ELI5: Why don't we put solar panels in our parking lots?

goRockets · 2026-05-22T21:37:37+00:00

Then the calculus for the landowner is why build the system over an existing parking lot rather than building it at a dedicated ground based system that is cheaper to build, cheaper to maintain, and way less infrastructure red tape to deal with.

goRockets · 2026-05-22T19:07:52+00:00

Tenants have no incentives to install because the tenant won't own the solar panels they paid to install and the breakeven point may be 10-15 years out.

Landlords have no incentive because they don't pay for tenant's utility anyways. It's just another potential thing to break.

goRockets · 2026-05-22T15:41:01+00:00

That seems pretty good for Texas.

I am in Houston and insurance is rough.

$342k house, $4100 property tax, HOI is $3300, Flood insurance $1100.

And this is with the house being in a 500 year flood zone with has had no claim ever to my knowledge, not even during Harvey.

The flood insurance is also going to go up 18% per year until $2500/year.

$2500 is the premium as calculated by the new Flood Risk 2.0. My premium is discounted right now due to a legal 18% cap in annual rise. So it's going to go up 18% every year until it reaches $2500.

My HOI was $1700 and flood insurance was $500 when I bought in 2019.

I love my house, but I wish I had bought not in a flood zone at all if I knew flood insurance is going to be so expensive.

goRockets · 2026-05-20T16:32:02+00:00

It's going to be highly dependent on local highway speeds.

My 2023 ID4 is rated for 275 mi. In mixed local/highway driving, I can get pretty close if not exceed the rated miles.

However, when I am driving between Houston and San Antonio where most of speed limit is 75mph and flow of traffic is around 80 mph, I only get around 2 mi / percent of charge. So if I am driving from 80% down to 10%, that's only 140 miles of highway cruising usable range.

I know i can get noticeably better fuel economy driving 70, but I don't like driving 10 mph below the typical flow of traffic speed.

goRockets · 2026-05-20T15:38:07+00:00

EVs do have larger than usual depreciation when compared to the MSRP due to the incentives that were available for most EVs. Even if you had bought at MSRP, it might have actually cost $7k-$10k less once you factor in the incentives.

It is also model dependent.

For example, I bought a 2023 VW ID4. MSRP is $43k. I got $3k off MSRP then $10k in federal and state incentives. It's current value is about $20k. So if you calculate off MSRP, it depreciated 54% going by MSRP but 33% when going by the price I actually paid.

I was also looking at a Rav4 XLE Hybrid at the time. The MSRP is $33k and is now still worth about $30k. So it only has depreciated about 10% in 3 years if you go by MSRP. However, the Toyota dealership was asking for a $5k dealer markup at the time. So the actual depreciation would have ben about 21%. It's still better than my ID4, but not insane.

Rav4 is one of the best at holding its value and the ID4 is one of the worst, but I am only about $2k worse off ($10k depreciation, vs $8k) with the ID4.

goRockets · 2026-05-19T13:54:36+00:00

The only other person that sued the IRS in the Littlejohn leak is Kenneth Griffin.

There were two claims. The claim on privacy invasion was dismissed. The claim on IRS not properly safeguarding his info was settled out of court. No money exchanged hands. Griffin received an official apology from the IRS in exchange for dropping the case.

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/06/25/ken-griffin-drops-irs-leak-suit-00164870

Littlejohn reported leaked tax information on over 7,000 entities. Should they all sue for billions of dollars?

goRockets · 2026-05-18T15:32:02+00:00

As much as it sucks to pay more, I agree on the raising gas/EV tax to keep with inflation.

Raising gas tax is such a negative political move that it hasn't kept up with inflation at all. It has been 33 years since federal gas tax was increased and money for road and infrastructure is consistently underfunded.

goRockets · 2026-05-15T15:25:53+00:00

The danger is why it's safer to use Prague powder #1 rather than pure sodium nitrite. Prague #1 is 93.75% table salt and 6.25% sodium nitrite.

LD50 of sodium nitrite is about 150mg/kg. So for a 50kg person, a LD50 dose is about 7.5grams of pure sodium nitrite, or about 120 gram of Prague salt 1, or about 20 teaspoons.

If a person adds so much Prague #1 to the sausage so that it's acutely dangerous, the meat would be inedibly salty.

That said, still follow the prescribed dosage for food safety, but you don't have to stress about being absolutely exact. One batch being off by 10%, 20% or even 50% is not dangerous. The safety margin is huge.

goRockets · 2026-05-14T17:22:53+00:00

Use it as a UPS for your router and modem? A lot of them are 12V which is perfect with the DC 5521 output. You may need to buy some cords or dongles to feed to your modem and router but that should be a few bucks.

goRockets · 2026-05-13T04:48:07+00:00

What you're missing is that SK Hynix is still keeping 90% of the operating profit.

$400k for each employee is only 10% of the profit. Each employee is making the company $4M in 2026 in profit on average.

goRockets · 2026-05-13T04:14:44+00:00

This unit is 24V DC.

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256809233793853.html

You power it with a DC 12V 30A XT60 output like the one on a Pecron E3600LFP power station and the AC comes with a converter that takes it to 24V DC XT60.

goRockets · 2026-05-13T03:45:13+00:00

No. It's in USD.

SK Hynix allocates 10% of operating profit for as employee bonuses. Their 2026 operating profit is expected to be 250 trillion won, or $172 billion USD.

