California Utilities Plan All Out War On Solar, Please Read And Help

[winfield100]

if you are being penalized for sending solar back to the grid, why are you sending solar back to the grid?

my connect fee is $21.69 which is a fair price it seems as my utility keeps the grid up
I do “gift” to the grid as a contributing citizen an excess daily, but neither I nor the utility are price gouging.

 

[nwdiver]

if you are being penalized for sending solar back to the grid, why are you sending solar back to the grid?

You would still get penalized even if you DON'T send solar back to the grid. That's the absurdity of a capacity fee. If you have 8kW, export 0kWh and import 0kWh you would pay $64 per month because.

 

[winfield100]

You would still get penalized even if you DON'T send solar back to the grid. That's the absurdity of a capacity fee. If you have 8kW, export 0kWh and import 0kWh you would pay $64 per month because.

how many gigawatts are installed in California?
If they suddenly went away i suspect it would be quite bad for all, and i am not suggesting that in any way shape or form.
if you have, as your example, 8kw system, and are using it all, you are not drawing 8kw from the grid, and if 1,000 similar homes are doing the same, 8,000,000 watts are not being drawn, ie 8 megawatts
if everyone just stopped stopped, where would those 8 megawatts come from?
or a lot more since there are probably a lot more than 1,000, 8kw systems.

i suspect they have far better lawyers though.

 

[h2ofun]

You would still get penalized even if you DON'T send solar back to the grid. That's the absurdity of a capacity fee. If you have 8kW, export 0kWh and import 0kWh you would pay $64 per month because.

I have 30kw of solar and 5 batteries. So even if I am import 0, which I do for like 8 months of the year, and export a lot, I still get charged 240 per month. This average stuff is BS. Why would I not take my panels off?

 

[gene]

I have 30kw of solar and 5 batteries. So even if I am import 0, which I do for like 8 months of the year, and export a lot, I still get charged 240 per month. This average stuff is BS. Why would I not take my panels off?

I wish it was that simple. Please do some research and see if you can defect from the grid. There are many, actually most, cities that will "red tag" a home if not hooked to the grid. Best thing you can do know is join us and call Newsom every couple of days. 9 to 5 at 916-445-2841.

 

[h2ofun]

I wish it was that simple. Please do some research and see if you can defect from the grid. There are many, actually most, cities that will "red tag" a home if not hooked to the grid. Best thing you can do know is join us and call Newsom every couple of days. 9 to 5 at 916-445-2841.

I have never proposed leaving the grid since yep, I do not believe it is legal. But seems I could remove all my solar panels, just leave the batteries, and save 240 per month?

 

[gene]

I have never proposed leaving the grid since yep, I do not believe it is legal. But seems I could remove all my solar panels, just leave the batteries, and save 240 per month?

Or maybe leave one light bulb on the grid and power everything else off grid?

 

[h2ofun]

Or maybe leave one light bulb on the grid and power everything else off grid?

The issue is the fixed monthly cost per KW of panels that IMO is the killer

 

[nwdiver]

Or maybe leave one light bulb on the grid and power everything else off grid?

It would be interesting to see someone test that. That's essentially what I have. My grid-tied PV is limited to 120% of my consumption and I wanted to play with a off-grid system so I added 5kW off-grid. It's non-parallel. I don't see how they can charge a 'grid participation' fee for PV that isn't participating in the grid

 

[miimura]

It would be interesting to see someone test that. That's essentially what I have. My grid-tied PV is limited to 120% of my consumption and I wanted to play with a off-grid system so I added 5kW off-grid. It's non-parallel. I don't see how they can charge a 'grid participation' fee for PV that isn't participating in the grid

My thoughts exactly. A hybrid inverter that only has a battery charger on the grid side and solar charge controllers directly charging batteries instead of being grid-tied should not incur the 'grid participation fee'.

I have been thinking of all kinds of policies that make more sense than the bogus fee in the new proposal. For example, minimum charges proportional to the service size. Does it make sense that a 100A service has the same minimum monthly fee as a 200A or 320A service when you have your own generation? Clearly it makes sense when you have to pay for all usage, but when you have local generation, it doesn't make sense for a large customer with 320A service to pay the same minimum monthly as a 100A customer. We now have technological means with Power Control Systems to allow large battery and storage systems behind a small service. If a customer wants a small solar system on a small service, that's fine. But a customer that wants to install a large solar system with batteries and PCS on a small service to minimize their impact to the grid should be allowed to do that without paying exorbitant fees.

