Is Solar Worth It? The Not So Conclusive 2 Year Report

So, I’m about 2 years in with my solar panels and the burning question is: Was it worth it?

The answer: It depends on how you look at it.

I sent the raw data to my friend, Pesy Hollander, who did the analysis for me.

FINANCIAL
From a pure FINANCIAL perspective, it seems like I am slightly behind (by about $100). Pesy had discovered a $210 delta, but I did get a check from Solar City last year to make up for underperformance (and, for all I know, I’ll get one this year, so perhaps I should wait, but well, I’m here now).

Also, a part of that is because the panels had a small technical issue upfront and it could be a function of the number of sunny days and/or an increase in consumption.

ENVIRONMENTAL
From a GREEN perspective, I am ahead. Way ahead. It’s a great feeling on a sunny day to know that I am doing a small, bit part for the environment. I am willing to pay $25 a year for that feeling. Plus, the offset of mature trees in CO2 helps.

TECHNOLOGY
From a TECHNOLOGY perspective, I am also ahead. I like having them on the roof, seeing the inverter, monitoring the output via the wi-fi/mobile apps and marveling at how it all comes together. I’ll also paid $25/year for that experience (heck, I do that all the time).

I’m ok with this, for now. I suspect I’m willing to pay the $25/year “green” tax well into the future (if I have to.). Think about it…Prius owners do it anyway, right?

As for the tech tax, I would hope that goes away.

I invested with the Long Game in mind, so I’m fine where we are.

If you are interested, you should use my referral code (and get a saving yourself). That would help my costs as well

Let me know via the comments if you have any quetsions.

Holy Solar Panels, Batman…

Now that the summer is in full swing, it’s just fun to see this… 26 kWh of energy created in one nice sunny day. Forget the money…it just makes me feel good.

Ok, back to money…If you are interested, here's the link to get an estimate for your own solar panels.
(full disclosure...if you do sign up via this link, we both get some $).

I’ll keep you posted on the economics of this for me.

Recycling, the Smell, and our Future…

It was difficult for me to walk around the Montgomery County Recycling facility and not feel a bit guilty.

I was there as a chaperone on Tikkanen’s 1st grade class trip and while the science, process, and automation weren’t fascinating, I was a bit dismayed by just how much STUFF this one facility on this one day in this one place during this 10 minute tour was processing.

It was mammoth.

I certainly wouldn’t be considered to be a person on the forefront of the Green movement, but my awareness, starting with An Inconvenient Truth, has certainly been raised recently.

I compost (or try to), am investigating solar for my roof. I’m pretty good and diligent about paper/plastic recycling.

Still, I saw all of this…all the one use drink bottles and felt pangs.

Pangs for the world that our kids could inherit.

Pangs for the disregard/lack of knowledge we’ve had in the past for the environment.

As I saw somewhere once, “we’re on a spaceship with finite resources on an infinite voyage…we can’t afford to waste things.”

I just wonder if more people would have the same reaction going through there as I did.

One thing you notice is the smell…and this isn’t garbage, it’s recycling.

I saw the people who work there…4 days per week, 10 hours a day, moving our cast away stuff to help our future planet.

They had my gratitude.

Definitely a worthwhile visit and a perspective changer.

Here’s a video of the process.

Related articles

• Full cycle recycling (nationalaquarium.wordpress.com)
• Five Things You Can't Recycle Locally (brighthub.com)
• Better for environment: wine cork or screw-cap? (sfgate.com)

Seismic Shifts: Prosecution and Gas

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Two really seismic events happened within days of each other while we were in Israel.

The first was that the former President, Moshe Katzav, was convicted of rape.

The second was that a HUGE natural gas field (known as ‘Leviathan’) was discovered off Israel’s northern coast.

While no one is in favor of rape, of course, I detected a small sense of national pride among Israelis that they were sending a message to the world: No one is above the law and we’re not afraid of prosecuting the elite and the higher ups.

This bodes well for Israeli democracy and national pride.

In how many other countries, they asked, would people do the same?

And the news of the Leviathan find sent another message, albeit a more subtle one.

It said, I think, that the dynamics of international politics will change significantly if, indeed, Israel is able to become a net energy exporter.

Two events which will have long lasting impact on the evolution of the state.

Drill, Baby, Drill..

