“I added $40/year to my homeowner’s insurance to cover the cost of replacing solar panels “
When I built both of my arrays, the panels and solar stuff were included in the dwelling total. I just added the 50k or so as an increase of the dwelling value.
Then after both projects were done (4 years apart) the glorious insurance outfit, Florida Farm Bureau, renewed and excluded any and everything solar. They now want an additional $500 a year. Agent took photos and even sent me an email saying my coverage ‘is bound.’
Three weeks later he was back pedaling. No coverage at that photo date. It has to ‘wait for the renewal date.’
Renewal date comes and premium for basic h/o jumps from $3500 a year to $7500 a year.
Needless to say, nada, I will self insure.
I did mine in two phases, with Phase I being 2 years ago (32 panels = 10kW, 1 inverter 9kW continuous AC, 30kWh battery storage) for me to study it to make sure it worked as much as I expected (with variations during the seasons as expected). Half a year in (fall of 2021) I liked it and did Phase Ia: converted my two natural gas appliances to electric (now have a variable speed heat pump with heat strips for cooling and heating the home, and a hybrid water tank for heating the water and also help a little with cooling the home). On the 1-year anniversary of Phase I I studied the throughput and it had produced 58.5% of the power I consumed in my now all-electric home. So I did Phase II, which was replace my wife's old ICE crossover with an EV crossover and expand the solar system (20kW solar, 18kW continuous inverter capacity, 92kWh battery storage). That was completed Aug 31 last year. Both times before the upgrade I contacted my insurance (State Farm), told them what I was doing, and that I'd like more coverage for rebuild cost (since rebuilding would include installing solar equipment). And both times State Farm gave me what I wanted and increased my premiums to account for the increased coverage, but with no extra rider charge added for solar. Perhaps because I don't sell power to the grid (which by some insurance regulations might make it look like business income equipment instead of home equipment).
So far I've seen Phase II work with fall, winter, spring, and early summer and it's produced 78.3% of all the power we consumed, including charging the EV for about 23K miles (we've put 26K miles on it, but about 3K of those miles were on trips charging away from home). When we reach the 1-year anniversary of the Phase II upgrade I believe the throughput will be in the low 80% of free power (buying less than 20% of our power from the grid). And my power bills averaging $75/month even though I don't sell power to the grid.
I'm applying for the grid sell plan and I predict my power bill will average $55/month (practically nothing in the spring, summer, and fall, followed by winter months totaling about $600). If the regulations change the fees or something else I don't like, I'll change the settings and quit putting power onto the grid (which is the way I'm currently working it) and be happy with only $75/month power bills as a regular customer who just rarely needs power from the grid (which is how I'm currently viewed by the grid because I don't put power onto the grid like a lot of solar customers do).