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posted by mrpg on Sunday May 14 2017, @06:45AM   Printer-friendly
from the hot-idea dept.

Tesla's Solar Roof Pricing Is Cheap Enough to Catch Fire

Tesla Inc. has begun taking $1,000 deposits for its remarkable solar roof tiles—to be delivered this summer at a price point that could expand the U.S. solar market.

Tesla will begin with production of two of the four styles it unveiled in October: a smooth glass and a textured glass tile. 1 Roofing a 2,000 square-foot home in New York state—with 40 percent coverage of active solar tiles and battery backup for night-time use—would cost about $50,000 after federal tax credits and generate $64,000 in energy over 30 years, according to Tesla's website calculator.

That's more expensive upfront than a typical roof, but less expensive than a typical roof with traditional solar and back-up batteries. The warranty is for the lifetime of your home.

"The pricing is better than I expected, better than everyone expected," said Hugh Bromley, a solar analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance who had been skeptical about the potential market impact of the new product. Tesla's cost for active solar tiles is about $42 per square foot, "significantly below" BNEF's prior estimate of $68 per square foot, Bromley said. Inactive tiles will cost $11 per square foot.

Also: Elon Musk has discovered a new passion in life — and it could be Tesla's best product yet


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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by bradley13 on Sunday May 14 2017, @07:12AM (29 children)

    by bradley13 (3053) on Sunday May 14 2017, @07:12AM (#509384) Homepage Journal

    Solar is great stuff...but. I'm getting more and more skeptical about the whole thing.

    Germany how has something like 30GW of installed solar capacity. On a cloudy day in the depths of winter, these installations were delivering around 1% of their rated capacity. So Germany also has coal and gas power plants that can deliver this power. So they pay to maintain two completely independent energy systems. Worse, coal and gas power plants have to be running on standby, even if solar is delivering.

    You would think that the solution, or part of the solution, would be energy storage. In Switzerland, there are lots of power plants designed to provide that storage: a pair of lakes at differing altitudes, connected by a power plant. When there is too much energy available, water from the lower lake is pumped up. When energy is needed, it is generated by draining the upper lake. However, the massive subsidies Germany uses to push solar have totally screwed up energy pricing. These storage plants - exactly what you want to help balance our solar energy over the course of hours or days - are going bankrupt.

    The response within Switzerland is - coming up for a vote this weekend - a huge package of subsidies for hydroelectric, to counterbalance those German subsidies for solar. This is great for companies that want to live off of government handouts, but it doesn't actually solve the problem. It causes even more distortions, which will be balanced out by more government intervention, ad nauseum.

    Can we just get our governments out of the market, and let renewables settle into the market wherever they belong?

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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by bradley13 on Sunday May 14 2017, @07:17AM (17 children)

    by bradley13 (3053) on Sunday May 14 2017, @07:17AM (#509385) Homepage Journal

    Forgot to tie my earlier comment into Tesla... The point here is that Tesla received massive government subsidies. And look at the numbers:

    would cost about $50,000 after federal tax credits and generate $64,000 in energy over 30 years

    So the production is subsidized, the installation is subsidized, and even then the solar cells take 30 years to break even - assuming no maintenance costs (like replacing batteries) during those 30 years.

    The numbers just do not add up.

    --
    Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
    • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday May 14 2017, @08:12AM (1 child)

      by Ethanol-fueled (2792) on Sunday May 14 2017, @08:12AM (#509390) Homepage

      You're paying to subsidize the F-35. Let's hope we get more addicted to opiates before then, this is becoming rather convoluted and annoying. Buy our shit! It's for the environment, not for climate change!

      Oh, but that's okay with you all, because I'm Peter Thiel, a gay.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:52PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:52PM (#509521)

        A gay what?

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by butthurt on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:09AM (1 child)

      by butthurt (6141) on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:09AM (#509411) Journal

      > The numbers just do not add up.

      These shingles take the place of conventional roofing material, so there would be some saving because of that. According to the story, the figures are for New York. They would differ for places with different insolation. In Arizona, for example, it would harvest more energy.

      • (Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday May 15 2017, @12:56AM

        by butthurt (6141) on Monday May 15 2017, @12:56AM (#509662) Journal

        The price of electricity is another thing varies from place to place, and I imagine that the price for the system may vary too.

    • (Score: 4, Interesting) by stormreaver on Sunday May 14 2017, @11:13AM (8 children)

      by stormreaver (5101) on Sunday May 14 2017, @11:13AM (#509425)

      The numbers just do not add up.

      I went to Tesla's site to run its estimator on my house. It projected that I would save about $2 a month (yes, two dollars) over my current utilities for 30 years (assuming no repairs or other infrastructure costs were required during that time). Even with regular price increases in utilities, I most likely would end up paying less by sticking with the utility company than with a Tesla roof.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @12:07PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @12:07PM (#509431)

        It would also be cheaper to remove SO2 scrubbing from power plants, catalytic converters from cars and let nuke plants deposit spent fuel in streams. Think what you could buy with those sweet $2/month savings... mmm!

