From Roper Survey indicates 90% of Americans think solar power should be available for all new home construction:

The findings of the survey include:

• 87 percent feel that homebuilders should offer solar power as an option for all new homes; older Americans are less enthusiastic, with 77 percent of those over age 65 supporting solar on new homes
• Respondents understand that solar power can be used to turn the lights on (82 percent), heat bath water (82 percent) or heat a swimming pool (80 percent)
• Respondents are less likely to understand that solar can power electric devices such as computers or appliances (71 percent)
• 82 percent say that a decrease in monthly energy bills is their primary motivation for installing solar power; other respondents indicated it was to reduce overall energy usage (79 percent), reduce oil dependence (77 percent) or because it is a secure source of energy (75 percent)
• 56 percent would be interested in learning more about solar for their homes if the system could be obtained for zero money down and their utility bills would be lowered right away

Of course solar should be an option on new homes. Good friends of mine, Mark and Eve (everybody wave to Mark and Eve) are in the final stages of building a house with a very large, regional home builder in the US, and they were given zero energy-related options by the builder. That’s right–zero. That had lots of options for things like computer and speaker wiring and other goodies, but not so much as extra insulation in the attic.

In general, I like the numbers in the survey, but I don’t find them surprising. People tend to have a very positive opinion of solar–clean, quiet, renewable energy source–but they think it’s too expensive or not capable enough. The business about a smaller portion of people thinking solar can run their computers or appliances is a bit depressing, but at least the overall percentage is still high.

I love the bit about reducing oil dependence. I can’t tell you how many times I see this mistake in news stories. In the US, only about 4% of our electricity comes from oil, so while putting panels on your house might be a major step forward in reducing your CO2 emissions and (indirect) consumption of natural gas or coal or whatever, on average it won’t do diddly about oil.

The kicker is that last bullet I quoted, the part about a zero money down option. That’s precisely the PPA (power producer agreement) model I’ve written about before that’s already taking off in the US. Essentially, a business signs a long-term contract with a company like Honeywell (which I’ll use as an example, even though other companies are in this business), that installs all the solar hardware on the customer’s buildings. The customer agrees to buy electricity from the panels at a fixed cost, typically less than the going rate from the local utility. Honeywell owns and maintains the hardware, and at the end of the 10 to 20 year contract, the customer has the option of signing a new contract or walking away from the deal, and Honeywell comes and takes away all the hardware.

The PPA business model is the key to the mainstreaming of residential solar PV. As I understand it, it’s currently used only for businesses, but it will surely expand into the residential market. PPA’s will be just as important to the future of solar power as cheaper hardware, possibly more so, simply because they turn the act of installing solar panels from a custom, almost boutique operation into much more of a standardized, mass production operation.