SunnySoCal
New Member
- Joined
- Jan 8, 2022
- Messages
- 49
If this is covered elsewhere, please advise. I did look...and did find several NEM 3.0 threads and read through most but posting here to "cut to the chase" for those on NEM 2.0 that are unaware of the consequence of what will happen to your bill when you transition. Those contemplating going solar on NEM 2.0 before the ST kicks in might take a long/hard look especially if you're looking at ROI.
I'm on NEM 2.0 having missed NEM 1.0 by about 2 months due mostly to college funding obligations at the time. Thus, I was one of the first NEM 2.0 installs. I know that all or most of the NEM 1.0 folks got "the letter" by now (but can stay on Tiered, or go back to, from my understanding) and I was disturbed to find "the letter" in October because my PTO was Oct 2017, and thus I thought I should have had one more year. Thinking it was a mistake I had many phone calls with my provider only to eventually find (own my own) that the tariff stipulates that the 5-year grandfathering on my TOU rate was either date of changeover to TOU or PTO, whichever came first. I'd gone TOU before PTO so at least I was able to get a solid "in-writing" answer.
That said, just warning those currently on favorable TOU rate (peak rate during afternoons) you might be shocked at what is about to happen. My carrier's estimate was that my yearly cost would (based on the previous year's usage) was going from <$200/yr to ~$1,200/yr... which is more than what my bill was before going solar!
In year's past I've had $50 - $200/year bill (including NBCs) while averaging producing ~75-80% of my total consumption. Now with the new peak rate in the late afternoon/evening even if you produce 100% of your total consumption you will still have a significant bill. I worked with a guy that some of you may have heard of but he's not in the role I first met him in back in 2017 (actually moved to another state) but he was a huge solar advocate and worked for the solar homeowners with presentations and papers sent into Ca Public Utilities Commision (CPUC) for many years. I will post the link below but here's from a paper he wrote in December 2019 arguing against the new TOU rates (note in his paper he bolded 40%, 44%, $10,000 and "slow solar adoption"):
III. Effects on Solar Homeowners of Change from NEM 1.0 to NEM 2.0 The addition of Nonbypassable Charges (NBCs) in NEM 2.0 did not greatly increase costs to solar homeowners. But what has hit solar homeowners very hard has been the several changes in Time of Use (TOU) rate schedules. We have alerted Energy Division to these effects, but we’ll restate them here. The change in the Peak rate period from noon - 8:00pm weekdays to 2:00pm to 8:00pm weekdays was somewhat costly for homeowners. But it was nothing compared to the now mandatory Peak rate switch to 4:00pm to 9:00pm. The switch from NEM 1.0 on TOU-D-A with January 1, 2017 Peak rates from 2:00pm - 8:00pm to NEM 2.0 on TOU-D-4-9 with current Peak rates from 4:00pm - 9:00pm requires the average SCE homeowner (whose bill without solar averages about $200 per month) to get a solar system about 40% larger to achieve the same optimal result - reducing the SCE bill as close as possible to zero. The full change from NEM 1.0 on TOU-D-A with Peak rates noon - 8:00pm all the way to the current NEM 2.0 on TOU-D-4-9 with Peak rates 4:00pm - 9:00pm requires a 44% larger system to minimize SCE bills. This percentage is probably close for the other IOUs as well. This fact does not appear to be generally known, including at the CPUC. One consequence of this drastic change is the cost of a solar system to a homeowner. An increase of 44% means that an adequate size system would cost about $10,000 more than an adequate size one would have cost before this change. Another consequence is that homeowners who purchased adequate size systems under the TOU-D-A noon-8:00pm or TOU-D-A 2:00pm-8:00pm peak rates will no longer have adequate size systems when they are forced onto the new TOUD-4-9 rates. Their electricity bills will skyrocket. They will be forced either to pay these higher rates or add more panels and inverter(s) to their system, but be subject to various constraints when they try to do so. Finally, this drastic blow to the economic advantages of acquiring residential solar is bound to slow solar adoption throughout California, in contradiction to the state’s legislated goals. Has any of this been taken into account when authorizing these changes in the TOU time periods? 4 Please remember that there are presently a bit over 1,000,000 homes in California that have solar, and that another 10,000,000 or so will be suitable for solar in the future. This must not be jeopardized on the altar of load balancing. Itron should focus specifically on these effects to solar homeowners, past and future, as well as state solar goals. A careful analysis is needed.
Of course, his advice was ignored. I'd exchanged e-mails with him a couple of months ago (when I was shocked with "the letter") and he basically has/had given up on California's "take" on solar.
So what can be done? If you want to keep your current yearly cost the same, you will need a combination of less consumption or more production (by about 40%). My understanding is that one can add 1 kW or 10% (anyone know if this is lesser of or either??) but at this point in time I probably won't do this...especially if the lesser of as I have a pretty small install as it is. I typically have "stored up" kWh "credits" going into the summer to be "spent" on window AC units. What I'm considering doing is manually shutting down (I went 5-8 pm vs 4-9 pm for this reason) my ACs from 5-8pm as one step. Even though I can readily afford the additional bill I'm still quite disappointed. However, as a retired EE I've long known everything in life is electropolitical.
