Whenever Solar/Battery power comes up I like to link back to this [0]. There was a HN discussion about it [1] when the article in question [3] referenced that PDF.
My favorite quote is probably:
> To put this into perspective, who would have believed 10 years ago that traditional wire line telephone customers could economically “cut the cord?”
Solar panels would only affect the revenue of coupled utilities. Depending on the regulatory framework of the state, Decoupled utilities [0] would be unaffected by solar (and may even benefit if they supply the capital investment to install the solar)
The linked document by the Edison Electric Institute is titled "Disruptive Challenges" and it identifies distributed power generation (among other things) as a potential disruption in the industry. I assume the point is that if the electrical companies view this as a plausible future scenario, then we shouldn't rule it out.
My favorite quote is probably:
> To put this into perspective, who would have believed 10 years ago that traditional wire line telephone customers could economically “cut the cord?”
[0] Disruptive Challenges: Financial Implications and Strategic Responses to a Changing Retail Electric Business (http://www.eei.org/ourissues/finance/Documents/disruptivecha...)
[1] Solar panels could destroy U.S. utilities, according to U.S. utilities (http://grist.org/article/solar-panels-could-destroy-u-s-util...)
[2] HN Discussion 261 points, 670 days ago, 139 comments (https://qht.co/item?id=5543603)