Tbf our electricity is expensive enough to scare away industry from the uk. And yet this fact appears true because diesel has shat its pants.

Damn if that’s the case, solar installations there should pay itself a lot faster huh?

Just by googling the electricity prices in California, I’d venture a guess and say yes. Unless it’s particularly expensive to install there.

Here where I live, in Estonia, electricity is about a third to a half of the price of California if you get a fixed plan, or it gets super expensive in the winter when solar is useless, and super cheap (sometimes free energy, but grid fee still applies) in the summer when solar output is awesome thanks to the super long days, if you don’t have a fixed plan. Installing solar panels without hefty batteries wouldn’t pay off in 2026 (the only real benefit is on a fixed plan in the summer so you don’t have to use grid power at all). In comparison, California has way less seasonal variability in production and as I understand it, less seasonal variability in demand too (our heating systems haul ASS in the winter, our record peak power consumption happened Feb 5th of this year).

Unless it’s particularly expensive to install there.

It is famously expensive here.

In comparison, California has way less seasonal variability in production

It depends on where in California the installation is. We have regions that get significant sun year round, and others that are under a coastal marine/stratus cloud layer for long periods of time. We also have alpine areas that have seasonal weather like you’re describing, but relatively fewer people live in those areas.

Upside… the surfing is still good when its cloudy. :-)

It depends on where in California

You’ll have much less variability in the length of the day though. If you transported Estonia to North America, it would extend from the northern border of British Columbia and about a quarter of the way down to Vancouver. The shortest day is 5h36m in Tallin vs 9h17m in Redding, for a northern CA town. That sun will also be much lower in the sky in Tallin.

Yeah, that’s a fair point. I was considering how weather impacts sunlight at the panels more than latitude. California is quite varied nonetheless.

Yeah. System prices are getting more reasonable (since the end the Investment Tax Credit and the sunsetting of our sorta-favorable NEM2 net energy metering program), but new systems need a battery to be practical, so while the PV system costs are coming down a bit, the shit’s still pretty expensive.

And heavily subsidised petrol and diesel

Source? Almost equal? With fuel consumption on american cars that would have to he like 10usd kilowat.

Edit: seems like 2-3x cheaper still

You want me to cite an authoritative source for what? I’m just reporting my actual experience. You can cross check it against public utility rates and car efficiency if you want.

My EV is a Tesla Model 3. I average about 2.8 miles per KWh. I see claims of 4-5, but that’s not real world for my car. Best I’ve gotten is just over 3 while driving like a granny. My gas car is a Lexus hybrid, and I can get 40mpg if I drive it easy or on the highway, but I average 35 overall.

Public chargers are $0.40 - $0.65 per KWh. EVs get around 2.8 miles per KWh. If you use .50c, that’s 17.8 cents per mile.
Gas is around $5.75 to $6.75 per US gallon, and my gas car gets about 35mpg. If you use $6.00, that’s 17.1 cents per mile.

If you hunt around for the cheapest public chargers at the cheapest times (like midnight to 5am), you’re still paying about 30 cents per KWh, so 10.8 cents per mile, which is a bit cheaper than gas (but comes at the expense of your time). In any case, it’s not 2-3x cheaper, and certainly not anywhere close to your kinda crazy assumption of $10 per KWh. Maybe I’m doing the math wrong, but I don’t think so.

Maintenance on the EV has been a lot lower, so there’s a savings there.