Well I'm still zipping around the country and so will be a bit disorganized for a while longer, but having taken a few days off it was interesting to find that the local paper at our Thanksgiving destination (Santa Barbara/Goleta) was starting a short series on alternate energy sources.  Given the location, they had an interesting cost evaluation of the investment required to provide power to a normal house.  Unfortunately, still  being on travel, that bit of paper got left, and the site requires registration, so you are left with my poor memory, but I seem to recall that they quoted a final cost of around $14,000 after tax incentives etc, to have your domestic power come from solar panels.  They do, however, have just a tad more sun than many of us.  The current level of takers in that community seemed to be around 15 a month.

In a quick scan of news elsewhere I see that India is recognizing their approaching peak production, and the need to find new sources, whether domestic or through pipelines from further north.