This has been an anxious year, with prices climbing, the stock market jumping, and bad news out of every corner of the globe. In times of uncertainty, I believe solar is one of those rare investments that pays off in all possible futures. Let’s explore that: if we assume a reputable company for install, is solar really flexible enough of an investment for these uncertain times?
What if I Sell?
If you aren’t committed to living in your home long-term, I have good news. The most comprehensive study on the subject found that, on average, buyers pay a premium for solar that recoups most of the cost of install. The two chief drivers of that premium are the costs of installation and electricity, and those rates continue to climb, so the premium remains intact even today. This means someone installing today could break even on their solar investment by selling their home after just a few years of savings. Even financed panels pay for themselves this way — unlike a lease or PPA. In markets where solar is uncommon, appraisers might undercount a system because they can’t find enough comparable sales nearby, but the Appraisal Institute continues to train on this material and may help homeowners document their value properly.
What if I Stay?
So if you stay in your home with solar, what other futures are we looking at? To answer that, think about what you’re actually betting on when you don’t go solar. You’re betting that utility pricing stays predictable and affordable, that the grid stays reliable, and that fuel and electricity costs won’t outpace inflation. Every one of those bets has been wrong somewhere in the country in the last few years, and locally we’ve been losing all three.
Where Are We Now?
That bet on grid reliability is critical. More heat waves, cold snaps, and data centers mean more stress piled on a grid that is decades old and fraying at the edges. Utilities are investing in smart grid options to shed peak loads or shift them to better times of day. Puget Sound Energy’s Flex program is an example of this, treating thousands of customers’ home batteries, smart thermostats, and possibly EV chargers as one coordinated resource — a “virtual power plant.” Flex incentives to customers come from the savings of not having to build an actual power plant, so it could actually be win-win. These benefits aren’t available yet at Clallam or Jefferson PUD, but with microgrid projects on the books already, there’s hope for the future.
Where are We Headed?
In the interests of exploring all possible futures, let’s consider two extremes: one where everything goes wrong, and another where everything goes right. If there’s a grid collapse, solar will certainly be a resource worth having. Even a 2-week outage will go far easier if your neighbors can charge their phones at your house. At the other extreme, utilities and customers turn the grid into a fully decentralized, peer-to-peer network. Customers generate and trade power among themselves while utilities maintain infrastructure. In that world, having solar already makes you a major player in that market before it fully arrives.
But Seriously
As much as I’m a fan of science fiction, neither of these extremes is likely. With so much effort to save the grid, it’s unlikely to totally collapse. With so much investment in the current model it’s unlikely to fully decentralize. That means the most likely scenario for the next twenty years is that they will look like the last twenty…only with higher electric bills. All of this is why I believe the future — any future — is better with solar. The near future. The far future. From apocalypse to utopia, from economic collapse to burgeoning marketplace, solar is one of the best ways to brighten your future. If you think I missed a scenario, please let me know in the comments. If you agree that solar makes the future bright and you don’t have it yet, give us a call.
(Matthew Barrett is the Solar Navigator at Power Trip Energy Corp, based in Port Townsend, WA. Power Trip Energy serves Clallam, Jefferson and Kitsap counties and the surrounding region.)