What was mostly theoretical in 1998 in terms of DG PV becoming a competing electricity generation platform with traditional centralized generation retail service has become a reality with the maturation of the solar industry, a ninety percent (90%) reduction in the cost of solar panels, a two thousand percent (2000%) increase in the number of solar workers, the spread of solar to dozens of states rather than California alone, innovation in financing and ownership structures for DG technologies, massive scaling in production, and sophisticated marketing and customer acquisition strategies.
Today DG solar and other distributed energy resources (DER) are competing head-on with regulated utilities and in many U.S. locations can provide the same product (electricity) at a lower cost to the consumer using a new, innovative platform.Yet as the FTC foresaw, incumbent utilities are positioned to keep DG competitors at a disadvantage or entirely out of the marketplace. In some cases, this is happening, resulting in DG companies substantially disadvantaged and consumers unable to avail themselves of an innovative and competitive technology operating on a new platform.