Up until now, net metering has been a sort of mythical to me. I understand how it works – you put up solar panels or wind generators and the utility company rebates you for the power you make – to an extent. You can’t be paid for any extra power you generate. I get that, but I’d never actually seen what it looks like.
Then I checked my mail today and found a letter [PDF] from JB Neilands, a retired UC Berkeley biochemist and past writer for the Guardian who broke the original story about the Raker Act scandal. Six years ago Neilands put solar panels on his Berkeley home, and now PG&E sends him a summary of all the excess power he’s generating for them – that they don’t pay him for. He could have made $122.86 off his panels last year. That’s not a lot, but it certainly would have helped pay back some of the cost of purchasing the panels. Plus it gives you a good feeling about what you’re doing, and that can go a long way.
Instead, how crummy it must feel to get a letter from PG&E detailing the money the AREN’T reimbursing you. As Neilands points out in another letter [PDF]to Assemblymember Lloyd Levine, ten states surveyed by Home Power magazine (gotta be a member to read) found that California is the only one that doesn’t pay people for the extra power they generate.
This is ridiculous. California legislators need to rise above the lobbying of overly powerful utility companies and change this law. This is a disincentive to put up more panels than you need. Energy misers with huge roofs could be selling renewable power into the grid for the rest of us to use, but they’re not going to buy more panels than they need unless the cost can be recouped.
Assemblymember Jared Huffman has introduced legislation to fix this, but it appears PG&E has already gotten to him.