The space to discuss Solarpunk itself and Solarpunk related stuff that doesn't fit elsewhere.
Join our chat: Movim or XMPP client.
It's great that people are trying, but it's also stupid to go to this level of workaround to get solar form 1/2 the day, when the roof is right there.
Tenants should have the right to install rooftop solar if a majority of the tenants agree and it should be securable against future energy savings.
They are not trying to power their home, but cut down on their utility bill over time, so it isn't stupid. That being said that a communal set of panels going to a central battery that you can pull off of and pay for excess power needed or a tenant sub wired array would be good, but their rental agreements would have to be changed by so much that it would literally take laws to make it work. Through their point of view is they are renting you the space and service some but not all, and sometimes none, of the features in the space. You literally own the flooring and the furniture and when you leave you take it with you or you sell it to the new tenant. So it is seen as roofing and walls/windows belong to the landlord and the rental agreements don't have rights to it and if they gave you rights to it you would have to rent the roof and return it to its prior state when you moved.
What's stupid is that it isn't easier for tenants to get full solar on the buildings they live in.
their rental agreements would have to be changed by so much that it would literally take laws to make it work.
Yes, if we are serious about climate change and inequality laws need to change, there are a lot of major cities that are majority rentals.
What’s even worse is not cleaning up the public grid by installing municipal or grid level solar and storage everywhere. We shouldn’t all have to spend thousands individually to 10s of thousands to get clean cheap energy individually.
The extremely low barrier to entry makes this not stupid. It's what gets it done. While this sounds less efficient, and I'm terms of power generated per panel it is, it is actually more efficient in money terms. You do not need professionals to install it in places that legally requires scaffolding to be rigged up first. For "real" a solar install, the price of the panels is actually a relatively minor point, as the majority of the price is made up of all the other requirements and labor costs.
This leads to the fact that this has the shortest return of investment time of basically all options and basically no administrative overhead either as it's exempt from all that. For reference, the RoI for this is usually a year or two. A full solar roof install is 8+ years. This isn't exactly close. It's also extremely fast, and lowers electricity costs immediately.
But it can't meet all your power needs, we need both.
No we don't need both for everyone. Those that can and want to do full rooftop overproduce significantly for their own needs. Even with significant battery capacity, they can easily supply quite a few neighbors.
The balcony solar still significantly reduces your power demand from the grid. But you're still connected to the grid. There's also winter where solar does basically nothing. It's not every individuals responsibility to be completely self sufficient (even though it would be nice). It's much more efficient to have centralized per generation of any type (water, solar, wind, possibly buffers like battery). That's what we have the grid for. We just need the coal plants to be turned off and replaced with sensible alternatives.
Private solar is nice, and any power you didn't need to transport is also nice. But having reliable and renewable grid is non-negotiable.