An analysis of panels per capita vs regional IQ would be an interesting signal. Panels are cash positive in less tan 5 years of their 40 year lifespan. There is hardly a better investment up until you cover your own usage.
The argument essentially breaks down to "smart people buy more solar panels, dumb people buy less solar panels". I think this argument is simplistic. I imagine the primary indicator of how many panels per capital a region will have are either the total amount of sunlight it receive, the total value of local incentives, or perhaps the regional cost of grid electricity.
My highest energy months are the ones with the least amount of sunlight, and my highest energy hours are during long nights, because my primary energy expenditure is my heat pump. This use case is common for people that live in colder climates, which is a large number of people. This causes me to require a much larger base kwh solar install and battery capacity than other homes in other environments.
If we assume a potential 8% ROI in the market, you would need to offset more than $100/mo in electricity usage for every $15,000 you spend in solar install before solar becomes a better investment. The numbers just don't crunch well for many of us.
That is pretty optimistic. The calculators I've used online estimate my payback at 18 years and my lifetime savings at about $18K, with $32K out of pocket up front for the install. But my roof is 50% through the lifespan and I was told they would not warranty it against leaks due to panel mounts unless I first replaced the roof. That's $25K.
My next house will be my forever home, a little farther south than where I am now in the PNW, and on a big enough piece of land to use ground mount instead of roof mount. But right now, I cannot make the numbers work. I'd love having solar but I am not spending five digits of extra money just for the fun of it.
I think the problem is likely exactly what you describe, the high cost for most people to install the panels.
For some reason people treat roofs like black magic, and in some ways I can see that from a contractor perspective.
Since I’m looking at this from a different perspective (in house labor, we also do our own construction) for us it’s an absolute no-brainier. A 660watt panel which cost us $125 produces $200 of electricity in its first year of operation at local rates.after installation and support infrastructure our installed per panel cost is around $400, so on the third year we are cash positive.
I acknowledge that it’s not the same for many people, but this seems like it is in the same category as the fact that I can get an MRI from the exact same machine here for $150 (in an unsubsidised, for profit commercial imaging center) while the (imaging only) cost is $2700 in the USA for the same study. It seems like somebody is getting screwed.
That industry exists, it is called Purchase Power Agreements. The value of x is usually 20 or 25. It is typically lucrative for the company, not so much the homeowner.
I see you’ve never been to (pick one of many places where the social conditions are such that anyone who makes it to an age of agency with their brain fully intact is almost guaranteed to leave because it’s intolerable for anyone who actually thinks much) unfortunately, until you’ve lived in one of those places, it’s easy to imagine that people are the same everywhere. They are not. Social conditions are an extremely strong force in the intellectual development of humans.
To imagine that there are not regions that are comparatively intellectually impoverished is a comforting illusion, but unfortunately it is not reflective of the statistical reality nor the subjective experience of living in one of those places. Culture is very much regional, and cultural (social) factors (along with their physiological consequences) are by far the strongest factor in intellectual development.