Image by NewsHour via FlickrThe refrain from St. Paul/ RNC convention has been haunting me recently. 

It's not that I think we shouldn't drill in Alaska. We probably should.  It's what the chant symbolizes.

And it's not a callous disregard for the environment.

It's the propensity for people to prefer short-term quick fixes to long-term strategic solutions.

Yes, if we drill, oil/gas prices will probably fall...which, honestly, is NOT what we want. At higher prices, entrepreneurs see the incentive to pursue alternative energy.

That's what we need.

When I hear "drill, baby, drill," I hear people who say 'let's just solve this problem for today...not for tomorrow."

That's not what we  need.

Got a forward from Josh with a Tom Friedman article that does a really good job of explaining it.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Ari Melber: Obama Mocks "Drill Baby, Drill," Reads Friedman
• Friedman nails McCain on alternative energy hypocrisy
• The Mixed Blessings of $100 Oil
• Tom Friedman on America's Addict-In-Chief

End Oil Dependence in 10 words

Ok, not quite, but the Minifesto community efforts at BetterPlace - Ten Words is worth investigating.

Better Place is a noble  effort to make electric cars. They are using Israel and Denmark as proving grounds.

It's fascinating and possible. Check it out. This is going to be big, IMHO.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Gas: Where are you cutting back?

Saw a report the other night saying that "gas prices are rapidly becoming the #1 issue in the election."

Perhaps that is true, but the conversation turned to how/where people are making sacrifices/choices due to higher gas prices.

Here are some of mine.

1. Our kids go to school a few blocks away. We do our best to walk whenever possible.
2. Definitely doing a better job of consolidating multiple stops into one trip
3. I've downgraded my coffee from mid-range to basic (hey, it's caffeine that's all I need.)
4. Eating red meat less often (down to 1x per week used to be 2)
   

Now, granted some of this may be due to the entrepreneurial effort we are undertaking and not entirely due to gas, but I can definitely say that gas has the most "mindshare" when it comes to inflationary costs.

How about you?

Nascar Backlash?

Will there ever be a eco-movement uprising against Nascar?

After watching Inconvenient Truth, my sensitivities are heightened. Talk about a sport that, at its core, is about raw consumption of non-renewable resources. 

Honestly, made me a bit sick.

Inconvenient Truth and the Dem-GOP bridge...

I'm definitely feeling the powerful reverberations after watching Al Gore in An Inconvenient Truth.

It came at a confluence of a few other items that heightened my awareness of the challenges around global warming.

In Scientific-American, I read Why Grassroots Initiatives Can't Fix Climate Change, which profoundly impacted me, particularly as a father:

Or think about it this way. Imagine you are living in the year 2108, and you are keenly aware that the political dislocations all around you were preventable catastrophes. Decades of turmoil caused by vast migrations of people who could not find enough food or clean drinking water; the crop-destroying volatility in the weather; the drying up of capital as investors withdraw whatever they can from unruly markets; the scourges of insects and disease set loose by the poleward advancement of the tropics—all of these are the legacy of your forebears who should have known better.

Wouldn’t you look back and shake your head at the feeble attempts at mitigation by the present age, the endless dithering over the reality of climate change, the head-in-the-sand policies that assumed addressing the problem could be put off for another day and that the future would be clever enough and rich enough to take care of itself?

Combine that with the powerful 20 minute (but well worth it) video of The Story of Stuff, showing how our consumption is digging us a hole from which we can't escape.

Put it all together and you are looking at a scenario where Surging Food Prices Mean Global Instability and where countries may have to engage in a Blood for Oil? or for food? foreign policy.

Not wanting this type of future for my kids, as Gianni sits here next to me, I am reflecting on the conversations I've recently had with some of my more liberal friends, challenging the Republicans for their lack of concern for environment/global warming. Fair, I might add.

What I realized is that there are different perceptions on the left and right about which pending disaster will get to us first.

The left thinks global warming.

The right thinks radical Islam.

Granted, the first destroys the earth and the second "only" Western Civilization, but I think we can agree that there are some good things to Western Civilization.

I wonder, then, if the opportunities for common ground, namely eliminating our dependence on (foreign and fossil) fuels in favor of cheaper, renewable energy are so great that the other differences can be put aside.