 

[holeydonut]

Or maybe leave one light bulb on the grid and power everything else off grid?

Yeah, my mother in law moved in with us due to COVID, but she still has a house in the peninsula near SF. She leaves her fridge plugged in and a fan going to keep the air from getting too stale, but otherwise the house is empty like 95% of each month.

PG&E sent her a nice letter commending her on her outstanding energy usage and how she's in like the top percentile of energy use in her area. Like good job! You don't live there so you're doing great!

I hate PG&E.

 

[mspohr]

I have 30kw of solar and 5 batteries. So even if I am import 0, which I do for like 8 months of the year, and export a lot, I still get charged 240 per month. This average stuff is BS. Why would I not take my panels off?

I wonder if (under the proposed rules) you could just disconnect your solar from feeding the grid and avoid the monthly charge. Just run on solar and batteries and draw from the grid but never export anything to the grid to avoid the solar grid charge.

 

[holeydonut]

I wonder if (under the proposed rules) you could just disconnect your solar from feeding the grid and avoid the monthly charge. Just run on solar and batteries and draw from the grid but never export anything to the grid to avoid the solar grid charge.

I think the issue for @h2ofun (14 years from now) is that PG&E will have a record of his original PTO (and his revised PTO with his solar expansion). They will start to bill him for his legacy system under NEM 4.0 or whatever.

He'll have to prove he submitted a permit to remove his solar and basically reverse-PTO himself at that time.

 

[h2ofun]

I wonder if (under the proposed rules) you could just disconnect your solar from feeding the grid and avoid the monthly charge. Just run on solar and batteries and draw from the grid but never export anything to the grid to avoid the solar grid charge.

At only 5 cents per KW, sure would be worth finding out could it be done. Seems a lot of folks might be asking the same question

 

[h2ofun]

I think the issue for @h2ofun (14 years from now) is that PG&E will have a record of his original PTO (and his revised PTO with his solar expansion). They will start to bill him for his legacy system under NEM 4.0 or whatever.

He'll have to prove he submitted a permit to remove his solar and basically reverse-PTO himself at that time.

But if I can change the setup such that it would never backfeed, like the batteries cannot do now, ..... Some folks it seems will be asking this question

 

[Ed Hart]

I have 30kw of solar and 5 batteries. So even if I am import 0, which I do for like 8 months of the year, and export a lot, I still get charged 240 per month. This average stuff is BS. Why would I not take my panels off?

I am there with you. My system is half the size of yours, and I have just two Powerwalls. My minimum bill will be $120 under the new plan, vs. zero today. I have just started looking at options, but one is to take half of the panels offline and just use them to charge our cars. On average, we need about 30-40 kWh per day for the cars. That would cut my monthly cost in half. Awaiting finalization of the new rules, I am simply listing my options at this time.

 

[h2ofun]

I am there with you. My system is half the size of yours, and I have just two Powerwalls. My minimum bill will be $120 under the new plan, vs. zero today. I have just started looking at options, but one is to take half of the panels offline and just use them to charge our cars. On average, we need about 30-40 kWh per day for the cars. That would cut my monthly cost in half. Awaiting finalization of the new rules, I am simply listing my options at this time.

Yep, we all need to share options. If we only get 5 cents per KW back, but 8 bucks per kw monthly for panels, not sure that is any value sending solar back. So yep, figuring out how to implement this with the tesla HW via gateway is something I hope someone will figure out. This is nuts!!! I would be 240 monthly

 

[iPlug]

If the CPUC proposal goes through as described, this may be enough to push several municipalities over the edge to pay the exorbitant buyout required to take-over utility infrastructure, such as from PG&E. I would be inclined to participate in such an effort here in Rocklin where there was already an interest in the buyout.

 

[Merrill]

This action by the CPUC is disgusting and makes no sense, California has set an initiative to become carbon net zero and this action will not help make that happen. The other lie they keep talking about is that with all the wealthy people with solar it shifts costs to the people who do not have solar. With more solar there is less need for the utilities to supply energy, so unless they are charging customers who do not have solar more to compensate it is bs.

 

[EinSV]

Although I’m usually not a big fan of the California initiative process this is exactly the sort of special interests politics it is designed to fight.

If the CPUC goes through with this, hopefully a strong proposal is put on the ballot to remove solar connection fees and incentivize more storage, while supporting low income ratepayers.

Californians strongly support solar — I think the CPUC will get beat at the ballot box if it goes through with this BS.