Grist Comment Feed en http://www.grist.org/article/california-net-metering-bill-progresses/ Thu, 09 Jul 2009 14:29:41 -0700 http://www.grist.org/article/california-net-metering-bill-progresses/1 A feed-in tarriff system might work better, but net metering does work pretty well for both the end-user with a small solar PV system and for the utility company. The end-user gets more value out of generating power, and the utility gets locally-generated power that supports the peak load, minimizes losses, minimizes maintenance costs on the grid, and helps to motivate the end-user to shift power usage to off-peak hours (leaving as much of the generated power to support peak power demand as possible).   My guess is that the utilities want more control (they want to be the power producers) and they want to get a bigger slice of the benefits when an end-user does generate power (i.e., simple greed).  I really believe that net metering or feed-in tarriffs are essential to push the roll-out of distributed generation as quickly as possible, and that is something we need as part of our GHG reduction efforts.  Unfortunately, folks like me who do generate power at home can't benefit from generating any more power than we consume, since the utiltily company pockets any extra benefits. All in all, net metering has worked pretty well for me.

]]> A feed-in tarriff system might work better, but net metering does work pretty well for both the end-user with a small solar PV system and for the utility company. The end-user gets more value out of generating power, and the utility gets locally-generated power that supports the peak load, minimizes losses, minimizes maintenance costs on the grid, and helps to motivate the end-user to shift power usage to off-peak hours (leaving as much of the generated power to support peak power demand as possible).   My guess is that the utilities want more control (they want to be the power producers) and they want to get a bigger slice of the benefits when an end-user does generate power (i.e., simple greed).  I really believe that net metering or feed-in tarriffs are essential to push the roll-out of distributed generation as quickly as possible, and that is something we need as part of our GHG reduction efforts.  Unfortunately, folks like me who do generate power at home can't benefit from generating any more power than we consume, since the utiltily company pockets any extra benefits. All in all, net metering has worked pretty well for me.

]]>