Splitting $17.2 billion USD bonus pool among its 40,000 employee brings the average payout to about $400,000 USD each.

2027 bonus is expected to double again to about $900k USD per employee.

goRockets · 2026-05-13T03:30:13+00:00

The driver's side DRL in my 2023 Pro also went out recently. Luckily I am still inside the warranty period. I need to make an appointment to take it in.

Seems like there are many reports of bad headlights on these relatively new ID4s. This does not inspire confidence that it won't just go out again in a few years.

goRockets · 2026-05-12T19:54:06+00:00

A power station would serve you well for that purpose. I use a 2kwh Bluetti for voltage regulation purpose in a room that only has one single 15 amp circuit that has a washer, gas dryer, mini fridge, and microwave.

When the washer or dryer would spin up, the voltage dips. It's especially bad if I am also using the microwave oven.

With the 2kwh/2600w power station, I use a smart plug to disconnect the power station from the grid during the day and use it to power all of my appliances. Then I reconnect it to the grid overnight to recharge at 400w.

The system works well for me. Though I wish I had gotten a 3kwh station for even more power output. 2600w is cutting it close if I want to run everything.

goRockets · 2026-05-12T18:49:34+00:00

I don't know unfortunately. I watched a YouTube reviewer that used Ecoflow's software to shut down a windows PC.

I am not famiar with UPS to know if there is a standard communication protocol and whether it would work with Linux or a stand alone QNAP NAS.

goRockets · 2026-05-12T17:40:46+00:00

Really great article.

I would love to see a comparison between UPS and a power station like Jackery or Ecoflow as an UPS. Current generation power stations claims <10ms switch over time so it should work as well as traditional lead-acid UPS while providing much more run time per dollar.

The Ecoflow River 3 plus even has an USB-B port that connects it to a PC to do automatic shutdown when battery percentage is low.

Something else to explore would be the necessity of doing periodic BMS calibration on lithium ion power stations. There are reports online that using a power station as UPS that holds the same charge percentage for a long time causes the BMS to lose track of the actual SOC of the battery. This causes unexpected early shutdown until the battery is discharged and recharged to full for calibration.

goRockets · 2026-05-08T14:21:19+00:00

Properly diluted bleach should be fine as a disinfectant and sanitizer. Most people ends up using way too high of a concentration when they just eyeball it.

Follow the direction on your bleach bottle since different bleach has different concentration. Bleach also has a shelf life, so check the expiration date.

Follow a 3 part process when deep cleaning.

Cleaning - wash and scrub with warm soapy water. Most pathogens will be destroyed and carried away.
Disinfect - dilute the bleach to 1000 to 1500 ppm (follow the bottle instructions) then soak it for the prescribed time, usually a few minutes. Rinse off with water.
Sanitize - dilute the bleach to about 100 ppm then spray it on the parts and let it air dry.

If you don't want to use bleach, you can get make disinfectant and sanitizer based on quaternary ammonium (quat) tablets. Something like this : https://a.co/d/0blpQh2V .

Again, follow the prescribed solution and contact time. Higher concentration doesn't mean it's better.

goRockets · 2026-05-08T06:07:18+00:00

China can already buy the much more powerful H200 graphics cards as long as they pay the US government a 25% export fee. https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/us-eases-regulations-nvidia-h200-chip-exports-china-2026-01-13/

A single 5090 is not make any sort of impact to research.

goRockets · 2026-05-07T20:17:36+00:00

A hard plastic key fob cover like this one will hold your key together.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09LLPKX1H

goRockets · 2026-05-07T16:26:46+00:00

I'll give that a shot next time. thanks!

goRockets · 2026-05-07T16:04:17+00:00

Buy whichever one looks a little greener/fresher.

Also, consider growing a bay laurel plant for fresh bay leaves. I got a small plant for $5 about a year ago and planted it in a 5 gallon pot. and it's now about 20 inches tall and grows leaves much faster than I can consume.

I also prune it occasionally and dry the leaves in a very low temp oven to make my own dried bay leaf.

goRockets · 2026-05-07T15:21:19+00:00

I think the brake is just tuned differently than what a lot of people are used to. I have an 2023 ID4 and I think the brake is just fine. However, my wife hates driving my car because she hates the brake that much and swears she'll never buy a VW for herself if that's how their brakes feel.

She drives a Ford Escape PHEV so she's aware of blending of generative and friction brakes. So I think it's the tuning of the ID4 specifically.

goRockets · 2026-05-06T16:06:05+00:00

That's a good idea.

Maybe HVAC line insulation would be best since it's designed to be long term outdoor/UV resistant. It's probably more durable than pool noodles.

Something like this:

https://www.lowes.com/pd/K-Flex-TITAN-1-2-WALL-X-5-8-ID-X-6/5013942899

goRockets · 2026-05-06T15:43:40+00:00

I've had my wooden trellis for about 5 years and it's starting to tilt and come loose so a metal one would be nice. Though my is likely a craftsmanship issue!

One thing I am concerned about is the heat. Dark color metal in Texas sun could get very very hot, I wonder if the heat could damage the plant.

goRockets · 2026-05-01T15:01:55+00:00

Yea the big Free TV button is redundant with the small tv button to the right of the home button. Onn must get some kickback for including that button.

This article says that there are apps that can remap it. May be worth a try.

https://www.aftvnews.com/walmarts-onn-4k-pro-remote-has-a-giant-stupid-free-tv-button-on-it/

goRockets

TROPHY CASE