By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent
What Happened: The Minnesota-based Institute for Local Self-Reliance, who employs one of the best DG analysts in the industry in John Farrell, have released a study that
- Proves that distributed generation is now cost competitive with utility-scale solar.
- The sweet-spot for project size is between 10 MW and 20 MW.
SolarWakeup’s View: The common narrative in the solar industry is that DG solar is still more expensive utility-scale. But an analysis by the Institute for Local Self Reliance (ILSR) says that a full analysis shows that narrative is simply wrong.
Farrell’s analysis is worth reading for its detail, but it’s the big takeaway that should rock the industry. If what Farrell and his team found is true, then the utilities should be worried about their long-term viability unless they change their business models significantly.
As I wrote about yesterday, the weakest link in the current transmission-and-distribution system on which the U.S. electrical grid is based is t
he wires. Not only are they prone to breakdowns, they leave the grid vulnerable to attacks by groups that want to disrupt life in the country.
Think about the chaos that would ensue if the electrical grid in this country went down for any length of time. And it’s those unsightly wires that could provide the inflexion point for an attack (I recounted my own experience with such a grid-level problem yesterday).
On the other hand, while distributed generation isn’t foolproof, it is much harder to damage or hack a system that is not the result of a centralized grid system. The more electricity is distributed in single-home or community-level distribution, the more secure our electrical system will be.
That’s why this report is great news for the solar industry – it undermines the typical utility argument about big being better. It’s something all solar advocates should internalize when that argument inevitably comes up again.
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