Massive solar installation completed in SoCal

[jpak]

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D94QLF0O1.htm

Utility officials said the largest solar panel installation in the state has been completed -- the first of some 150 solar projects planned for warehouse and factory roofs in Southern California.

The 600,000 square feet of solar panels on the roof of a distribution center in Fontana, about 50 miles east of Los Angeles, will produce enough electricity to power as many as 1,300 homes, said Ted Craver, chairman and chief executive of energy company Edison International on Monday.

The installation was the first component of Edison's $875 million plan to put solar panels on a total of two square miles of rooftops.

The entire project would provide some 250 million watts of generating capacity, enough to power up to 162,000 homes.

<more>

[silverweb]

1. Wonderful!

I always look for solar panels on rooftops here in sunny SoCal, and it saddens me that there are so few as of yet.

I hope this project is wildly successful and is just the beginning.

[metapunditedgy]

2. $875M for at least $5400/home.

It's a start... it will be nice to see the numbers improve as these sorts of projects progress.

[tinrobot]

3. That's not bad at all...

If I could adopt a solar system on my roof for $5400 that would completely power my home, the system would pay for itself within 2-3 years.

No brainer.

[metapunditedgy]

4. Do you live in SoCal? Electric use very different, esp. in coastal areas.

I think the numbers don't include the tax incentives, either. (Although that just shifts the costs.)

There's also maintenance and repair fees, etc. I'd like to see a breakdown indicating whether this is financially viable at the current time.

Of course, there are the obvious benefits of supplementing power generation and spurring future solar development, which are excellent and hard to value in dollars.

[NNadir]

5. If you could? Why haven't you done so? Do tell...

We've been hearing lots and lots and lots and lots and lots about the brazillion solar roofs in Southern California, and are now going into 8 years of "world's largest solar" posts on this website.

I hear lots and lots and lots and lots of "if I could" stuff here too.

In fact, it we had a solar roof from a "solar will save us" for every "world's largest solar" posts in the E&E forum solar electricity in California would have certainly doubled by now, since it's relatively easy to double "next to zero."

However, outside of "lah-lah" land, in the world of real numbers, we see that California solar energy hasn't doubled in the time that mindless hooples here have been posting "Brazillion Solar Roofs" posts.

http://www.energyalmanac.ca.gov/electricity/electricity_generation.html

On the contrary, the already trivial solar production in California has been declining unless you are here to argue - as some anti-nukes on this website do continually - that 860 is smaller than 616.

So then, by your own count, you're spending well over $1000/year on electricity. Why no solar roof?