Sunrun Sees Your Rising Utility Bill as a Bull Case for Solar

(Bloomberg) -- Your power bill is about to rise. And that’s a potential boon for the rooftop solar industry.

Lynn Jurich, chief executive officer of the biggest U.S. residential solar company, Sunrun Inc., warned Wednesday that the billions of dollars that utilities are proposing to spend on new poles and wires is going to raise electricity rates. Those higher prices are going to give consumers a good reason to ditch the grid and install rooftop solar panels instead, she said.

Utilities are about to “go into this huge spend cycle,” even though U.S. electricity demand is expected to remain flat, Jurich said in an interview Wednesday at Bloomberg’s New York headquarters. “That’ll make it more desirable for homeowners to do solar.”

Jurich’s projection sets the stage for a new front in the clash between traditional power utilities and the rooftop solar industry. They’re already at odds over how much panel owners should get paid for their power. Now utilities are pushing for grid upgrades that Sunrun sees as unnecessary.

The San Francisco-based company cites research from the Rocky Mountain Institute, showing that the monthly utility bill for a typical house in New York’s Westchester County may reach $350 a month in 2030. The same customer could spend $260 a month for solar panels and a battery backup system, potentially going off the grid entirely.

That’s one scenario. But Sunrun isn’t advocating for utilities to invest in “yesterday’s technology” as a way to boost residential solar. Driving customers to install panels and batteries and defect from their utilities, even going off-grid, isn’t the best way forward.

Jurich would rather see policies that encourage investment in developing solar and storage systems, and better integrating the assets into local grids. She said rooftop panels could eventually meet as much as 40 percent of residential demand, and batteries would let utilities use that power when it’s most needed.

Right now, rooftop solar depends on policies known as net metering, which require utilities to buy systems’ excess power. Several states have changed these rules in recent years, and in some cases they’ve been abruptly yanked. That kind of uncertainty can make potential customers wary, hindering growth.

“The best way to stifle innovation is to change the rules all the time,” Jurich said.

©2018 Bloomberg L.P.