Elected officials and school leaders in Alameda County are calling on the state to block a controversial proposal that could prevent California schools from embracing solar power.
Critics say under the new proposal schools and other sites that have solar and more than one electricity meter would be required to sell the energy they produce back to their utility and then buy it back at a much higher rate.
Crap like this is just going to make sites with solar buy backup batteries. And then they’ll never send the energy back to the grid (and electric bills will go up even more).
Meaningful solar backups for residential applications cost about the same as the actual panels.
These are meaningful capital expenses and talking about double the cost just to avoid these rate gimmicks is not realistic. The utilities need to fix their transmission issues and the state needs to stop the perverse incentives that they've structured the utilities with.
The CPUC did not respond to NBC Bay Area's request for comment but has previously said the proposal is meant to enhance solar consumer protections and would only apply to future customers.
I would be thrilled to hear the mental gymnastics used to get from “enhanced solar consumer protections” to “pay us for the energy you produced”.