Blanketing the whole roof with solar cells is a bad idea anyway. First, most of the cells won’t be facing the sun at optimal angles, thus the energy generation per rated Watt for such a system would be suboptimal (essentially, a waste of PV material). Second, the likely lack of ventilation will hurt performance further due to overheating. Third, maintenance/repairs would be a nightmare.

$50 per sq ft for SRS Energy’s tiles is equivalent to $10 per Watt (the tiles are about 5%-efficient under STC). For comparison, 15%-efficient quality crystalline PV panels sell for less than $2 per Watt today (at the factory gate). And the panels are indeed eligible for incentives today, while the SRS Energy’s tiles are not (not on the SB1 list in CA). Do you now understand why the market for these solar tiles will be basically non-existent?

And are the SRS Energy’s tiles even UL-listed? Since they are made of plastic, are they fire resistant? Can they survive the summer heat and UV radiation? And what is the long-term degradation of the thin-film PV material they use?