system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why is push-back from power utilities against solar power such a big deal?

It seems to me that most of the strategies that utility companies are using to "push back" against the rise of solar energy is in the form of changing the way that they "buy" excess production from the solar panel owners. 

Why do we have to sell it back to the utilities in the first place? Why not just use solar when you can, and use electricity when you can't? How is this a problem? What am I missing here?
gpt
Interestingly, current power prices have a low fixed rate plus the variable rate based on usage. If you generate more power than you use, it credits back.

That fixed rate is *supposed* to account for grid maintenance and such, but the pricing used by most American utility systems doesn't charge enough in the fixed rate to cover those costs, and the balance is made up through usage.

Customers which use very little grid power thanks to on-site generation are therefore gaining the benefits of grid connection (more or less steady power at all times) without, necessarily, paying into the maintenance of said grid.

It's similar in some respects to the ways that electrical adoption in other fields is causing the breakdown of existing price structures. There's talk of switching the gas tax to a per-mile road tax, for example; the gas tax is a primary funding source for road maintenance, but high-efficiency vehicles pay a fraction of it and all-electric vehicles are effectively driving on roads that they're not helping to pay into.

It just means that the cost structure and pricing models associated need to adjust, and haven't done so yet.