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @12:43PM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @12:43PM (#509436)

        You seem to have left out a pretty big cost in your cost comparison: Paying for a regular roof.

        • (Score: 2) by shortscreen on Sunday May 14 2017, @08:13PM (1 child)

          by shortscreen (2252) on Sunday May 14 2017, @08:13PM (#509595) Journal

          It's negligable. The cost of materials for asphalt shingles, roll roofing, or corrugated sheet metal is $3 per sq-ft. or less.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:14PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:14PM (#509623)

            Nobody in a position to purchase solar panels would be using either of the later two.
            Furthermore that ignores installation costs.

      • (Score: 2) by epitaxial on Sunday May 14 2017, @03:35PM (2 children)

        by epitaxial (3165) on Sunday May 14 2017, @03:35PM (#509490)

        The cult of Elon Musk strikes again. People act like that guy is Christ himself walking on water.

      • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:39PM

        by kaszz (4211) on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:39PM (#509546) Journal

        Another benefit is independence and redundancy.
        Great when the "big shake" comes for places like California or the utilities thought maintenance is just a cost.

    • (Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @12:57PM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @12:57PM (#509441)

      So the production is subsidized, the installation is subsidized,

      Unlike coal and natgas.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:31PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:31PM (#509539)

        Explain how gas is subsidized. There is a BS claim floating around that it is a subsidy when gas companies deduct normal expenses when reporting income. This is not a subsidy . The government does not give significant money to fossil fuel suppliers. They do give money for solar installations and often mandate net metering which is another subsidy.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:17PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:17PM (#509624)

          https://www.eia.gov/analysis/requests/subsidy/ [eia.gov]

          And that doesn't even begin to include the social cost of pollution - asthma, acid rain, cancer, etc, much less the social cost of global warming.

    • (Score: 2) by SunTzuWarmaster on Monday May 15 2017, @04:42PM

      by SunTzuWarmaster (3971) on Monday May 15 2017, @04:42PM (#510098)
      In this particular article you are overlooking the primary benefit - a roof. Roofs in my area are $8K every 10 years ($24K over 30 years). You really have to run the numbers 3 ways, I'm running them below for my house (assuming that roof costs and energy costs adjust equally for inflation, anything else is speculation and you should buy/sell oil futures depending on your opinion):
      1 - Roof-No-Solar. $24K in costs. $50K in energy costs. Total is $74K.
      2 - Roof-And-Solar*. $24K in roofing costs. $7.5K in energy costs (cost of panel installation). $3K in connected-to-the-grid costs. $4K in remove/replace panel costs (paid when you get a new roof). $39K in total.
      3- Solar Roof. $50K in costs. $0K in energy costs.

      Note - I apparently have chosen the most cost-effective option (yay me!), but I am still connected to the energy grid. There are some benefits to being off-grid (and having a giant skylight!). That said, if you are getting a new roof, you should seriously consider getting a solar one (especially if it is warrantied). That said, the point is for the roof to be 'free' because it paid for itself with generated energy. You were going to have to pay for both a roof and the energy.
  • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Sunday May 14 2017, @02:10PM (2 children)

    by Immerman (3985) on Sunday May 14 2017, @02:10PM (#509451)

    Of course the market is extremely short-sighted, and happy to profit off as many externalities as possible.

    But something like a substantial carbon tax would help to remove fossil energy's substantial externalized costs, but would end up increase energy costs for everyone. You could potentially offset that by immediately redistributing the tax proceeds to the population though - either as a straight per-capita carbon income, or perhaps as a per-watt rebate - get the same rebate regardless of energy source, but only pay the tax on fossil energy, so that you come out ahead by buying non-fossil energy.

    • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @03:06PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @03:06PM (#509471)

      Something like this, right?
          https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/08/09/the-unsung-inventor-carbon-tax/f1xFyWmaXf2XzW3nVxrNJK/story.html [bostonglobe.com]

      ... In 1973, OPEC’s oil embargo had Americans lining up for blocks at gas stations that were running dry. Amid calls for gas rationing, Wilson proposed an alternative: Spur conservation by taxing fossil fuels, but keep the revenue out of government coffers by returning it all in equal dividend checks to every adult. ...

      Here is the original proposal including a number of details and some updates for this century:
            http://lessgovletsgo.org/?page_id=2 [lessgovletsgo.org]

      • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:34PM

        by Immerman (3985) on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:34PM (#509512)

        Something like that, yes. It's far from a new idea, but is consistently opposed by one of the most powerful and well-funded lobbyist groups in the nation - for good reason, since it is an open attack on their rapacious business model.

