[Mogger]

The problem is the “grand scale” they try to impose. Keeping it centralized and in the hands and control of the power companies. On a personal level wind and solar actually works great. But they do not want this personal independence from the government control and utility companies. It will never work the way they are handling it now...

Exactly.

If the enviro-nuts were serious about "sustainable energy", their focus would not be on solar electricity, but on solar heating.

We have been heating our hot water for over 40 years with solar and are adding more now to heat the house, storing the heat in water and concrete.

I do have enough (NON GRID TIED) solar electric to run my ham radio gear, the boiler, refrigerator, freezer and one kitchen appliance such as microwave, Keurig, etc., at a time, plus lighting.

Sending power into the grid mostly at off peak times with home solar is insane.

[Openurmind]

Excellent, well done! And you are absolutely right, solar water heating should go hand in hand with solar and wind power. One can even just bury a grid in the yard as thermal mass storage like a battery. All it takes to circulate it is a small 12v pump on your solar and wind. And what you have for power is all one really needs to get by. We had about the same when we lived off grid. I have say though, that adding the wind generator was the best thing we ever did. Most times it was charging the battery bank all night while we were not using much power. Between the two we were completely topped off almost all the time. :)