) into increasing capacity.

No doubt fossil fuels interests are working to limit the growth/acceptance of renewables, but investors are vast in number and mostly motivated by the money they make.  They are generally not allied with any specific industry group. 

As much as anything this is most likely about unrecognized opportunity.  Solar is a tiny sector compared to other industries.  A little bit of fossil fuel FUD could easily cause investors to not spend much time looking deeper for opportunity.  Low prices, themselves, could be working as a signal to avoid the sectors.  (“Nobody’s paying much for these stocks, must be something wrong with them.”)

With the Fool making the strong statement they have made I wouldn’t be surprised to see prices jump up.  Individuals are constantly looking for undervalued stock.  That’s how Peter Lynch made his incredible gains in the early days of the Magellan Fund, finding undervalued stock like L’eggs (pantyhose in a plastic egg) that other investors hadn’t noticed.

Chances are, not only will they save money while they live in their homes, they  may enjoy a higher sales price if they do move.

What we’ve seen at Altamont Pass, our oldest wind farm, is that turbines continue to crank out the watts for a decade or more past their ’20 year lifetime’.  And the oldest large scale PV installation is now over 35 years and producing power with little drop in output.

People talk about the low price of power coming from older, paid off coal and nuclear plants.  Just think how low power prices will be from wind and solar installations once their upfront costs are recovered.

when ask my friends if they want to invest $1000 (or euro) to get a return after 10 years they are not interested. when i ask them if they want to have a 30 year guarantee on a electricity bill with only .10 per kwh they are all ears