I'm not the first to realize this, of course, and you should take a look at Gal Luft's work at IAGS to see some areas of overlap, but is there enough folks who (for the most part) agree on these as core issues and don't care as much about secondary issues to create a true movement?

In some respect, as Jeff commented on the oil post previously (the most commented on post in Jer979 Blog history, btw), the best thing we can have right now to save the planet is $4/gallon (and rising) gas prices, since market forces will compel us to find other ways, but the "moral imperative" as Gore describes is there as well (full disclosure: I endorsed Gore in '88 when he ran for President; ok, I was a teenager, but still)

I know the steps/awareness is happening. Met with the folks at Discovery Channel the other day and they now have 100% recycled biz cards (they do feel a bit flimsy), but they are making a statement in another way. And it's consistent with their Planet Green efforts.

The question is: how much time do we have?

Blood for Oil?

How about blood for copper? Or Zinc? Or Cobalt?

Just finished an absolutely fascinating series of articles about "ChinAfrica" in Fast Company. I HIGHLY recommend that you read them (and once you do, you'll get the irony of this suggestion: Print them out to read them, since they are quite long.)

Anyhow, the author details vividly how there is a mad rush going on in Africa (which China is winning) for natural resources that lie at the epicenter of modern wealth creation.

We're all complicit in it...US as end consumers, China as extractor, and corrupt African dictators as well. Combine that with a Chinese willingness to look the other way re: human rights in Africa and bribery and the US gov't (and consumer!) willingness to ignore Chinese policy...and we have the makings of a resource war.

In his book, China: The Gathering Threat, Constantine Menges argues that the Chinese outlook (political and military) along with the need for resources puts the USA on a collision course with the mainland.

Reading these articles, you've got to wonder if he is right.

While a full on war may not be the end result, what could be are:

• less democracy and human rights in Africa
• continued kleptocracy and poverty
• Chinese crackdown on internal protests to which the world turns a blind eye
• and the total devastation of the majority of the earth's natural resources (in Africa).

The NFO asked me the other day about rising food prices. "Will it get better?"

"Not in the short term. It's going to get worse before it gets better. Oil is at the center and rising living standards around the world contribute as well. Time to find other, cheaper sources of nutrition."

You know my investment policy is weighted (and has been for 2.5 years now) towards oil going to $200/barrel. And that I have some strong views on this topic (economically and politically).

Time to add another one.

Anxiety Morning...

So mornings you wake up and you're calm.

Some you are not.

It started off because I was freakin' exhausted.

I've got a nagging cough that I can't kick and which kept me up all night.

Then, the car dealer calls.

I dropped off the car on Wed. (had my cabbie pick me up at the dealer) for an oil change. Idea was to have them do the work and I'd pick it up Friday morning.

Well, apparently, the guy called my office number (which I never check) and not my cell (I was in Fargo, ND remember?).

So, I didn't find out until today that my $20 oil change had become a $750 set of repairs including a tire with nail in it, lightbulbs that were burned out, and some belt that wasn't working.

Now, I love Fitzgerald, the dealer, so I have no reason to assume they are being dishonest (though I was irritated that the guy didn't call my cell number-which he had).

And, of course, it's cold and oil has hit $100/barrel. You know how I feel about that.

All of this led to a greater than usual money anxiety AM for me.

Ugh.

Economic Outlook...

In light of the 3-way discussion about oil, my curiosity was piqued by Fred Wilson's post on "the story of 2007."

He offers that the fact that so many US businesses are being "bailed out" with foreign money is a cause for concern.

That may be true. On the other hand, it could be a sign of confidence.

But, there's another issue here (and I'll invite Laura who works for Bureau of Labor and Statistics to weigh in)...

In an economy the size of the US, is it really possible to know what is happening?

I know everyone talks about sub-prime and weakening dollar and imports/exports/visa/immigration, etc., but it just seems a $5bn investment in Morgan Stanley (while not inconsequential, of course) is really just a drop in a HUGE bucket.

On my Amazon Wish list (5 shopping days left!) are two books called Fooled by Randomness and The Black Swan. I haven't read them yet, but the recommendation that Asher and Albert sent me seemed to imply that people, in order to make sense of the world, often misinterpret singular events for larger trends.

