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Show RESIDENTIAL PHOTOVOLTAIC AND STORAGE IN UTAH: AN IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS INTO POLICY AND INFRASTRATURE Anthony Fratto Oyler Department of Chemical Engineering Department of Political Science Anthony Fratto Oyler Swomitra Mohanty, PhD Department of Chemical Engineering Christopher Simon, PhD Department of Political Science Swomitra Mohanty Christopher Simon Variable fuel prices and the interest in pursuing less carbon intensive energy has led to a variety of federal and state policies for renewable energy. Solar photovoltaic (PV) has become a commonly used renewable technology. Despite a high upfront cost, solar PV has a long economic life, little maintenance cost, and is relatively easy to install. The State of Utah has had one of the longest lasting renewable energy tax credit policies in the nation and is set to expire by the end of 2017. The program has seen a 1,200 percent increase in processed solar PV credits in the last five years. The credit is set to expire by the end of 2017. This paper identifies major renewable energy policies and the specific impact of PV tax credits on Utah’s residential PV adopters and taxpayers. Additionally, we look at national trends as well as the incentive of households to install PV by examining payback periods with and without the tax credit. This argues that the upswing in tax credits processed by Utah Governor’s Office of Energy Development is a strong indicator of the success of the tax credit. Payback periods for installing solar are continuing to go down and have reached a point that even without the state tax credit and the planned phase out of the federal tax credit, we would still see solar PV payback periods of under 10 years. Considering Utah’s low electricity rate and that these payback periods were 20 years in 2010, that is an incredible growth. As such we propose a phase out of Utah’s current residential solar PV credit by the end of 2021 while simultaneously including a storage credit for lead acid and lithium ion storage in 2018. The current electrical grid is unable to support intermittent sources of energy like solar PV. Thus, residential solar PV consumers must purchase their own distributed energy storage systems to compensate for peak usage. To properly identify the appropriate tax credit for a solar storage system, we design the optimal grid connected photovoltaic (PV) system and battery storage for a standard Utah home. It is imperative that the future of renewable energy (and all public policies) is reliant on sound public policy that fully utilizes engineering, technological, and economic factors. Future research and analysis should be directed towards credits that favor lower income households, a federal storage policy system, and the impact of lithium ion versus lead acid storage. |
