Busting 7 Solar Power Myths

January 28th, 2012 by Zachary Shahan

Britt Mauriss, an occasional writer here on CleanTechnica, had a great post yesterday on sister site Planetsave on 7 popular solar power myths,… and why they are myths. Check it out:

7 Home Solar Power Myths… Busted! (via Planetsave)

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Tags: quickies, solar energy myths, solar power myths

About the Author

Zachary Shahan spends most of his time here on CleanTechnica as the director/chief editor. Otherwise, he's probably enthusiastically fulfilling his duties as the director/editor of Solar Love, EV Obsession, Planetsave, or Bikocity. Zach is recognized globally as a solar energy, electric car, and wind energy expert. If you would like him to speak at a related conference or event, connect with him via social media. You can connect with Zach on any popular social networking site you like. Links to all of his main social media profiles are on ZacharyShahan.com.

alf

The article is about “home” solar power, which is “retail” power (i.e. it replaces power for which you would be paying a retail price), but then #7 is comparing it to the cost of coal and nuclear plants which is “wholesale” power. That seems like a key difference to me.
Also panels on your roof are providing the energy very close to where it is used (your house), but wholesale power from coal and nuclear plants has to be transmitted and distributed to you, which incurs significant losses.
And while I’m on the subject, in the future when your utility switches to time-of-day electricity pricing, you will notice that the power produced by your solar panels will be replacing some of the more expensive power from your utility.
And I suppose I should mention something about the cost of “externalities” in regards to coal and nuclear which causes it to be much more expensive than just the cost we pay to the utilities.
I could go on, but I really just wanted to mention the wholesale/retail power thing..
- http://cleantechnica.com/ Zachary Shahan
  
  All great additional points. Mostly stuff I noted on our solar page. However, I think I need to add a TOD pricing section in there.
Cleve716

If I wait ten years, new technologies will be better, and I will be stuck with this old stuff
- Kevin L
  
  Did that stop you from buying your computer? At that rate you will never own any type of technology, car, etc. Funny thing about people – we spend tons of money on things that consistently lose value…but when a technology is proven to pay you back over a certain amount of time…we want to wait. Anyone else catching this???
  - http://cleantechnica.com/ Zachary Shahan
    
    Yeah, it confuses the heck out of me.
    
    It’s like we can get from A to B, but not from B to C.