Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Solar Firms Face Hard Times in New Jersey

Here's an interesting article from today's Philadelphia Inquirer on the birth and maturation of the solar industry here in New Jersey. It talks about changes since the salad days of government grants and subsidies all the way to today's climate of sparse assistance and the SREC glut.

Oh, and it features SolarWorks NJ, an installer based right here in Washington Township!

Solar Firms in Hard Times





2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dave, I just got into the solar market and have 3 SREC's in the bank. Should I sell these at $225 or wait for this legislation I've heard about that may bump prices back towards $500? According to Flett Exchange Customer Service, if the legislation does not pass, prices will drop down to $150 range. I think it makes sense to hold until the other shoe drops, hoping that prices double or more. Any thoughts?

daveconifer said...

I'm far from an expert on this, and really, nobody has any idea what's going to happen. You might want to check the comment threads of recent posts, where smarter people have made points.

I can tell what I'm going to do, though. Maybe it's the neat freak in me, but I don't like having these things lying around cluttering up the place. So I'm planning to dump mine at the next auction for 2-300 bucks (I'll probably have 5 by then). Then I'll watch and wait.

With the current economy I don't think politicians and the general public will be in the mood for finding a way to boost the prices for these things, which, for all intents and purposes, is a subsidy for something that many don't feel warm and fuzzy about. In other words, I don't expect any improvement any time soon...