Utilities Face Billions In Losses From Distributed Renewables

Lucas123 writes: Over the next 10 years, adoption of distributed power in the form of renewables such as solar power has the potential to reduce revenues to grid utilities by as much as $48 billion in the U.S. and by $75 billion in Europe, according to a new study. The study, by Accenture, revealed that utility executives are more nervous (PDF) about the impact of distributed — or locally generated renewable power — than ever before. 61% of those surveyed this year indicated they expect significant or moderate revenue reductions compared to only 43% last year. The cost of rooftop solar-powered electricity will be on par with prices for common coal or oil-powered generation in two years, and the technology to produce it will only get cheaper, according to a recent report from Deutsche Bank. New technologies, such as more efficient solar cells, are also threatening to increase efficiencies and drive adoption.

Comments

Re:Reduced revenues != lost profit

[Facegarden]

Well, they're kind of in a losing position - raise rates to pay for losses, and people just move to renewables sooner.

It seems pretty clear that generating electricity from free sunlight is going to be cheaper than mining and transporting fossil fuels to a complex facility to burn them. Solar has it's own "moore's law" equivalent that says the price of the panels goes down by 50% every time we double installed capacity. We're currently only powering less than 1% of the world from solar, so there is a lot more room for doubling. You can find a study that goes either way, but supposedly solar is already at parity with coal power in certain regions, and fossil fuels only get more expensive, not less.

Regulated or not, if you're selling the horse and buggy and someone else is selling the automobile, your industry will die.