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CA Considers Taxing Solar Power Generation
California is considering a proposal by the state Public Utilities Commission to charge an 'exit tax,' proportional to the amount of power you generate, on electricity generated by means such as solar panels for your own use. I would expect a state like California to try and encourage the adoption of alternative power sources, but this seems a really odd way of doing it. Two groups have started lobbying against this tax. If passed, it sets a precedent that many fear will lead to similar taxes outside CA.
Since when does any government have the right to place taxes on unrefined, natural resources like the sun? Pretty soon, they'll be trying to charge for the spinning of a pinwheel or the clanging of wind chimes in a front lawn. If an individual were to sell unused power to other people, I could see how a tax might be warranted.
"increase the cost of using solar energy in California....by up to 40 percent..."
This makes no sense? Why offer incentives if they are going to turn around and tax? California offers something on the order of a 50% rebate+tax credit on solar, why turn around and tax the system? If they are really having problems just lower the incentive to 10% rather then give the person 50% then take back 40%? What are they trying Enron accounting here?
Amazing! Just when you think the most ludicrious proposal comes along, they top it with ease...
While they're at it, they should count the number of compact florescents I installed and tax me on the amount of electricity I'm not using...
No, I don't trust in god. He'll have to pay up front, like everybody else.
Might as well have a Composting Tax and Gardening Tax for producing your own fertilizer and food. I bet it's a bluff, a feint. The commission really wants something slightly less atrocious, and after this they'll get it.
Old trick. Always works too.
Operator, give me the number for 911!
a whole bunch of you idiots are going to blame the government. however, the government is just doing what its constituents want. since most of you are too lazy to vote, never mind really get involved in politics, the real constituents are the ***PRIVATE*** power companies that essentially wrote this proposal.
just like they wrote the energy privatisation bills in california and tons of other states. so all you moronic, short-sighted, ignorant libertarian "privatisation-at-any-cost!" now have *EXACTLY* what you want.
congratulations. go team. ra-ra.
so i really only have one question - why in the hell are you complaining?
US Citizen living abroad? Register to vote!
Why wait? Go to a "business friently" state and start your own consulting company.
I moved to a smaller town where the taxes are low, housing / land is cheap, and work can be had for anyone with a little ambition.
California has lost it completely. With the scools ranked 49th in the country, taxes approaching the highest, Loopy laws and fruitcake bezerkely behavior all over the place, housing prices among the top in the country, no jobs, environmentalist protecting fucking common garden worms, some of the most corrupt government officials (Davis and crew) on the planet, why the HELL would you stay?
But the government already collects tax when you purchase the panels. Twice. (One sales tax from you, again as income tax for the company). They also collect tax if you hire a contractor to install them.
What they're proposing here is basically to put an electric meter on your panels and charge you for the sunlight you collect.
Sounds to me like the power companies are lobbying this to try and make up for lost revenue, just in case too many people decide solar would be a good investment. (Which is probably would be)
I didn't see anything about solar thermal heating, though. Hmm...
=Smidge=
The point is to stop a utility company from setting up a gas powered generator next to a factory and avoiding state taxes by not using the electric grid.
I don't think anyone here even read the law before going on another anti-tax bender.
First of all, whoever told you that "it takes more energy to manufacture one than they ever generate in their useful life" was incorrect.
Perhaps you should try to figure out if it is because that person needs education, or because (s)he has a vested interest in deceiving you.
Second, the point of solar panels is not always lifetime efficiency anyway, it is often control of power generation by the person(s) needing the power - intelligent people act to secure the resources they need to survive, and the power grid (in California, at least) is not reliable and cannot be secured by consumers.
There is a wealth of data available online from the IPP and Sandia that will refute your claim. Or you could directly contact a vendor such as Siemens (German) or AstroPower (Delaware, USA).
The proposed tax is simply the latest move in the long-running war between the centralised dirty energy producers (championed by GWB and Cheney, among others) and the promoters of distributed clean renewable energy production (a grassroots movement championed principally by the Home Power crew).
This war is primarily being fought in and around California; mostly because of the high availability of sunshine and engineering talent in that area. The recent fake energy crisis that the Enron crowd purposely created was the most effective offensive in the same war so far.
Hopefully, the decentralized nature of grassroots opposition will prevent the current administration's attempt to crush distributed renewable energy producers. The "Solar Guerilla" movement was started for just this reason.
Reading through the document it looks like this is designed to only add a tax/surcharge to customers generating their own power that actually feed their excess back into the power grid (known as banking).
So no, a geo-thermal heating/cooling system or turning off your air conditioner on a hot day could not be taxed.
This proposal appears to hide behind an attempt to say "running+managing the grid costs money, even power producers should pay if they are hooked up." That is only true to a point. Until a significant number of customers start doing consumer power generation (10%, etc) this makes no sense whatsoever except when you realize that the PUC would rather consumers live in completely cold black boxes that need tons of light and heat with no way to generate their own power and efficiently use it.
The PUC companies would be better served by scrapping this law and adjusting their variable rate schedule power prices at different times of day to recoup their grid operation and management enrichmet costs from consumer generation.
With governments losing all sorts of tax revenue due to basic economic factors, they are looking all types of problems. This one is not unusual:
* Governments tax electricity, if you generate your own or conserve they loose tax money.
* Governments tax gasoline. If you use fuel cell cars or more energy efficient cars they loose tax money.
* Governments tax cigarettes. If you smoke less of them they loose tax money.
Use taxes and sin taxes often seem like a good idea, but the government quickly get used to the income, and when one activity falls out of favor they must hit up some other activity with a new use or sin tax to pay for it.