Generators pay to stay on as dominant rooftop solar 'cannibalises' electricity prices
www.abc.net.au
The rise of rooftop solar in Australia shows no signs of slowing, bringing cheap, clean power. But the technology is also reshaping the power system in some surprising ways.
  • Wholesale power prices are increasingly turning negative at times of high solar output
  • Observers say rooftop solar is “cannibalising” electricity prices and hitting large-scale solar hard
  • There are calls for storage and greater daytime demand to help soak up solar production
      • nottheengineer@feddit.de
        3·
        11 months ago

        Yes, but you don’t necessarily need batteries. If you just have a bit of solar, you’ll use up all the power it produces as it does that.

    • stabby_cicada@slrpnk.net
      51·
      11 months ago

      Sure! As far as I know, county and city ordinances permitting, you can be off grid in CA.

      However, if you’re on grid, and you connect your solar panels to your home electric system, your solar power is now connected to the grid. I don’t think you can segregate electricity by source. You could in theory have some of your home powered by your solar and some of your home powered by the grid, separate systems that don’t connect, but I think that would be both dangerous and illegal. Maybe you could have an ADU that’s totally solar powered while your house is on grid?

      And googling today - it’s been a while - it looks like CA regulators withdrew their shitty fee schedule and approved a slightly less shitty fee schedule, so good news there 😆

      • nottheengineer@feddit.de
        6·
        11 months ago

        There are solar inverters that will just take some load off the grid, but never put power into it for this use case. It’s technically connected to the grid but for the grid, there are no downsides or risks.

        If the fee also applies to that, it’s just straight up stupid.