Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

zebtacular t1_iu5prvb wrote

Sounds great from the title. But I see know way windows of this nature being made as affordable as a common window just purely based on greed alone. Why wouldn’t they make them a unreasonable cost? It will end up being like solar panels today where you need a tax credit to get them and really that doesn’t help too much

3

Bhosley t1_iu5uxah wrote

But if they're cheaper to produce, as the article claims, the manufacturers have more flexibility in price. They'll want to move towards the market equilibrium with the highest profit. Which will probably mean lower cost to capture a greater customer participation.

I expect the hype would be enough to keep a relatively high consumer demand. And if they aren't efficient enough to pay for themselves in energy costs the producers can always greenwash/pr some extra demand. And if they are large enough could push for tax credits on these too.

I am also left wondering if they'll be efficient enough for residential use (doubt it for a long time). Maybe they'll only ever make sense for large corporate buildings.

1

zebtacular t1_iu5vvxi wrote

Cheaper to produce usually doesn’t translate cost savings to the consumer as it should, more likely just will be used to increase their profit margin. Just going off of current events.

3

Bhosley t1_iu5xy3e wrote

That falls within what I said. The only reason anyone drops prices is if it means the increased number of customers translates to greater profits.

But lately, lack of competition is pushing equilibrium in the favor of the ever decreasing number of corporations. I wish we (in the US) would have some serious trust-busting coming from our government. It would solve so many problems...

1

DirtysMan t1_iu5yasn wrote

Solar panels are cheaper than any form of energy besides geothermal, with or without subsidies.

1

zebtacular t1_iu5yxht wrote

That’s not the discussion. If a home builder is pricing windows and these “solar panel” windows are 4x the cost of a transitional window, they will opt to install the standard window. Coming from someone who built their home, I couldn’t afford to install something at a 4x markup vs traditional items that late in the building process when budgets are running thin and overages are piling up.

1

DirtysMan t1_iu782om wrote

So you don’t understand how financing works? Here, let me explain how money works with actual adults instead of straw men.

You see, when you finance solar panels while building a house you make a small monthly payment for it. You don’t actually pay all of the money up front.

Even better, you can make more power than you use and sell it back to the utilities. So instead of an electric bill of $150 a month, you get paid $30 a month for a net saving of $180 a month.

That $180 a month is more than the cost of financing, and therefore you save money every month.

−2