Rooftop solar panels are flooding California’s grid. That’s a problem.

[rangerrebew]

 
Rooftop solar panels are flooding California’s grid. That’s a problem.
© Mario Tama/Getty Images

In sunny California, solar panels are everywhere. They sit in dry, desert landscapes in the Central Valley and are scattered over rooftops in Los Angeles’s urban center. By last count, the state had nearly 47 gigawatts of solar power installed — enough to power 13.9 million homes and provide over a quarter of the Golden State’s electricity.
 
But now, the state and its grid operator are grappling with a strange reality: There is so much solar on the grid that, on sunny spring days when there’s not as much demand, electricity prices go negative. Gigawatts of solar are “curtailed” — essentially, thrown away.

In response, California has cut back incentives for rooftop solar and slowed the pace of installing panels. But the diminishing economic returns may slow the development of solar in a state that has tried to move to renewable energy. And as other states build more and more solar plants of their own, they may soon face the same problems.
 
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/rooftop-solar-panels-are-flooding-california-s-grid-that-s-a-problem/ar-AA1nr34N?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=HCTS&cvid=7abd4df0ffa641f4b7a38a568dd14aeb&ei=49

[MajorClay]

Hmmm

[Cyber Liberty]

Most of the country is not like Southern California.  Solar can never do the job in places like Seattle and North Dakota.  In this story, it appears California ran head-on into brute economic forces.

[GtHawk]

Why the answer is simple, just cover as much of the remaining state as possible with battery farms to store the excess...and wait for them to go

[The_Reader_David]

Does California have a separate grid?  Surely there's demand for electricity elsewhere when too much is being produced for the demand in California.  Isn't the the point of having a grid?

[roamer_1]

These solar systems must be grid-connected. There must be a feed-back buy-back where those privately owned systems are being paid for excess. Well if their value is in the negative, that means California is having some pretty cheap electricity they can sell to a greater/different grid.

Dunno how all that works. Up in here, they don't buy unused solar energy, and the private system is divorced from grid... If it is grid-tied at all. I don't know anyone that is outfitted other than as a fail-over system, used in emergency, or they are 100% off-grid.

[Cyber Liberty]

These solar systems must be grid-connected. There must be a feed-back buy-back where those privately owned systems are being paid for excess. Well if their value is in the negative, that means California is having some pretty cheap electricity they can sell to a greater/different grid.

Dunno how all that works. Up in here, they don't buy unused solar energy, and the private system is divorced from grid... If it is grid-tied at all. I don't know anyone that is outfitted other than as a fail-over system, used in emergency, or they are 100% off-grid.

It appears it all breaks down when the Utility company has to pay the homeowners for having a surplus of power.  Gee, who could have predicted this?

[roamer_1]

It appears it all breaks down when the Utility company has to pay the homeowners for having a surplus of power.  Gee, who could have predicted this?

But I think that's the best way to utilize solar - From/at the end point - a distributed system is most robust. Capturing the excess, at pennies on the dollar, that should be a product capable of sale into the greater grid - I guess they can't ship it that far. 

[Smokin Joe]

Does California have a separate grid?  Surely there's demand for electricity elsewhere when too much is being produced for the demand in California.  Isn't the the point of having a grid?

I, too, am confounded.  We generate twice as much electricity as we use in North Dakota, 55% coal, 33% wind (which is abundant here), and the rest Natural Gas and misc. We sell that surplus to Montana, Minnesota, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Canada.

Surely there are some Business folks with those high powered degrees that could find a market for California's surplus. Why, they could even power pump jacks if they'd let oil drilling continue, or maybe some industry...surely they could find some market?

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

I just saw that California's electricity prices were 19 cents and change per KWH, not exactly cheap.