This pro-solar decision will cause California to suffer the same fate as Germany and Denmark. Since California’s solar-energy build-out began in 2011, energy prices have risen 24 percent. Abigail Ross Hopper, the Solar Energy Industries Association’s CEO believes this a positive, momentous decision by California when he stated:
“California has long been our nation’s biggest solar champion. Now, California is taking bold leadership again, recognizing that solar should be as commonplace as the front door that welcomes you home.”
Many proponents of RE – particularly solar advocates – consistently speak about falling solar panel prices and lower energy when using solar: here, here and here as examples. That isn’t the case. Michael Shellenberger, Forbes contributor and President of Environmental Progress gives a hypothesis that says, “as electricity from solar and wind became cheaper, other energy sources like coal, nuclear and natural gas became more expensive.” Thus prices were raised eliminating overall energy savings.
The exact opposite happened. Natural gas declined 72 percent between 2009-2016 due to fracking and European natural gas prices dropped by almost half during the same period. The price of coal and nuclear stayed flat during these time frames, “despite increased demand for those two fuels in California and Germany.” Then why did California’s prices go up 5X more than the rest of the US between 2011-2017? RE is the answer and implementing solar panels on all new homes after 2020 will dramatically raise prices more than $10,000, which the current speculation says, will occur.
Shellenberger gives another hypothesis stating, “the closure of nuclear plants resulted in higher energy prices.” Evidence for this shows that nuclear energy leaders Illinois, France, Sweden and South Korea, “enjoy some of the cheapest electricity in the world.” However, California, since 2010 closed one nuclear plant that had 2,140 MW installed capacity while Germany closed 5 nuclear plants and 4 different reactors at operating plants with 10,980 MW total. Electricity is 42 percent cheaper in Illinois than electricity in California and in France it is 45 percent cheaper than it is in Germany.
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