[DannyTN]

"what should happen is solar cell makers should offer “shake and bake” solar systems that come at a flat rate and offer easily defined benefits."

The problem is that the benefits currently don't justify the costs without the incentives. The only people who would buy them, are people who are in remote locations, and a few ultragreenies that have more money than common sense.

There are at least 3 approaches:

1. Let the market fund research on it's on, and very little will happen. At least until another oil price shock and very little will happen then, because people will be too broke and too cautious to invest.
2. Do what these two legislators are suggesting and provide incentives to create demand. The problem is that is very expensive and very little of those incentive dollars will go into research. It's like spending a fortune on untreated wooden bridges that will rot in 5-10 years, instead of researching how to make bridges last longer. Consider 10,000,000 homes at 50% incentive for $60,000 systems. That's $300,000,000,000! $300 Billion! You can fund a lot of research much cheaper than that.
3. Or fund the research directly, which is much less expensive than creating demand. And once research reveals a product that truly is cost effective, the market will gladly fund the rest.

[padre35]

Disagree DnTn, if there is one thing Marketers can rely on it is that Americans A) love gadgets B) want to be first to have those gadgets.

Toss in “no more power bills” and the easier the access to solar, the more the sales imho.