They are, but they only provide power when the sun is shining.
Batteries are expensive. Backup for one small house for one day retails at $12,000 now and it lasts 20 years, like the panels. In Arizona, then, solar panels can produce power for one house for 20 years pretty reliably for around $23,000 (DIY) today, it might be cheaper or more expensive in the future. Batteries might get cheaper, or might get significantly more expensive. It's pretty hard to know at the moment. But anyway, $23k/20 = $1150/year. That is quite cheap. In the southwest, Texas, Florida and other sunny states, Solar is a no-brainer. Even if you have to set aside $12,000 for potential emergency repairs over that 20 years, it's still just $1750 a year if you do have to replace a failed battery, or lose the panels in a storm.
In places along the Great Lakes or in the Pacific Northwest it might be $100,000 for equivalent reliability, or about $5k a year. That's expensive. If it's not reliable, is it really worth the fuss?
Storms might destroy panels every so often, maybe once every 50 years in certain areas, or maybe once every 20 years in other places. Also the panels will require infrequent maintenance in sunny areas--dusting or cleaning at minimum every once in a while. It's probably less maintenance than cleaning gutters once a year.
Anyway, in sunny areas, solar makes a lot of sense. Does it make sense to replace natural gas capacity with solar in sunny areas? That's a different question. I don't really know.
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