Originally Posted by Duffman

Most likely. Most utility companies ensure that you can only get a building permit for 70-100% of your average need. So in the summer people tend to sell a lot of power back to the grid and in the winter they need to tap in. Usually the utility company gives you credit for the excess power you produce in the summer and applies it to your winter deficit, so it evens out. The way to game the system is unnecessarily run up your electric bill for a year, then as soon as you have solar, install LEDs and throttle back your usage and turn a profit. Obviously, that's precisely what utility companies are trying to avoid, but without their restrictions, odds are there's enough surface area on your roof to meet your demand, even in the winter.

The other important thing to note is that when you install solar, you're not using the power, you're backfeeding the entire grid. That's why solar has a sort of 'dead-man switch' so that when the power goes out, your solar automatically stops producing power so it doesn't zap the techs who're working on the lines downstream of your house who think the power is off.

My uncle is installing solar on his roof, by himself, and he showed me his system. It's actually really simple. It's just a steel bracket bolted to the roof, then the solar panels are attached to it, a plug-and-play microinverter is plugged into each panel, they're daisy chained together, and a wire is run to a dedicated circuit breaker in the main panel. That's it. He had a $600/mo electric bill and for $7k in material he now has 100% of his need, although I'm not sure if that cost included subsidies. Granted, he did it himself and he lives in CA where they have very solar-friendly laws and year round sun, but still.

I'm not an expert in high voltage power transmission, but everyone with solar is already back-feeding the grid at least past the transformer on the power pole, so if everyone were feeding the grid, maybe it'd be possible for the West Coast to power the East Coast after dark, or the North to power the South in the summer, and vice versa in the winter, so that there'd really only be a few hours in the middle of the night when we had to rely on non-solar power. I suspect the reason utility companies have fought solar tooth and nail is because they see it as a replacement, but if the grid could mitigate solar's biggest issue, which is reliability, then it could be mutually beneficial. But that's just a theory and I'm interested to hear if anyone knows of any show-stoppers for that.

I think what everyone is really pulling for though would be an energy storage method that's more effective than lithium ion batteries. That really could make the grid and utility companies obsolete. It'd also mean that there would be nothing wrong, from a global resource perspective, with low-density housing and longer commutes in personal transportation, which is the American way of life. You also, theoretically, could set your thermostat to whatever you want, leave the lights on, or if you have an electric car, drive around town as much as you want, without really spending any resources except wear-and-tear. I just think it's funny that socialists have grabbed onto solar to push their agenda, when in reality, it could mean way more freedom and guilt-free energy usage.