SOLAR PANELS FOR HOME

Myself | 11/25/2021 | Captain Peter Blood

[Captain Peter Blood]

I have been researching putting Solar Panels on my home and would like to know out there who has done this. How did it work out and what suggestions or opinions do you have.

I live in Arkansas and my home seems to be a good candidate for Solar Panels, it is finding the right company and getting the price that makes sense.

So far on Monday I dealt with a company here in Arkansas and I received a estimate for $35,000, without a battery backup system. That would cost and extra $25,000. Well I can't make those numbers work even without the battery backup system.

The recommendation was for about a 9.62 KW system.

The plusses on any Solar System are a 26% Tax Credit on the cost of the system, plus my energy provider, Entergy, would buy my excess electricity and run that as a credit on my monthly Bill.

After talking to this first company I decided to see what Tesla had to offer just as a comparison. Their bid was about $21,000 including the Backup Battery System. Huge difference here and I can make those numbers work for me.

So now I have something to compare to and will look at other installers in my area to see what the average deals are. Not sure Tesla even has a company they affiliate with in my state. Will find out.

I sent the Tesla bid to the first company I talked to and told them if they could match this we might be able to do business. Of course I have yet to hear back and probably will not.

[Chode]

don’t...

[RKBA Democrat]

I looked at it as an economic question, and absent serious subsidies, the numbers don’t pencil out. If you’re looking to save money, insulation and weather stripping have a great payback.

I still might do solar, but only for energy resiliency purposes. Not to save money.

[srmanuel]

I’ve not put in solar but I have plans to build a house with an advanced solar system and have done a fair amount of research...

The biggest question you need to answer is why are you wanting to put in a solar system ???

To lower your electric bill or have power should the grid go down or some other reason....

If you don’t have a battery backup system, if the grid goes down, you solar system is useless so in my mind putting in a solar system without a battery back up system is not what I would do.....

I live in Florida and my idea is to have power regardless if the grid is down and down for a significant period of time like days or a couple of weeks due to a hurricane....

In this scenario you would need a battery back up system combined with a generator that can charge the batteries should the sun not cooperate...

The other issue you need to justify in your mind is the cost, the question of solar systems comes up on FR from time to time and someone always brings up that you will never make your money back.....to me that is the wrong way to look at Solar, it’s about what type of lifestyle you want to live....

People make purchases all the time when there is no ROI, things like buying a mercedes vs chevrolet, large or small home, international vacation vs staying home, etc...it’s about lifestyle not ROI...

To me solar would give me the ability to be as off grid as possible and produce your own power and there is not an ROI for that type of freedom in my book, but that may not be everybody’s idea of a good investment so it’s an individual decision.

In my system, I would have enough solar to basically run the house, have a propane generator to charge the batteries and sell power back to the grid and use grid power as a last resort.....that type of system is expensive but it’s a lifestyle I’m seeking not a money making investment...

[PUGACHEV]

We have 10.5 KWh of solar panels on our home in Northern Virginia, and they work very well. I expect they would work even better in Arkansas. Our electric bills were running about $160 per month. Now, from April to October, our bill is anywhere between $10 and $20, and $9 of that is a flat rate “connection fee”. The rest of the year we offset between 1/3 and 1/2 of our electric bill.

The panels are warranted to produce 98% of their rated power at twenty-five years, so I expect them to last at least that long. If I factor in the tax credit, the electric bill savings, including a yearly rose on price of 5%, the cash back from SRECS, Solar Renewable Energy Certificates, and our local property tax credit, the system will have paid for itself in less than ten years. Personally, I expect electric rates to skyrocket much more than 5%, as Virginia has adopted an aggressive policy of switching to wholly renewable energy sources by 2040.

The devil is in the financing. My advice is to completely avoid it. It is touted as being at ~2% for twenty-five years, but they take your tax credit and extract a huge origination fee from you and another large sum from the contractor, which is passed along to you as well. Either pay cash for the system, or get a home equity loan to cover the cost. That’s the only way it makes sense.

[mylife]

I works but does not save any money.

[Chode]

But the solar panels generating that power don’t last forever. The industry standard life span is about 25 to 30 years...

https://www.greenbiz.com/article/what-will-happen-solar-panels-after-their-useful-lives-are-over

[Leep]

Naysayer.

Although, I have consider a rouge system for stuff like light,internet,small fan and radio.

And a propane frig. And a fireplace.

[kjam22]

6.3 kw is not much. Would not come close to powering my whole house

[exnavy]

I wouldn’t waste the time or money. I have worked as an electrician since 1975.

[bourgain]

The quotes you mention seem really high.

I have a 4.1kW system from Tesla, which cost $7500 up front and about $4750 after rebates. It is new, but I’m thinking it will cover 60-70% of our needs in Maryland.

I was originally going to get a 8.2kW system which would have cost more than double due to the way Maryland handles rebates (flat sum vs percentage).

