[aquila48]

“Here in Virginia we pay the rooftop solar generators 12 cents for the their politically correct but unreliable electron holes instead of 3-4 cents for reliable wholesale power.”

That is true if the utility has to continue to have enough power plants and infrastructure necessary to supply all of the electricity for every residence. If it is able to reduce the number of plants it needs then the solar excess may have some benefits since it would also save the utilities the cost of the generating plant.

But the latter has proven to not be the case here in CA, where we’ve been subjected to power outages whenever we get a bit of heat wave because utilities had shut down gas generators.

[palmer]

My coop's supplier (a nonprofit) doesn't own any plants but we own production shares. We need those shares otherwise we will have rolling blackouts like California. One advantage we have is private control. The state doesn't tell us how much energy capacity we will need. OTOH we can't waste money on excess capacity.

I'm not against solar. I have about 16 panels although none are grid-tied.