It’s the right take. Wondering why the Tories are so hot on fossil fuels…
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Absolutely spot on article. This actually reminds me of my attempt to use the Green Deal scheme in 2012. It took me a great deal of time and effort to get absolutely nowhere.
I could see first hand just how ridiculously bureaucratic and inefficient it was. I wrote to the department and ended up having a conversation with one of the guys responsible for it. He actually agreed with most of what I was saying but he said that the policy was actually functioning as the government intended (i.e. not at all).
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We’ve technically had programs in place here in Florida for a decade to facilitate the transition to domestic solar, but there is such corruption in the hosing insurance market and utility regulation that few people have faith that you wont get fucked before the installation has had the time to pay for itself. I looked into it when I first bought my house in 2010 and a friend who just went through the same process this spring had all the same questions and concerns I had then.
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I’m assuming that air con is the biggest electric draw there? Solar would be ideal for that.
Oh by a mile. Everything in my house is electric and AC is responsible for about 60% of the usage. My system is not very efficient so I should get that close to 50% with the needed upgrades, and closer to 40% once the peak of the summer is over (hopefully within the next couple of weeks).
On its surface Solar makes sense. Im sure there is variation, but the typical projections are that with the current agreements, solar panels will last for approx 25 years and pay for themselves in 10 years. The issue is though that the largest utility company in the state has massive (corrupt) influence in Tallahassee and is constantly picking at the rules like a velociraptor looking for weakness in the fences. We also have an insurance situation where its increasingly difficult to retain affordable coverage on your house and we’re constantly jumping through hoops to retain coverage. The result is people are faced with the prospect of committing to a project that within the 10 year pay off period you’ll find the rules get changes so the buyback rates get lower and the 10 year pay off is not more like 15. Furthermore, there is the prospect that even if you can get to the break even point, insurance companies are being really aggressive with demanding new roofs (roofs with 30 year warranties all over the state are demanded to be replaced in full after as little as 10 years) with the prospect of them telling you that to qualify as a new roof you;re not allowed to put your solar panels back up.
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I would have thought that in most of FL, if you sized a PV array to simply support the AC load in peak generation times, you could make a ‘behind-the-meter’ installation work and never worry about what FP&L will pay.
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Just did a little maths for a mate’s business:
NEWS: The new 1 Oct price guarantee average direct debit rates have been announced Electricity Unit rate: 34.00p per kWh Standing charge: 46.36p per day. Gas Unit rate: 10.30p per kWh. Standing charge: 28.49p per day Pls share
So a panel of 4 x 37w (148w) lamps over a year (8 hours, 300 days) costs £3623.
Reduce the panels to 3 tubes and use LED tubes (48w) with the above maths, £1175.
Tubes cost £8 each. 30x3x£8 £720
You’re welcome 
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When I moved to Germany I had an Amazon voucher left over that I needed to use up. I bought a box of LED bulbs for my mother and fitted them in place of her halogen and incandescent bulbs. Typically it was going from about 60W to about 6W. She will usually have two or three of these things on all day. As our US cousins are prone to say: “Do the math.”
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Only thing is that I make that 336 KWh/year. I take it that there is more than one panel?
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Sorry, missd that off somehow, 30.
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You are actually missing one massive area of savings, more relevant to organizations than consumers. Switching to LEDs with lifetimes of 50k+ hours versus fluorescents with a continuous lifetime rating of 20k that gets reduced by the number of on/off cycles (places like schools usually plan on ~10k, so 4 years) has a significant labour cost saving.
Also notable that you cannot really use occupancy sensors effectively with fluorescent lighting, between the life cycle reduction and the dim start-up they have, whereas LEDs work perfectly with them.
I have seen analyses that suggest the energy efficiency of the light itself is not actually necessary for a workable business case, between reduced hours of use and replacement costs.
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Yep, got all that, just didn’t headline it. People see the obvious figures first.
LED life is much much longer.
Having done the cost savings calculations as part of a borough-wide LED upgrade project for a London borough a couple of years ago (recently completed), I can concur that its not just the unmetered energy consumption that’s the big saving but the reduction in maintenance costs due to much longer useful lives. As expected its never smooth sailing (faulty manufacturing resulting in water ingress in the photocells. Only a small percentage but across thousands of lights being installed in bulk becomes a headache)
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Up early and for reasons, decided to work out the cost of turning on the kitchen lights now.
14 5w lamps so 70w running current. 14 hours of that now costs £0.36 Call that 2 days. So multiply by 15 to give a month. £5.40 per month just to turn on my kitchen lights. Even with a price cap it’s bloody scary. Although 14 lights might be excessive 
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How big is your kitchen???
Normal, nothing posh. 6 spots in the original fitting, 3 across the sink, the rest in the top of the glass front cupboards.
Still fractionally cheaper to charge the car at home than just run it on petrol, Not by much though. £6.90 for a full charge vs £7.30 for the petrol. If it gets any worse (give it a year) Tesla drivers are going to look a little foolish.
That’s where it’s arguably the most pointless functionally (although great aesthetically). I’m glad that my kitchen lights are at least on different circuits, so I can create different moods easily (and save money when I need it).