Net Metering

[Wilco Vercoelen]

Ontario, Canada offers the Net Metering program. With this program you can off-set your hydro bill by means of Solar, Wind or other types of Renewable Energy sources. For more information visit http://www.energy.gov.on.ca/index.cfm?fuseaction=renewable.netmetering

[Mark Parsons]

Greetings Wilco,

I am located in Chatham-Kent, SW Ontario. The local utility - C-K Energy - is installing smart electrical meters in every home by end of 2007. My understanding is that our electricity will be charged based on time of day use following the installation. Of course, the highest time of day energy charges are daytime consumption. This means a big penalty will apply to all who turn the air conditioner on before 7pm at night. With summer temperatures and humidity quite uncomfortable in this area, it will be very stifling to leave the air conditioner off until 7pm. If this is so, then net metering with solar PV sounds like a very wise investment to offset those very expensive mid-day high cost times. Might bring Solar PV payback time way down.

Can you shed any light on the smart meter program? Am I wrong in my information about time of day charges?

Thanks
Mark

[Wilco Vercoelen]

http://www.oec.ca/html/funding/net_meter/index.cfm

This is good, but even better news.

[Rob Beckers]

So do I understand that correctly; Saskatchewan will pay 25% of the cost of equipment and installation for solar and PV when used for net-metering?! That's pretty incredible!

-RoB-

[Wilco Vercoelen]

Hi Rob,

That's exactly how I read it. That's pretty amazing and very good step in the right direction. The question is, would you rather have the SOP or this program? The choice is obvious to me.

[Rob Beckers]

Let's do the back-of-the-envelope calculation:

Say an average 3 kW array, that'll run roughly CAD$30,000 installed and inspected, for net-metering. This will produce about 9.4 kWh/day, or 3,400 kWh/yr (4.17 hours insolation, 75% overall efficiency) for southern Ontario.

So for net-metering that'll offset about $476 per year ($0.14/kWh), and we get $7,500 back (25%) off the bat. Making for a total time to earn back the investment of 47 years. Of course, when the price of electricity goes up the payback time will come down.

For the SOC we have an installed cost that's at least $2,000 more, or CAD$32,000 thanks to all the hurdles put up by the local electricity companies. We get back $1,428 per year ($0.42/kWh), though that's taxable, say at a 30% rate, making for a net return of just about $1,000. Now the total time to earn back the investment is down to 32 years.

Neither one is all that great....:(

-RoB-