Return on Investment on Renewable Energy

Public utility is an increasingly expensive cost for ordinary people in North America. Housing owners who decided to use renewable energy in the form of geothermal, wind, or solar energy are looking for ways to pay utility charges. As the average cost of solar power plants or kits falls and popularity increases, this problem is a long-term investment return. To better understand ROI's return on investment, in this case solar energy must consider the implementation of the system.

Imagine that $ 20 billion was invested in renewable energy. Investment in development of renewable energy technology, efficiency of aged energy infrastructure, increase of renewable energy production, training of the dying fossil fuel industry unemployed, designing and construction of solar panels and wind turbines , Installation and sale. Remember, this $ 20 billion includes only the money taken directly from the taxpayer's pocket. Physical external costs of fossil fuels are not included. This includes medical expenses for diseases related to contamination and the economic and ecological costs of habitats damaged or destroyed by extraction and refining of oil and gas spills, runoffs, and other contaminants Yes. These are not wind and sun problems

If the penetration rate of renewable energy rises sharply, some skeptics will worry about economic consequences. In this month's article, Michael Kelly at the University of Cambridge focused on energy investment return on solar power and wind turbine (EROI). This means the ratio of the amount of energy they produce to the amount of energy invested. According to his argument, their EROI is much lower than fossil fuels and using renewable energy to regenerate half of the world's electricity will provide less energy for other types of economic activities .

Renewable energy always provides environmental benefits. The exciting thing is that the business case of looking at today's renewable energy is likewise eye-catching. Everyone can enjoy the renewable energy revolution, whether it is reducing power costs, improving ROI, new employment, or a healthy planet.

In the case of electricity supply exceeding demand, operators of renewable energy can not reduce the electricity supply to the electric grid without wasting energy, which inevitably reduces the ROI and renewable energy Make it more than fossil fuel. Power generation is economically attractive. This is an essentially intermittent result of renewable energy generation. Because the amount of solar radiation and the amount of wind power are constantly changing, the power generated by these energy sources is constantly changing. As a result, the increase in production of renewable energy does not match the demand of the power grid all day, so energy waste will occur. In fossil fuel plants, operators choose not to burn fuel to reduce the instantaneous power supply, but still fuel can be burned later to earn money.