I think anybody that has been passively reading about solar is probably familiar with solar&storage.

This piece, while being a great explainer, is interesting for dissecting the the economies of this model which goes beyond the usual discussion just on how cheap solar panels and batteries are/will be.

For solar&storage at a given place and time, the economics will depend on two big considerations.

The first is: How do the value streams described above add up in a given environment, under a given retail price of electricity, a given market structure, and a given amount of sunlight?

The market structure matters a ton. Only in a few places are all the value streams offered by solar&storage assigned a monetary or market value. In many places, many of them go uncompensated. (For instance, not all areas of the country have wholesale power markets where demand response can be bid in. Not all have "ancillary services" markets where customers can bid in their frequency regulation. Etc.)

In fact, it's safe to say most areas of the US currently lack the market structures that would fully compensate solar+storage for its value.

We'll get into when and where solar&storage is economical in the US in a moment.

The second consideration is: How cheap are solar panels and batteries?

Let's take a quick detour to look into that...

Edit: Had to change all instances of the 'plus' sign between solar and storage to an ampersand cause the markdown was bolding everything :)