![]() Those economics also affect the rooftop solar industry.”ĭropping costs have spurred Rocky Mountain Power to pursue its own “utility-scale” solar projects that can produce power more efficiently than “distributed” rooftop systems, he said. ![]() “Now the same reason that those prices are coming down are going to make it so that our entire service territory is able to enjoy the benefits of renewable energy, like wind and solar. “The entire industry has seen the price of solar coming way down,” Hall said. Rocky Mountain Power’s proposal is based on its own survey data and the rapidly evolving economics of solar technology, according to utility spokesman Spencer Hall. And they’ve taken a deliberately narrow view of the benefits of rooftop solar.” Rocky Mountain Power just isn’t looking at the whole picture. “We’ve intended to cast a wide net to paint a clear picture of the full benefits that rooftop solar provides. They’re occurring during the peak hours when electricity is costliest on the grid,” Kobor said. “The exports are occurring in high-value hours. (Leah Hogsten | The Salt Lake Tribune) Creative Energies solar installation employees install photovoltaic panels on the roof of the Boys and Girls Club in Salt Lake City, March 5, 2020. The group’s experts analyzed that data to account for the utility’s avoided energy and capacity costs, financial and security risks, and environmental and societal benefits, concluding the “true value” of rooftop solar is 22.6 cents per kilowatt-hour, 14 times higher than the utility’s proposed rate. “In contrast, if you didn’t have that resource, you would have to put a power plant on the ground, sometimes out of state, carry that energy over transmission lines, over distribution lines and everything would have to be sized appropriately to carry that.”Įarlier this year, Vote Solar gathered transmission and export data from 3,300 of Rocky Mountain Power’s solar-equipped customers to craft a proposal it filed Tuesday with the Public Service Commission. It’s not going to go very far in the system,” said Briana Kobor, regulatory director for Vote Solar. “By providing energy at the time it’s needed at a location very close to where it’s used, a unit of energy exported from a rooftop solar system is going to flow to your neighbor or the guy down the street. Lowballing the value of rooftop solar would discourage Utah homeowners from installing photovoltaics which helps reduce the need for coal-fired electricity and the stress on the state’s electrical grid, advocates argue. “RMP is unfairly preventing people from realizing a fair compensation.” “It would have a dire impact on the entire rooftop solar industry,” Jones said. ![]() Solar system designer Scott Jones, of the Salt Lake City firm Creative Energies, derided Rocky Mountain Power’s proposal as “nefarious.” ![]()
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