Solar panels?

Orogogus

A post in the Green Living thread got me thinking about a solar panel installation. I bought and moved into a new house earlier this year, and from the CC&Rs it looks like the HOA is generally amenable to solar power installations, although I haven't seen any in the neighborhood. I went to a site that gathers quotes from installers, and the first one that came back quoted a cost of $6,244 (including all hardware, labor for installation, and permits), minus a 30% federal tax credit, with a break-even point of 8.1 years. That's less than I was expecting, and now I'm seriously considering it.

Has anyone here installed solar panels on their home and have any experience they could share, or are any enthusiasts aware of any new upcoming technologies that mean I should hold off? Any comments appreciated. Thanks!

Mysst

just keep in mind that the return on investment is low and that you're mainly doing it to try and cut fossil fuel emissions

oh and also point the panels southwest

Enc

$6,244 seems pretty low for a full installation. Are they just doing one panel?

Orogogus

The quote says 5 panels.

Size of proposed Solar System: 1.4 kilowatts ‐ D.C.
Solar Panels: 5 Q‐Cells 280 Q.PLUS BFR G4.1
Solar Inverter: 3 APS YC500A Microinverter
1st year estimated electricity production: 2418 kWh

It's a fairly small house (912 sq ft), and electricity usage is fairly modest (about 150-220 kWh/month since I moved in. I also have 2 tenants, so 3 residents in all, all working professionals (not home during the day), and I'd switched all the light bulbs to LEDs. Heat/water/kitchen & laundry are all on gas; there's no AC.

I do see in this company's testimonials that everyone else's systems seem to have been larger than 1.4 kW -- the lowest I see is 2.35 kW, and the average seems to be around 7-8 kW.

Not knowing anything about the process, I was expecting the installation to cost like $10-30K, but I can't find a bigger number anywhere in this quote. The quote was based on my electricity bill, the square footage and a satellite view of the house.

Reducing emissions is my main goal, but I didn't want it to be a money-losing proposition on the order of tens of thousands of dollars. This seems much more affordable than I was expecting.

Enc

Are you leasing to own? With that low of a price I'd guess they are taking a portion of the power rebate until it pays for itself. It could be soCal is a lot different on cost, but here in FL average runs ~$17k for the average sized home, usually paid over time through a lease program.

I'd get a few opinions and do some market research.

Orogogus

Those prices are based on a cash purchase. The federal ITC is an additional $1,873 off the price, making the net system price $4,371.

I'm doing what research I can, was just trying to canvass for some additional experiences here, as well as any relevant advice on what I should look for.

Is switching over the water heater to solar instead of gas an entirely separate process?

Thro

Orogogus wrote: »

Those prices are based on a cash purchase. The federal ITC is an additional $1,873 off the price, making the net system price $4,371.

I'm doing what research I can, was just trying to canvass for some additional experiences here, as well as any relevant advice on what I should look for.

Is switching over the water heater to solar instead of gas an entirely separate process?

Do you mean switching to an electric water heater powered by your solar panels, or switching to the black roof panels that get your water pumped through them?
Either way, yes, but if it's the latter I think you're out of roof space. . .

Orogogus

The former. The company that provided a quote had a section about solar water heating which says that their heaters last longer than gas or electric models, which would be nice. My gas bill is small, between 25-50% of the electricity component -- $10-20/month. If the water heater is its own thing then it might take a while for that to earn back its cost.

KafkaAU

I'm in Australia so not sure on the price, but I grossly overestimated how much of my power is used during the time the sun is up. I really need to use my power to save on buying it from the grid rather than making money from selling it (I sell at 1/4 the price I buy). I installed panels when my wife was pregnant with our first so would be spending a lot of time at home. Still only used perhaps 40% of what we generated and sold the rest, even moving most things to during the day (i.e. washing machine, dishwasher all go on during the day and not at night unless absolutely needed). This blew out my payback period (I had estimated 6, but its closed to 8 now).

As previously mentioned, you won't be making lots of money off it, but if you can handle the payments over the payback period (even if it does blow out a little) then ultimately you wont lose money and will be saving the environment a little bit.