{"id":29458,"date":"2015-09-02T00:21:16","date_gmt":"2015-09-01T22:21:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.w-t-w.org\/en\/?p=29458"},"modified":"2015-09-02T21:10:23","modified_gmt":"2015-09-02T19:10:23","slug":"29458","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.w-t-w.org\/en\/29458\/","title":{"rendered":"Solar Power Up in Hawaii. Pricing Bias?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brittany Lyle writes: \u00a0Hawaii\u2019s electricity prices are higher than anywhere else in the nation. The burdensome cost of power, paired with the island state\u2019s plentiful sunshine, has led to an unparalleled adoption of residential rooftop solar energy. On the island of Oahu, where 80 percent of the state\u2019s population lives, more than 12 percent of Hawaiian Electric Co. (HECO) customers have rooftop solar systems \u2014 about 20 times the solar penetration rate of any mainland utility. As homes increasingly morph into mini power plants, some residents are winding down their HECO bills to net zero.<\/p>\n

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The problem is this: When solar customers provide their own power, they don\u2019t pay for the fixed costs the utility has outside of electricity generation. As more and more people switch to solar, an ever-shrinking pool of utility customers still connected to the grid are left to cover these operating and maintenance expenses. This causes bills to spike for traditional customers, which incentivizes even more people to switch to solar, raising bills for nonsolar customers even more. Every new rooftop solar installation added to the grid contributes to this cost shift.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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<\/i>\u2018It could be that all of the people living in apartments are going to be subsidizing the millionaires with their huge estates covered in rooftop solar. I don\u2019t think we\u2019re quite at that point yet, but we need to change or that\u2019s where we\u2019re headed.\u2019<\/div>\n
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Oahu\u2019s solar energy boom is unleashing what\u2019s known in the industry as the utility death spiral. The prediction is that it will overwhelmingly hurt the most vulnerable people \u2014 namely those without control over their roof space, such as renters and apartment and condominium owners, as well as low- and moderate-income homeowners who can\u2019t afford the high up-front cost of a rooftop solar installation.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\u201cIt could be that all of the people living in apartments are going to be subsidizing the millionaires with their huge estates covered in rooftop solar,\u201d said Michael Roberts, an economics professor who studies electricity pricing at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re quite at that point yet, but we need to change or that\u2019s where we\u2019re headed.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2014, HECO\u2019s nonsolar customers picked up the tab for an extra $53 million in operating and maintenance costs because so many people switched to solar. It is estimated that they will pay an additional $80 million in 2015.<\/p>\n

As the island grapples with the task of making a biased energy pricing system more equitable, mainland utilities with large and growing solar energy bases in states like California, Arizona, New Jersey and Colorado are looking at Oahu and watching their future unfold.<\/p>\n

In the basement of the faded 1934 cottage where he was raised, Kong thumbed through a filing cabinet in search of his utility bill records. Vintage Hawaiian slack key guitar music buzzed on an old radio. A small electric fan circulated warm air in the room.<\/p>\n

A retired Pearl Harbor security guard, Kong inherited his childhood home. But he lives next door in a newer, five-bedroom house that he shares with his wife, two daughters, son-in-law, grandson and the occasional foreign exchange student. The house stands on a corner lot in Honolulu\u2019s Kaimuki section, once an ostrich farm owned by the Kingdom of Hawaii\u2019s royal doctor. Bordering the iconic Diamond Head volcano, it is one of the city\u2019s oldest neighborhoods.<\/p>\n

He pulled from his files his HECO bill from February. In time with the music, he tapped a finger next to the figure for the total due: $336. That\u2019s a 53 percent increase from his bill for the same month two years earlier.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think about shutting the power down, putting the two refrigerators on a generator and using flashlight and candles,\u201d Kong said. \u201cIf it wasn\u2019t for the refrigerators, I\u2019d shut the power off now when we go to sleep.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Brittany Lyle writes: \u00a0Hawaii\u2019s electricity prices are higher than anywhere else in the nation. The burdensome cost of power, paired with the island state\u2019s plentiful sunshine, has led to an unparalleled adoption of residential rooftop solar energy. On the island … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-finance"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t