Pre-purchase barriers to photovoltaics within Marin County Gwendolyn Johnson Abstract Pre-purchase barriers to photovoltaic (PV) systems within Marin County were studied. Four areas were investigated: 1) the residential sector, 2) the PV-retail sector, 3) the Marin County government and 4) educational information. The emphasis of the project was on the residential sector. The retail sector, county government and educational information were examined to determine their individual impacts within the residential sector. Surveys were administered to homeowner’s without PV, with scenario questions used to quantify the variables willingness-to-pay (WTP), degree of familiarity (DF), homeowner interest (HI) and customer initiative (CI). A multi-stage cluster technique was used to randomly pick the survey sample for residents without PV, unstructured interviews were conducted with PV-sales engineers from various retail sites and semi-structured interviews were conducted with three government officials. Educational information was gathered in the form of pamphlets, booklets and website pages, which are distributed by local solar energy organizations. Major trends show that while there is a low DF with PV, WTP and HI is high. Whereas most of the current PV-users were initially interested in PV systems because of the perception that they are environmentally benign, potential PV-owner interest stems from a desire for reliable electricity service, in light of California’s energy crisis. Other barriers include siting limitations that prevent significant solar energy uptake as well as surface area constraints in relation to high electricity consumption and/or swimming pools using solar thermal panels. A strong interest exists within county government to implement campaign programs for PV, but there is a lack of direct responsibility within a single department, which acts as a barrier, though easy to overcome. PV retailers themselves do not appear to be barriers, but rather their lack of marketing and advertising to new audiences.Introduction Photovoltaics (PV) refers to a technology that utilizes the sun’s energy in order to produce a direct electric current. For localized production of electricity, this technology is employed in centralized forms, such as power plants, and decentralized forms, such as on the rooftops of houses or commercial buildings. This research project examined the role of PV systems within the residential sector. The basic components of a home-use PV system includes PV panels and an inverter. The PV panels are semiconductive and create a direct current when hit by sunlight and the inverter changes direct current (dc) into alternating current (ac), which is used in most houses and buildings in the United States. If the PV system is a stand-alone system, then it also requires an electricity-storing component, typically a battery, but if the system is interconnected with the local utility grid, electricity storage is not always necessary. Understanding local perceptions of PV systems is potentially important for several reasons. First, there is the increasing volatility of electricity markets. Specifically in California, deregulation has created uncertainty in electricity prices. Second, utilities have had difficulty adequately meeting rising electricity demand. Particularly, prolonged heat waves, power plant maintenance leading to temporarily decreased generating capacity, and an ever-growing population that uses power in similar peak patterns have combined to create stress on California’s electricity-generation capacity. Current methods of meeting increasing electricity loads are institutionally biased, limited to building new power plants and making efficiency improvements to existing equipment. In California, the capacity to do this is being strained by the rapidly growing population, space constraints, and in general, the increasing costs of fuels and building new plants. To this end, it is important that we explore other methods of providing electricity, with PV as one of many options. One benefit of using PV is that consumers are likely to become more aware of their energy consumption patterns and in turn may begin to reduce overall energy use as well as shift consumption patterns (Haas, 29). Done on a large scale, distributed PV could greatly ease the strain on California’s energy market. Yet, despite uncertainties in price and electricity supply, and the potential benefits of PV, use of PV systems in Marin is presently very low. In the existing body of research on renewable energy markets, barriers to photovoltaic systems are most commonly addressed from the perspective of technology transfer programs in developing countries where there is a strong need for decentralized energy distribution. Otherresearch on PV systems is very broad, analyzing its place in commercial markets, but only focusing on the average, middle-income consumer. In this sector, photovoltaics can be prohibitively expensive, requiring large capital investments and long payback times. Most barriers can be categorically described as financial, technological, institutional, regulatory or structural (Jackson et al, 380). There is not much research on market barriers within affluent communities in the United States. Marin, specifically, represents a unique population: it is an affluent area, a large percentage of its population lives on hills and water, which receive a good amount of annual sunlight, and it is a community that prides itself on being environmentally aware. With these factors combined, I felt that barriers would take on a different form, with a lack of public awareness being a more important barrier. In fact, one study cites that affluent homeowners, in general, are actively interested in microgeneration, i.e.finding new means of generating and storing their own electricity, in response to the current state of the electricity market (RKS press release, 01). The issues I investigated in Marin include the familiarity level of residents in regards to PV systems, its relationship to the homeowner’s willingness-to-pay for a PV system as well as the effect of a PV system’s typical investment cost on willingness-to-pay. There is currently a rebate in California that subsidizes purchases of certified PV systems by $3 per watt. I examined how this might affect a homeowner’s interest and whether or not customer initiative (or lack of) was an important factor. Finally, I
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