Topic: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

Hello Solar Chris,

Ok Chris, my mistake, I will put it into a more easily understood format.
I am dashing this off before going on holiday, so no research and no spreadsheet - assume these figures as correct in theory, only for discussion purposes.

Say PV cost to a residence is $15,000 true cost without subsidy –
You have supplied your own $15,000 capital to install, and if each of us did this for 1.5 million homes the capital cost would be $225,000,000 and in theory, we could all make 7% return on our investment.
The only downside would be to the generators profit line but an upside of no new hydro dam required. How I wish that could happen, but it won’t.
Very few home owners other than the likes of you and I have that capital available.

So the alternative under a subsidy scheme, has the Government step in and supply the capital on our behalf to retrofit our homes.
But only 15% of the roof planes are correctly orientated to the sun so the efficiency rate falls to say 40% of optimum and this factor alone drops your return back to zero.
But the retrofitted installed costs are 25% higher than new building because we both know that only by planning and designing PV into a new building construction can we come close to optimum.
This is why your 7% investment return applies to only a very few and cannot be extrapolated for the whole population.

However, any Government run subsidy scheme costs at least 10% to 20% more to administer than your personal borrowing plan so apply another surcharge.

But the Government decides to save itself 5% overseas borrowed interest and acquires the capital through compulsory targeted taxation via the emissions trading scheme.
This tax is levied against coal and oil generators so the price of electricity rises to recover these costs. But this method of taxation adds another 10% to 20% cost to administer.

Assume the life of PV as half that of a hydro plant so x2 the capital requirements.

So a simplistic equation might be:
$225,000,000 x 1.25 x 1.15 x 1.15 x 2 = $744,000,000 or $489,000,000 subsidy paid to the Chinese PV manufacture various non productive bureaucrats, other researchers and contract advisors, leakage and slippage Etc. Etc. (Don’t hang me on the figures – I already know they are rubbish but the principle is right.)

But what is worse, we did not recover anywhere near the Kws theoretically available due to non optimised PV set ups so we ended up putting in another hydro plant anyway and paying more to the coal and gas generators.
T
his Chris is what is wrong with ‘green’ subsidies.
As Spain found out, they can end up costing us a lot more than they promised.

Rex

Ps, Solar Jack, There is a masive oversupply of units as well as an undersupply of buyers. In these hard times, buyers will no longer indulge themselves, and the bottom line is now the more important driver.
I am signing out for a while to leave you the thread.

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

yes it is crazy you can buy a 6.0kw system for $6991 fully installed in nz it would be over $30gs

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

Would that be with subsidies.?

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

how many panels in a bulk load
regards J

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

Incentives are key for small scale solar success, look at Australia, all the incentives are pretty much gone but the industry is booming.

'Early Adoption' need to be incentivized, then the government can gradually bridle the rebates etc. until solar is common and tried/tested in our climate.

There is always apprehension with solar because 8-15% ROI is a high return and people naturally associate high returns with high risks. It has been the same in every country that has adopted solar, initial apprehension followed by early adoption, then mainstream adoption then the laggards get in when they discover the results and acknowledge the benefits.

For further reading:
www.thinksolarnz.blogspot.com

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

N .Z.$ 1.50 per watt x195 w per panel is the cheapest in auckland

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

I am incontact with a company in China at the moment and am trying now to find someone who is will to install the whole on grid system.
The company is To Point Solar and the contact I have is Betty Lin.
To set a full set of 250Watt mudules will cost me around $NZ 5500. I can bring one set of these but cannot bring more to onsell but need to get a broker in, this would automatically wack the price up considerably.
Most installers won't do just the installing but you must use all thier products.

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

Most of us don't install other people's imports because we aren't able to tell if they are legal and compliant in order to be used here, and not set someone's house on fire.

Seeker

Re: Solar Panel Prices in New Zealand 

There are many counterfeit certificates floating around that says panels are compliant to this and that, but they aren't the real deal.

Seeker