> but that'd pay for 100,000 - 200,000 residential solar panel installs that would primarily benefit...residential homeowners. That'd be a ton of jobs, too. And there'd be no power-company profits.

If those homes are not grid-tied, good luck with electrically-powered heat pumps as a winter heat source during the winter anywhere that has a winter. Not everyone has (and for the foreseeable, can have) a Passivhaus.

So that means the local grid has to be able to accept the overflow in summer and deliver in winter, which means ... power-company involvement and likely profits.