[nnf]

I have solar panels and battery storage and have been very happy with them, but there are two aspects (in the area of the U.S. where I live) that made obtaining panels a lot more difficult than it needed to be. Around here, it's extremely common for homeowner associations to ban solar panels outright ("they're ugly", "nobody wants to look at that", etc.). Additionally, the local power utility has been granted the ability to limit how much solar capacity an individual homeowner can have. I would be more understanding of this second point but for the fact that very nearby, across a state line, solar capacity is not limited even though it's the same utility and the same power grid.

When looking for a home several years ago, we only had a couple of options because solar was a requirement for us, but we wouldn't be allowed to add solar at most of the properties that were on the market at the time. We ended up finding a place and adding solar, the largest array we were allowed by the utility. It's very beneficial and I'm still glad we did it, but with an electric car and all electric appliances, it's often not enough to supply our needs.

By allowing utilities to place such low capacity limits on solar generation, solar installation becomes less attractive, which I presume is what the utilities want and is the reason they lobby for such restrictions.

Getting rid of these outdated HOA rules and utility-imposed capacity limits (when there's no technical reason for them) are two things we'll need to overcome in order to make solar adoption more attractive and hopefully more affordable for everyone.