Solar energy gains ground in Florida
Gainesville, Fla. is the first city in the country to adopt a new solar incentive program, making it profitable for an average person or business to put up solar panels and begin feeding power back to the grid. Jennifer Collins reports.
Damon Corkern, who works for ECS Solar Energy Systems, Inc, installs a solar panel system on the roof of a home in Gainesville, Fla. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)
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Kai Ryssdal: Gainesville, Florida sits right in the heart of the Sunshine State. It's probably best know for its powerhouse college football team, the University of Florida Gators. The city's also started attracting attention for power of a different sort. Solar energy. Panels are popping up all over the city. So are the economic benefits. Jennifer Collins has more from the Marketplace Sustainability Desk.
JENNIFER COLLINS: Gary Rowell owns a tire shop in Gainesville, and this is what he thinks about climate change.
GARY ROWELL: I don't believe in global warming to 100 percent. I think it's mostly bull.
That said, Rowell has installed two sets of solar panels. One on his house and one on his shop. He's even running ads on local radio. Because despite his doubts about global warming, Rowell wants to let customers know he's gone green.
AD: Gainesville Tire Service, we'll make it happen. We're extremely proud of the sizeable investment just installed here at our shop. You won't notice anything different when you drive up, but there are a 144 solar panels on our roof now.
The system cost more than $200,000 to install. But Rowell expects to get that money back and more. That's because this spring Gainesville adopted a solar incentive program that's the first of its kind in this country.
Over the next 20 years, the city-owned utility will pay Rowell and others who put up solar panels for all of the power they generate. And it'll pay well, about three times the current retail rate for electricity. For Rowell, that adds up to about $18,000 a year. Gainesville designed the program with this question in mind:
ED REGAN: What does the payment have to be to make it a good investment for the owner?
Ed Regan heads the program for Gainesville's utility. He says in most of the country, people who put up solar panels don't have the option of selling their power to the grid. And if they do, they typically get far less than the retail rate in return.
Gainesville's paying for this incentive program by increasing utility bills about $10 a year. It's all part of the city's plan to get 20 percent of its power from renewable energy in the next five years.
To see how the program's working, Regan only has to head out onto his office balcony.
REGAN: You see that flat shiny thing with the kind of square looking things. That's a 75 kw solar array right there. Right behind those trees there's a bunch on those buildings over there another 100 kw.
Regan's looking at enough solar panels to run about 35 homes. And as new ones come online this year that figure will jump to 800 homes. That's got the solar installation companies in town scrambling.
Wayne Irwin owns Pure Energy Solar. He and his crew are at a ranch house in Gainesville, installing a three kilowatt solar array. That system should provide about half the home's energy needs. Right now, Gainesville's solar incentive program has at least a five-year waiting list.
But Irwin says the program has sparked so much interest in solar, that some folks who don't want to wait in line are buying panels anyway, just to save on their electric bill.
WAYNE IRWIN: There's no question as to whether it will payback. With all the incentives available in Florida, it's possible to realize your return on investment in the first year and then everything after that's gravy.
Thanks to that gravy, Irwin expects his work load to quadruple this year. And he's already talking to Gary Rowell about installing a third set of panels. Rowell's motivation...
ROWELL: I got five grandkids, and I said you know what: I'm gonna do it for them if I do nothing else.
As it is, Rowell expects to earn $300,000 over the next 20 years. And he wants that money to be there when those grandkids head off to college.
In Gainesville, I'm Jennifer Collins for Marketplace.
Comments
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From Cape Canaveral, FL, FL, 08/19/2009
The FIT (feed In tarrif) is the largest driver for approving financing of solar projects. Companies like GRU that have stepped up and said that they will guarntee the purchase of all the production from a solar array, only helps the unawre risk averse financial community to approve loans. Since everyone understands that the sun will shine every day, and then that a power company is guaranteeing the purchase of that power at a fixed amount, loans can be approved more easily.
So great job to GRU and Gainesville,FL.
Lastly, an important note between large centralized power plants and distributed power generation. The GRU FIT promotes a much needed distributed power source, much like the many nodes of the web. It is this commentors opinion that a moajor focus should be placed on renovations of all those caty-wumpus power poles and lines so that when these distributed solar systems are installed (or other renewable resource) at existing points on the grid, that they power companies will be able to buy the power.
From Los Angeles, CA, 08/18/2009
Thanks to all those who listened and commented on this story. The $18,000 figure is based on the power produced by 30kW. Mr. Rowell has a 5 kW system on his home and a 25kW system on his business. The figure was Mr. Rowell's and was also cleared by Pure Energy Solar.
From Gainesville, FL, 08/16/2009
I've been promoting a solar Feed-in Tariff to our elected officials for over five years and are proud that the City of Gainesville and Gainesville Regional Utilities have passed this ordinance. It will make a solar PV system much more affordable. But one has to be cautious not to create unrealistic expectations. In Florida, the ROI still depends on getting $4/Watt in state rebate money and there are always more applications than there is funding. Furthermore, the above mentioned 25kW system will not generate $18,000 a year. Not even close, not even in the Sunshine State. So realistically, without the state rebate money it can take 10-12 years for a $200,000 system to be paid off.
From Seattle, WA, 08/14/2009
Washington State passed the first production incentive in 2006.
My clients earn 15 cents for every killowatt hour their systems produce.
(Our electrical rates ar between 4 and 8 cents a kWh). This is on top of netmetering which is when the meter spins backwards when the system is producing more than the building needs.
FYI a national law was passed in late 90's that says every power company has to give credit for power put into the grid. The fact that many power companies have failed to comply with the law is a story that needs to be covered.
Pam Burton
From Menlo Park, CA, 08/14/2009
The FIT Coalition is working to extend the success of Gainesville's Feed-In Tariff (FIT) policy around the country; starting with a comprehensive FIT program for the State of California. Get more information at www.fitcoalition.com. Thank you Gainesville for your tremendous leadership on unleashing the market for renewable energy in the United States!
From Portland, OR, 08/13/2009
Get rid of the sound bites (ALL or most of em') and you'd have a MUCH MUCH MUCH better program!!!!!!!!! 99% 0f 'em are just INANE!
From Newton, NJ, 08/13/2009
A great article, but another article could discuss solar hot water heaters and their higher cost-effectiveness when compared to unsubsidized PV arrays. After all, taking heat directly from the sun is much more efficient than converting heat to electricity, then back to heat again in the water heater.
From CA, 08/13/2009
Hello:
Just to clarify, Florida is not the only state in the country to offer solar incentives, as indiciated in the first paragraph. Other states (including California) offer solar incentives, but only offer credits. I know this was mentioned on air, but this is misleading on the website.
Thanks.
Thanks,
Matt
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