Quote:
Originally Posted by sendler
The cheapest pricing I have seen in the NY area is from Renovus on community/ shared grid scale installations at $2.20/ kW installed. So the Ithaca group's 50kW system would have cost at least $110,000 and have a 15 year pay back at $0.12/ kWh if the electric company gives them the very generous situation of buying any instantaneous excess at the "meter runs backwards" price. If they only received the true spot price for their excess they would only get back around $0.04
.
State and national rebates would give back an additional $60,000 of the installation price. And they might even qualify as a "grid scale" installation which unlocks a further $0.03/ kWh federal "feed in tariff" reimbursment.
|
Hey I'm trying to be really optimistic. I know that's unusual.
The lowest of the lowest utility scale rates I could find were a little over $1 per watt. That's the price with everything in your favor, free land, the power company doesn't have to do anything, immigrant labor, solar panels by the shipping contaier, inverters by the truckload.
When you start having to lease land like the wind turbine guys, get right of ways for electrical and roads, install electrical and build roads, deal with the usual amount of red tape I would expect at least $2 per watt.
Residential is typically $3 to $5 per watt depending on how small the system and what kind of roof.
Just mounting the panels flat on a metal or asphalt shingle roof appears to be cheapest, probably doesn't produce the most. If the panels need a tilt mount, that adds at least $30 to $70 per panel, mostly depending on how big the panels are and what kind of quality tilt rack you want.
If you need tilt racks it's probably cheaper to put them on simple ground mounts.
God forbid if you have a terracotta roof just the install labor and hardware is going to be the bulk of the cost. Most of the solar panel install horror stories I have heard of involve terracotta.