Adding the batteries costs $$$$ and is unnecessary in places like where I live that have net metering.

My low cost system should pay for itself within 7 or 8 years, especially if President Brandon’s policy causes electric costs to go up, which seems likely.

[kjam22]

The part everyone forgets to figure in is the value of the money. If you invest the money right there is a good chance it doubles in 11 or 12 years. So a person may save enough on electric bill to “pay for the system” over 10years..... but they are still way behind in reality.

[rellic]

“I still might do solar, but only for energy resiliency purposes. Not to save money.”

The best advice given here today!
I’m in Hawaii with some of the most expensive electricity in the world($0.38 per kWh). Even with subsidys, the payback period is 8-10 years for my 10.6 kWh system battery backed up system.

The real value is have to electricity, as much as you want when you want regardless of what the government or local utility says.
You aren’t going to save much money.
But I’m in very rural Hawaii and will, when the solar system is completed, be “off Grid”, by choice.

If you are a city guy your best bet is to get out of the city and become a little more independent.

[Wissa]

We have a lot of Solar Farms now in this state, so someone thinks they make sense.

Have you considered the possibility that the people who think they make sense just aren't very smart?

[reg45]

Another question is, will you be able to get propane or other natural gas in the future if ALL fossil fuels are banned?

[RKBA Democrat]

Thanks for the kind words. Happy Thanksgiving!

With antiAmericans getting creative on their coercion techniques, its a pretty good bet that shutting off utilities for those who don’t comply with ____ directive is in the cards. If you’re already off grid, that’s not much of a threat. Nor are the more common utility outages much of a problem.

Hearty congrats for going off grid.

[Dad was my hero]

I had them installed on my house in around 2012. I had a 5KW system put in place. My calculated payback was eight years. We are about nine years in and I figure that they have paid themselves back at this point. Was paying about $250 a month for electric, the first full year my total electric out-of-pocket for electric was $308. I’ve had several years since where I’ve had no bill for as many as 2 to 3 months and very minimal bills for the rest of the year. I live in Florida. I didn’t do it with some misbegotten idea that I was saving the planet, I don’t “believe” in that crap. I did it because I’m cheap and I don’t like paying money to utility companies if I don’t have to. But I’m not totally off the grid because I don’t have battery back up… Yet. But I’m looking into that. I have to clean them maybe once a year. Hope that helps.

[Openurmind]

We lived like that for over ten years off grid. And a small solar/wind system like you mention works fantastic. With only 12 big rig batteries we could run everything in the house on until 11PM every night if we had no cloudy days.

All lights, TV, Computer, stereo in the kids room, Etc. Being conservative it would go all night with turning on only what we truly needed.

Built a small gas generator that had a 90 amp car alternator on it to recharge the batteries when needed. We could let it idle for half an hour and bring them all up to full again from 10.5 volts to 13 volts.

[doragsda]

I live on the central coast of California, so it’s very sunny here. I first evaluated systems around 10 years ago, when the only options were purchase or lease. No way I would do a lease, and the purchase was a little pricey for us at the time, but with about a 5 year payback given our electrical usage.

Eventually the solar companies started offering Power Purchase Agreements, which is what I wanted, so three years ago we put a system on our house. The solar company sized it at 5.2 KW, but I did the calculations myself and decided 3.6 KW was better sized for us. It’s turned out to be just a little larger than we needed. They provided all the hardware and installation labor at no cost to us, and we pay them 17 cents per KWh for all power generated by the system. This is compared to around 31 cents per KWh for power we purchase from the utility. PG&E does net metering, so we do a true up once per year.

Things to consider:

What will the utility actually pay you for excess generation? Here it is only 4 cents per KWh, so only a fraction of what we paid to generate it (17 cents) which emphasizes the importance of not over-sizing your system.

When you own the system, you are responsible for maintenance, and the system usually adds cost to your property taxes and to your homeowner insurance. With the power purchase agreement, Sunrun is responsible for all maintenance and it does not affect our assessment nor our insurance. The problem with a lease is you have to make the monthly payment even if the system is down and not generating.

For us, it has saved a tremendous amount of money. About $100 / month in savings over what we were paying PG&E. At three years in we’ve saved around $3600. This year has been exceptionally sunny, so it’s really been a boon. We have a gas stove, gas furnace, and gas water heater. If you had a heat pump system, you’d save a lot more. Of course, we have probably the highest utility electric rates in the country, so your mileage may vary.

[sasquatch]

I’ve got a solar house. ~1Kw solar panels, 10Kwhr battery.

Propane furnace, waterheater, cook stove, fridge, wood stove, 3Kw propane generator.

Works great. Grid is $60K away, down the road. If you don’t have a realistic choice, solar’s fine.

[Leep]

Not sure if we will still “allowed” to do any number of things in the not to distant future..that most take for granted.
Otherwise,there are always alternatives.
I’ve only seen supposedly passive fridges. Not sure how well they will if at all.

Of course,there are always root cellars.