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My panels on the roof cost 35 cents per watt capacity bulk on the pallets. The two 8000 watt inverters that back feed to the grid cost 50 cents per watt. My 15 kw system makes its full rated power 220 days per year in North Texas at full sun and still makes 2 to 3 kw under partly cloudy skys. The installers did the job in two days and the electricians took two more to grid tie two 200 amp panels. I leased my roof top real estate to the solar power company. They played for the panels and inverters I happened to see the invoices that’s why I know what they paid for the system. Install was general labor at $20 hr and electricians were $80 hr. In exchange I get all the kWh I can use at 3 cents per kwh and they sell anything that I don’t use to ERCOT at what ever peak rate they bid up too. My panels make 120 to 130 kWh per day in full sun and DFW gets 220 or more of those days per the nws climate center per year. My home never has used more than 50 kWh in a day I have twin system ground source heat pumps that are amazingly efficient keep my home at 68 all summer and 75 in the winter months. At a retail rate of 7 cents per kwh the pay back period would be 7.6 years if they sold all the power at 7 cents , peak rates for summer ERCOT bid can be $130 megawatt hr or 13 cents per kwh or more. Solar never curtails first by law so they always get the highest leaker rates from ERCOT the payback for a 15 kw system would be 5 years or less in sunny Texas. These Panels have a full 25 year Warranty and have survived 70mph winds and golf ball sized hail in fact the area of roof that were not covered in panels had to be replaced after the golf ball sized hail we got in April the panels saved the roof under them in this case. Not a single panel has failed in the two years they have been up even after hail of that size.

You got way too deep into the long weeds for me in that narrative and lost me after a couple of sentences. Imagine the average citizen trying to follow that complex system. I suspect you have some kind of electrical engineering background or similar experience.

But it is common knowledge that solar is only cost effective with government (taxpayer) subsidies and tax credits. It's been that way for decades.

Spain had a big solar industry and it shut down essentially because the government ran out of money to subsidize the solar businesses. And we all remember Solyndra. Obama pushed it and praised it until it went bankrupt. All it accomplished was to launder money back to some of his political supporters who started the company in the form of government subsidies.

I looked into it when I built my new house in Florida and the up-front cost versus the years it would start paying for itself was 38 years. I chose to go with the regular electric provider instead. For 38 years I'll save money on my electric bill before the solar would have started paying for itself. I'm 73 years old. You do the math.

And solar panels need maintenance. Anything built to stand in the scorching sun is going to deteriorate after a few years. Parts and components need replacing. Roofs usually last 10-20 years. There is no reason to believe that solar system components on the roof will last longer without needing work or replacement too. And the panels need to be cleaned regularly to maintain their efficiency because of dust and dirt accumulation, which I learned in Arizona when I first looked into it. Arizona is a dusty place and so is Texas.

Solar hot water is feasible for most people and takes about 5 years to start paying for itself in savings. But to power the entire house with solar is cost prohibitive for most of the population or it just takes too long to recover those large up-front costs to start seeing any savings. Most people nowadays are in a house between 5 and 15 years.

If you have the excess funds and/or you're out in the middle of nowhere with no electric grid, solar probably makes sense. But most people can't afford it because of the costs involved.

When I investigated intalling solar on my existing home in Arizona, I read an article that claimed for solar to power the Valley of the Sun (Phoenix metro area) there would have to be an array of solar panels built that would run continuously to cover the entire desert from Phoenix to Tucson, a distance of 110 miles. Now how environmentally friendly would that be?

If solar or wind were economically feasible, everybody would be using them. But they are not. That's why after a quarter century, they still only provide 15-20% of the overall power to the country. They have their limits.

Thanks for you response.