I'm on NEM 2.0 having missed NEM 1.0 by about 2 months due mostly to college funding obligations at the time. Thus, I was one of the first NEM 2.0 installs. I know that all or most of the NEM 1.0 folks got "the letter" by now (but can stay on Tiered, or go back to, from my understanding) and I was disturbed to find "the letter" in October because my PTO was Oct 2017, and thus I thought I should have had one more year. Thinking it was a mistake I had many phone calls with my provider only to eventually find (own my own) that the tariff stipulates that the 5-year grandfathering on my TOU rate was either date of changeover to TOU or PTO, whichever came first. I'd gone TOU before PTO so at least I was able to get a solid "in-writing" answer.
That said, just warning those currently on favorable TOU rate (peak rate during afternoons) you might be shocked at what is about to happen. My carrier's estimate was that my yearly cost would (based on the previous year's usage) was going from <$200/yr to ~$1,200/yr... which is more than what my bill was before going solar!
In year's past I've had $50 - $200/year bill (including NBCs) while averaging producing ~75-80% of my total consumption. Now with the new peak rate in the late afternoon/evening even if you produce 100% of your total consumption you will still have a significant bill. I worked with a guy that some of you may have heard of but he's not in the role I first met him in back in 2017 (actually moved to another state) but he was a huge solar advocate and worked for the solar homeowners with presentations and papers sent into Ca Public Utilities Commision (CPUC) for many years. I will post the link below but here's from a paper he wrote in December 2019 arguing against the new TOU rates (note in his paper he bolded 40%, 44%, $10,000 and "slow solar adoption"):
III. Effects on Solar Homeowners of Change from NEM 1.0 to NEM 2.0 The addition of Nonbypassable Charges (NBCs) in NEM 2.0 did not greatly increase costs to solar homeowners. But what has hit solar homeowners very hard has been the several changes in Time of Use (TOU) rate schedules. We have alerted Energy Division to these effects, but we’ll restate them here. The change in the Peak rate period from noon - 8:00pm weekdays to 2:00pm to 8:00pm weekdays was somewhat costly for homeowners. But it was nothing compared to the now mandatory Peak rate switch to 4:00pm to 9:00pm. The switch from NEM 1.0 on TOU-D-A with January 1, 2017 Peak rates from 2:00pm - 8:00pm to NEM 2.0 on TOU-D-4-9 with current Peak rates from 4:00pm - 9:00pm requires the average SCE homeowner (whose bill without solar averages about $200 per month) to get a solar system about 40% larger to achieve the same optimal result - reducing the SCE bill as close as possible to zero. The full change from NEM 1.0 on TOU-D-A with Peak rates noon - 8:00pm all the way to the current NEM 2.0 on TOU-D-4-9 with Peak rates 4:00pm - 9:00pm requires a 44% larger system to minimize SCE bills. This percentage is probably close for the other IOUs as well. This fact does not appear to be generally known, including at the CPUC. One consequence of this drastic change is the cost of a solar system to a homeowner. An increase of 44% means that an adequate size system would cost about $10,000 more than an adequate size one would have cost before this change. Another consequence is that homeowners who purchased adequate size systems under the TOU-D-A noon-8:00pm or TOU-D-A 2:00pm-8:00pm peak rates will no longer have adequate size systems when they are forced onto the new TOUD-4-9 rates. Their electricity bills will skyrocket. They will be forced either to pay these higher rates or add more panels and inverter(s) to their system, but be subject to various constraints when they try to do so. Finally, this drastic blow to the economic advantages of acquiring residential solar is bound to slow solar adoption throughout California, in contradiction to the state’s legislated goals. Has any of this been taken into account when authorizing these changes in the TOU time periods? 4 Please remember that there are presently a bit over 1,000,000 homes in California that have solar, and that another 10,000,000 or so will be suitable for solar in the future. This must not be jeopardized on the altar of load balancing. Itron should focus specifically on these effects to solar homeowners, past and future, as well as state solar goals. A careful analysis is needed.
Of course, his advice was ignored. I'd exchanged e-mails with him a couple of months ago (when I was shocked with "the letter") and he basically has/had given up on California's "take" on solar.
So what can be done? If you want to keep your current yearly cost the same, you will need a combination of less consumption or more production (by about 40%). My understanding is that one can add 1 kW or 10% (anyone know if this is lesser of or either??) but at this point in time I probably won't do this...especially if the lesser of as I have a pretty small install as it is. I typically have "stored up" kWh "credits" going into the summer to be "spent" on window AC units. What I'm considering doing is manually shutting down (I went 5-8 pm vs 4-9 pm for this reason) my ACs from 5-8pm as one step. Even though I can readily afford the additional bill I'm still quite disappointed. However, as a retired EE I've long known everything in life is electropolitical.
