I understand your thoughts Paul but unfortunately your argument is wrong. To buy into solar today at the current transfer rates a pay back period of 50 years is almost unachievable. The only saving to be made is to actually change your lifestyle and use the energy you generate and not to allow any to return to the market. To pass energy into the market only extends the period required to gain any return on investment.
I just love this comment:" Suggesting there is a disparity for someone who buys a 3kw system now for $1800 -$3000 or so dollars really undermines those of us who helped the system develop by being early adopters." What a load of codswollop. You bought when you did because you could see a dollar in it and could afford it. To say you helped the system develop to where it is now is a fact now it is financially stupid to buy into the system at 6 or 8cents a kilowatt hour. at 68 cents for 20 years it was a good deal OK.
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Originally Posted by Paul Haese
We had a 3 kw system installed home on the old system. We get the higher feed in tariff and another few years we will have finally paid it off. One thing that many who are only entering the market now seem to have forgotten is that pricing for systems as early adopters was huge. We paid nearly $9000 for our system. I know of several others who put in much bigger systems and they paid a big price. Suggesting there is a disparity for someone who buys a 3kw system now for $1800 -$3000 or so dollars really undermines those of us who helped the system develop by being early adopters. The incentive was listed as being only 17 years from the time of the introduction. I think we got in with about 15 years remaining. It made the switch affordable and removing that would punish us for doing the right thing early. So some might want to be a little grateful for those of us who paid the price early to help get the industry up and running.
As to the battery system. This will be our plan in the next 5-6 years once the system costs reduce down a lot. There is little incentive right now to jump in early while costs are quite high. We will try to increase our current system to around 11-15kw with a new inverter/s to suit and a battery system that will store around 85kw of power. The thinking here is that it will prevent the need to be on the grid entirely, provide several days back up power in the event of cloudy weather and I will be asking the power connection to be removed altogether. This will negate supply charges and power cuts when the annual black outs occur. The current cost of such a system is not even worth considering and since we have the larger feed in tariff I am content to stay where we are at present. I like the idea of going totally solar and more so I like the idea of preventing being gouged wholesale by suppliers. SA still has the highest power charges in the country and it appears set to increase further in the next year. Not to mention the actual benefits to the earth I will be providing by not burning coal (the poisons created from making the solar system are another matter though but we have to start somewhere). So my suggestion Robin is to wait off if you can. Get a larger storage system when it is affordable. Right now the system I mention above would cost around $85k.
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