Now, I'm not saying that there isn't a larger trend. I'm just saying, this economy is GINORMOUS and it's going to be difficult for anyone to really make sense of it.

Movie: Crude Awakening

In short, we're screwed.

Royally. Big time.

How would you feel if you knew that your children or grandchildren would never fly in an airplane? Or drive a car?

Make no mistake about it, this movie about the end of the era of cheap oil is extremely DEPRESSING, but, worse yet... what if it's reality?

What happens if, sorry when, the world does run out of cheap oil?

For a few years, I've been focused on the issue of weaning the US off of Middle Eastern oil as a key driver of national security. That's well and good, but the next question is, "ok, what do we replace it with?"

Ever since I read the Coming Economic Collapse (and my allnighter in March 2006), I've altered my investment strategy to reflect rising oil prices and it's paid off, to some extent.

But this movie raises a much larger question than a financial hedge strategy...it raises the question of...can society even survive in the wake of an ongoing decline in the availability of oil?

There are a huge number of issues, including:

• the lack of viable replacements on a large scale sufficient to meet current (and future) demand
• the lack of political will (all across the board) to focus on the enormity of the problem

There's blame all the way around, but I do remember on Sept. 12, 2001 when Bush got up and made his post-9/11 "axis of Evil" speech and challenged the US to end our oil dependence that I thought, "here's an opportunity to raise taxes on gas, etc. to fund a Kennedy-like 'man on the moon' initiative."

And we've seen nothing.

Nothing at all.

Gas is now cheaper than water, cheaper than Starbucks. The US has 2% of known reserves and consumes 25% of oil. As the Poli Sci Prof from Stanford said in the documentary,

"We have 2 choices as a society. Either we can figure out a way to create renewable energy sources that allow us to grow and live the way we want...OR we need to be prepared to go to war over oil...often."

Ironically enough, I watched this DVD on a flight to St. Louis, gazing out at miles and miles of blue skies, seeing the roads below me and reflecting upon life in a hydro-carbon/petroleum based economy. I began to worry about Tonka, Paco, and #3 (as well as all of us as we age) and wondering what the world will look like.

One commentator (the founder of dismally-named www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net) said,

"this is the end of the American Dream."

We can always hold out hope for the ingenuity of humans and new technology, but we need to recognize the enormity of the challenge that lies ahead and galvanize around it.

I used to tell people that I vote on 2 issues

1. recognition that Islamo-fascism is an existential threat to Western civilization (energy independence was a key element here)
2. the fact that the private sector does a better job than the public sector of creating jobs and wealth.

Beginning today, I vote on one issue...energy policy.

For more info, you can check out Gal Luft's org, Institute for Analysis of Global Security and Mike Granoff's effort at Secure Energy.

Backup Generator...

As if this month weren't expensive enough :-) (see minivan entries), I decided that we "needed" a backup generator for the house.

It was delivered today. Installation is next week.

The good thing is that the "nameless one" actually wanted it more than I did.

As if you need proof that people can justify anything to themselves, here's mine:

• Our neighbors will verify that our area is disproportionately prone to electrical outages
• I work from home a lot, so if I'm out of power, my ability to generate revenue is affected
• When you lose power, you run the risk of having to throw out spoiled food from your fridge/freezer
• While you can leave w/o AC (uncomfortable though it may be), it's hard to live w/o heat and having to pack up 3 kids and drive through (most likely) snow to my parents, for example, is more than hassle and inconvenient [we did this last year w/2 and it wasn't easy]
• General inconvenience and disruption that it causes
• We do live in DC and thus a 9/11 type scenario is not out of the question (I am definitely not joking on this one)

That being said, you could still do a ROI/Payback analysis and easily determine that it wasn't worth the price I will be paying.

So, here's the ironic thing...

For me to "feel good" about my purchase, I need the power to go out. Otherwise, I feel like an idiot.

Irony? Schadenfreude?

I will let you know how it goes.

Oh, by the way, I'll get referral credit if I send you to "my generator guys," so once/if I'm satisfied, go through me!

Alternative Energy...

About a year ago, I blogged on the coming wave of Cleantech opportunities as I saw it. Combined with the national security interest, it's critical.

A big shout out to my friend, Mike Granoff who is DOING something about it. And in the biggest nut of them all...automobiles. Good work, Mike!