How Solar Works
Fiction:
Solar isn’t reliable because it doesn’t generate power on cloudy days or at night.
Fact:
Solar power works when it’s cloudy, works at night when paired with batteries, and is very valuable during heat waves to power your AC.
Fact:
Solar is highly efficient at providing local power, avoiding losses from generation, transmission, mining, processing, and transportation.
Fiction:
Solar panels don’t save greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
Fact:
Solar power is carbon free and solar panels pay back their manufacturing GHG emissions in as little as 1-2 years.
Solar and Our Electricity Grid
Fiction:
Solar is causing a utility “death spiral”.
Fact:
With only 2% of Mass electricity coming from solar – reports of a utility death spiral are greatly exaggerated.
Fiction:
Solar power is unpredictable.
Fact:
Modern forecasting allows solar power to be effectively and predictably integrated into the electricity grid at a large scale.
Fiction:
The electricity grid can’t handle solar.
Fact:
Solar doesn’t stress the grid, as Germany has proven. Their grid is 5x more solar-powered than ours and is 15x more reliable.
Fiction:
Solar owners don’t pay their fair share to maintain the electricity grid.
Fact:
Solar owners often pay to upgrade the grid, and the costs to install solar and maintain it – all at no risk or cost to the utility.
Fiction:
Solar power drives the need for expensive grid upgrades.
Fact:
The need for grid upgrades is driven by our aging infrastructure and insufficient investment in the electricity network over the last 20 years.
How Much Power Solar Can Generate
Fiction:
Massachusetts doesn’t have enough sun.
Fact:
A National Renewable Energy Lab report shows solar can deliver more than double Massachusetts’ electricity demand.
Fiction:
Solar is a net energy loser.
Fact:
Solar generates 15x more energy than is used to manufacture panels. Natural gas power plants produce just 7x more energy than they consume.
Fiction:
Solar energy is intermittent and requires fossil fuel generators as backup.
Fact:
A diversified portfolio of solar, wind, hydro plus energy efficiency can absolutely provide the electricity needed in all 50 states.
Fiction:
There isn’t enough land for solar.
Fact:
If we put solar on the 9.6 million acres used for coal mining and mountain top removal it would supply over 100% of US electricity demand.
Who Benefits from Solar
Fiction:
Solar power is too expensive.
Fact:
Solar power is cost effective today. It costs less than conventional power in Mass and is 50% less expensive than it was 5 years ago.
Fiction:
Low income families can’t afford solar.
Fact:
Solar is affordable and increasingly available to moderate and low income families with no money down thanks to innovative financing.
Fiction:
Only people with big homes and south facing roofs can benefit from solar.
Fact:
Policies like virtual net metering and community shared solar give everyone equal access to solar, whether they own a sunny roof or not.
Fiction:
Solar hurts home resale value.
Fact:
Solar homes sell faster and with higher resale values than non-solar homes, and demand for solar homes is high.
Who Pays for Solar
Fiction:
Subsidies for solar are the reason electricity bills are going up.
Fact:
Natural gas is increasing electricity bills, not solar. Solar saves more than it costs because it’s cheaper than old dirty power plants.
Fiction:
Solar incentives are subsidies paid by low income people to help rich people install solar.
Fact:
Lower income households are helping to drive the solar boom in MA, and solar is increasingly available in low income communities.
Fiction:
Solar customers shift costs from solar customers to non-solar customers.
Fact:
Most solar owners pay an electricity bill each month covering the utility’s cost to serve them, thus shifting no costs.
Fiction:
Solar power raises electricity rates for non-solar customers.
Fact:
Solar power lowers electricity costs for all of us by providing cheaper power during summer peak and reducing the need for costly transmission lines.
Fiction:
Solar incentives are excessive.
Fact:
Solar creates 3x more jobs per $1 invested than fossil fuels. Even so, fossil fuel subsidies are far larger than solar incentives.