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Originally Posted by Sylvanfan
What are the long term costs of maintaining these systems and what should I expect to pay to remove it and replace it in say 15 years. How are these evolving year over year in terms of advanced. Is it possible that it's like a T.V or computer where 5 years from now the product will be so superior and similar in cost that the $5000 grant to buy today's system is pretty much worthless? Or will it be more like a ICE car where it will be advanced, but not really that different in terms of function?
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Solar panels are often warranteed for 25 or 30 years and they'll continue to function long after that should you choose albeit at a lower efficiency. Efficiency now is usually in the 19-22% and that's probably close to the top you can theoretically get without changing something significant. Even if they get to 25% for what it costs today, that's a little more than a 10% improvement and not significant for a residential customer (different argument for commercial/grid scale).
As for costs, it's a bit more complicated. The cost of solar panels have dropped by more than 90% over the last decade plus, but the all in costs for residential solar are now largely soft costs (labour, permitting, etc) and non panel hardware (inverters, etc). As modularity increases and permitting gets smoothed, prices will go down but I doubt it will be drastically. More likely, carbon taxes and price volatility will make the economics more favorable.
Edit: as for maintenance, nothing really. Could have the washed from time to time if dust is a big concern and you can use soft bristle snow brushes to do snow removal though snow usually comes off on its own. Inverters do potentially fail over time and if you need to do your roof there would be removal and reinstall costs