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Weasley on Sunday May 14 2017, @03:59PM (3 children)

    by Weasley (6421) on Sunday May 14 2017, @03:59PM (#509499)

    A single technology wouldn't be used for power generations with or without solar. We'd be maintaining coal and gas power plants anyway.

    Something that has deeply affected my opinion of this is my friend in San Jose. He has a typical solar array on his roof. His house runs on it, and his Tesla charges off of it, and the remaining power is sold back to the power company. He has not purchased gas/petrol or paid an electric bill in years. In fact, he makes money back from the power company.

    Can we get governments out of the market? Absolutely not. Corporations have no interest in being clean. They are only interested in making money, and they will cut every shortcut to do it. And we all suffer when the results of their short cuts cause calamity.

    • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:46PM (2 children)

      by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:46PM (#509517) Journal

      While that's a good point, it ignores that when energy production shifts over to solar, the costs for storage escalate. There are alternatives, but not for house roof systems (because of scaling costs). One alternative might be molten salt storage. Or there's a convenient mountain range that you can pump water up to store energy. Iin your case there is...but it's not that conveniently close, so you need the utility to handle the storage. Your friend might want to use Mt. Hamilton, but PG&E would probably prefer to use the Sierra Nevadas. (Actually, PG&E looks like it prefers molten salt in the Mojave desert, but, IIUC, that plant is experimental.)

      It's not clear what the best approach is, and it probably differs with location. But storage is a substantial cost for all "green" energy sources. And, unfortunately, NONE of the energy sources pay for all their externalities, and none are unsubsidized. This makes comparing costs quite difficult.

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      Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
      • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:28PM (1 child)

        by kaszz (4211) on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:28PM (#509538) Journal

        Maybe the electric car can be the energy storage?

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 15 2017, @10:38AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 15 2017, @10:38AM (#509931)

          Riiiight...

          So when you're commuting to/from work every day, your electric car is also somehow storing the energy coming off your solar panels.

          And at night, when the panels are dead, you're sucking power out of your car. And then the next morning, the car somehow has power to handle the aforementioned commute?

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Thexalon on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:25PM

    by Thexalon (636) on Sunday May 14 2017, @04:25PM (#509510)

    Can we just get our governments out of the market, and let renewables settle into the market wherever they belong?

    No, we can't just get the government out and have perfectly functioning free markets. I know that libertarianism as a philosophy basically takes that as a given, but it's never shown to be true. In the case of the energy sector:
    1. All kinds of large-scale energy production requires government involvement, because it involves all kinds of actions that affect third parties. For example, the fracking techniques now used to collect natural gas in many places also affect the water supply. Coal mining companies have to deal with the coal ash and waste. Nuclear has to figure out what to do about spent fuel rods.
    2. Any kind of distribution system uses government involvement to handle the easements to put in the lines and other equipment. Otherwise, for instance, any high-voltage line project could be completely derailed by a relatively small group of property owners refusing to allow the lines to cross their property.
    3. Lots of costs involved in collecting energy will not be factored into the price, thanks to externalities.

    Also, I can't help but notice that you seem to think you're the first person who noticed that solar power might be affected by nighttime and cloud cover, which is obviously silly.

    There is also another source of renewable power that works perfectly well at night and under cloud cover: windmills.

    --
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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:48PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:48PM (#509554)

    Solar doesn't get down anywhere even in the ballpark of 1% of its nominal efficiency on a cloudy day. That is simply a lie.

    And your rant on subsidies isn't much better. It of course depends on the country, but at least in the US fossil fuels receive vast [investopedia.com] federal subsidies. By contrast there is a single [energy.gov] federal subsidy for solar. Drill an oil well and the company gets a 100% tax rebate on tangible costs, 100% rebate on intangible costs, 15% of their gross income completely tax free, and much more. The solitary subsidy for solar is a 30% consumer rebate - the company themselves get no direct refund on their costs. And that solar subsidy is set to decline to 26%, 22% and then 0% in 2021. The subsidies for oil have been increased over the years, and are permanent.

    In any case this is all tangential and irrelevant to the biggest problem. Your post simply has no relevance to the topic at hand. This isn't a country replacing their infrastructure or whatever. This is a company offering individuals roofs that cost less than a traditional roof, look great, and generate free energy as a perk. Trying to be against this reeks of extreme bias which I think is supported by your misleading to plainly false supporting 'facts.'

    • (Score: 2) by Whoever on Sunday May 14 2017, @09:44PM (1 child)

      by Whoever (4524) on Sunday May 14 2017, @09:44PM (#509618) Journal

      Solar doesn't get down anywhere even in the ballpark of 1% of its nominal efficiency on a cloudy day. That is simply a lie.

      Bullshit!

      I installed solar panels on my house a year ago. During the course of that year, the lowest daily production was about 10% of the highest daily production. We did not see a single day during the year where production was effectively nil.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:19PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @10:19PM (#509626)

        Woosh!