Nonprofit Solar Company

• Solar is simple if you know all of the moving pieces, (or lack thereof)

Solar is glass lined with a copper wire that turns the heat into electricity, moves it down the side of the house to the inverter box. That box converts it to usable power and power flows to the grid.

Most of the time the system can make all the power you need and then some. Compared to your local power plant, having your personal power plant on your roof cuts down on the delivery fees. Because of how close your power source is to your home, the bill to purchase a system is less than paying for just the juice itself.

Because there are no moving parts, systems typically last up to 50 years but pay themselves off in about 6 years. By year 8, the system owners make a profit on their return on their investment.

It is important to note that unless a home has a battery and even with a battery in most vases, the power must flow to the grid first. Electricity will always be pulled from the grid. If a power outage occurs and the home has a battery, the battery will then kick into effect.

Yes but only if you own your system. Because the system generates the home’s power, the value of the home increases as it has its own power source. Typically between 4-6%.

If you lease the system, your selling point is your price per kilowatt which should stay fixed if you’re with an ethical company.

Your system should cover your annual usage and produce just a little bit more as a buffer. It depends on if the home is comfortable with power usage or not. If so, adding a 10-15% to the annual electricity consumption is typically a good amount of buffer. By sizing a system larger than the home’s needs, it leaves room for power changes and degradation of the system. If the residents in the home feel like they need more power, 15-25% should be adequate.

Most utility companies have a fair net metering policy. Net metering is when the utility company counts how much power the solar system makes and how much power the home uses. Any extra power that the home produces, the utility company buys that power from the home and sells it to other consumers. The utility company then credits the home for the power that it made and put back into the grid. Then, when the home needs electricity after sunset or for the hot summer months, the home can use the credit it has been accruing over the year to pay for their power usage.

When someone has solar, all day their system is producing power and selling it to the grid. In exchange, SCE gives them virtual currency in the form of Power Credits. These Power Credits are made all day as a system produces and pushes power onto the grid. Whenever a homeowner uses power, they are pulling power from the grid and instead of paying with money, they spend their Power Credits. During the day, typically a system will produce more than the homeowner can use and thus builds up Power Credits all day. At night, the homeowner draws power from the grid and pays with Power Credits. The remaining credits roll over into the next day and each month, this bank gets bigger. When the summer months call for more power use during the day, these Power Credits can be used to pay for power thus… they help solar homeowners from having to pay for all the extra power with cash. Instead, their bills remain the same. At the installation anniversary, SCE converts the remaining Power Credits to cash, sends the homeowner a physical paycheck and resets the account to 0.

During the year, any excess power generated is credited to the home and rolled over from month to month. At each installation anniversary, the utility company converts the credits to cash and pays the owner for the extra power the system generated that year.

After you’ve met with a company and you agree to their proposal, the next step is to assess the roof and the electrical panel of the home. This happens at the Site Survey.

Should your home pass inspection, the project moves to engineering designs and when completed, the company will submit for permitting. Once permits are received, material delivery and installation is scheduled with the homeowner.

Installation can take a couple days based on the size of the system. After install, the city and utility inspect the work before giving the project the Permission To Operate.

When PTO is received, the home is put in the utility company’s queue to get connected to the grid. This can take up to a month. Once connected, the system is live and producing power.

IMPORTANT: If you need a Main Panel Upgrade, this can take an ADDITIONAL couple of months as the Utility company needs to be present for its installation and their queue is typically incredibly slow. It is no longer up to the installer at this point. Everyone is then at the whim of the Utility company. 

Utility companies can take up to 3 months to recognize a home as a “Generating Facility.” It’s best to call the utility company and ask for them to put billing on hold until they recognize the home as such. If this does not happen, typically the utility account holder will get credited back the money they paid but this is subject to the utility company’s policy.

Expect to always get a bill Fromm your Utility company though. Your bill will outline how much you are generating versus consuming in electricity. It will also show you your Non-Bypassable Charges (NBC’s).

Solar panels go through wear and tear like anything else. Typically, the weather is the reason for the wear and tear. Each day, the solar components expand and contract with the daytime’s heat and the nighttime’s cold. With that said, panels lose their efficiency at .7% each year. This is normal, to be expected and taken into consideration when we build a system design. 🙂

Most of the time homeowners charge their electric vehicles, or EV for short, at night. It depends on the type of outlet used to connect the home’s power and some chargers have a slow trickle charge that will last up to 8 hours. If you’re using the recommended charger for it, it can be quicker. Regardless, charging an EV at night during Off Peak hours is considerably cheaper than charging it after work hours.

To most accurately assess how much power you may need for your EV, find out how many miles you drive/plan to drive and multiply that by .3. That will give you the necessary amount of kilowatts to charge your vehicle from home.

For example: 13,500 miles x .3 = 4,050 KwH