Renewable energy generation and usage has been increasing pretty much everywhere in the world. They are practically infinite sources of energy that don't need to replenish over long periods of time (unlike oil, coal, natural gas, or uranium), and they are friendly with the environment.
I'm sure most of you know, but just for the context, this is what is considered renewable energy:
- solar energy
- wind energy
- hydro power
- geothermal energy
- biomass energy
- tidal and wave energy
- green hydrogen (splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen using electricity from a renewable energy source)
In our country, there has been quite a movement in the population to install photovoltaic panels on the roofs of their houses to capture the solar energy. It's true, this movement was amplified by government subsidies in a program that has supported people becoming prosumers. The program has been going on for some years, and renewed yearly so far.
In my neighborhood, most houses have solar panels installed. I can't say just by looking at them how many were installed by accessing the funding of this program and how many on their own, or a combination of the two. For example, my immediate neighbors (their house next to ours), did both. They installed parts of the solar panels through the program, and then installed more entirely self-funded. One condition to participate in this program is to not be funded in a program from one of the previous years. Otherwise, everyone would apply yearly to extend their installed power at no or minimum costs.
I haven't been able to apply yet, mainly because we wanted to redo the roof first. Which we did. Its shape, more than its quality was an issue for us regarding the installment of solar panels.
Now we are ready to apply to the program that will start shortly. I started to gather the needed documents, and tomorrow I'll probably have the last missing piece, but I'll go over everything one more time afterwards to make sure.
The online application itself to this program is a very stressful event, as everything ends in a few minutes and often not all applicants get funded. For example, not all applicants from last year were funded, and from my understanding, if they apply again, they have priority. My neighbor caught this funding in the 3rd year... But my brother-in-law caught it from the first year, so it matters how quickly you move when entering documents.
Compared to previous years, in this year's program it is mandatory to install batteries as well. Which I think is a great deal! It reduces the dependency on the national electricity grid, and if consumption and production balance out over different times of day and seasons, one can opt out of the national grid. I know people who have done that. It also increases the decentralization of the electricity production and storage, which is important in so many ways given the high dependency we have on electricity in our modern times.
If everything goes well, I'll probably have my solar panels installed and working by... next year? Oh well... much better than after 3 or 4 years, lol.