# What's the current state of solar?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-state-of-solar/729110>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [August 27, 2015, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-state-of-solar/729110 "2015-08-27T22:06:56Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\
**Post date:** [September 4, 2015, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-state-of-solar/729110/21 "2015-09-04T02:46:19Z")

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> [@usedtobe](#):
>
> If they try to change their price structure to make the ‘delivery fee’ applicable to all customers, the PUC (regulatory) will have their asses.

Nah.

In almost every US state, the public utility commission is much more controlled by the utilities than the public.

The people appointed are generally ex-employees or retirees of one of the regulated utility companies, or from some think tank or public policy institute (usually ones funded by utility committees), or lawyers (from law firms with utilities as clients). Occasionally a Governor appoints someone who actually represents consumers & the environment; then the PUC votes have one dissenting vote instead of unanimously rubber-stamping the utility requests.

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**Author:** ![Silophant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a698b9/32.png) [@Silophant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silophant)\
**Post date:** [September 4, 2015, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-state-of-solar/729110/22 "2015-09-04T06:21:41Z")

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> [@usedtobe](#):
>
> If you don’t tell them, how would the supplier know you had a solar array and a battery/inverter?
> 
> If you don’t tell then you want to sell them electricity, how would they determine you had an array and add the connect charge?

When your meter starts running backwards, they’ll know.

Additionally, it’s a safety hazard to have a generation source on the grid that the utility doesn’t know about. The distribution grid was built before distributed generation was at all common, so it was and is assumed that anything downstream of an open switch is safely dead. If there’s a solar array that the utility doesn’t know about, a line could unexpectedly stay energized and electrocute a lineman.

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**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\
**Post date:** [September 4, 2015, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-state-of-solar/729110/23 "2015-09-04T14:35:36Z")

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> [@Silophant](#):
>
> Additionally, it’s a safety hazard to have a generation source on the grid that the utility doesn’t know about. The distribution grid was built before distributed generation was at all common, so it was and is assumed that anything downstream of an open switch is safely dead. If there’s a solar array that the utility doesn’t know about, a line could unexpectedly stay energized and electrocute a lineman.

This has been a problem since long before the advent of distributed solar. Every time there’s a major storm, some jackass gets the bright idea to plug a generator into their house with a suicide cord to the dryer plug, thereby backfeeding power to the whole neighborhood. That’s why the NEC requires that generators and solar panels, etc. have interlocking transfer switches that make it impossible to feed power to the grid when the grid is broken.

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