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Solar panels reduced my electric bill in 2022

• plantain 4y ago
  Is this the normal price for a solar install in the US? In Australia it's ~$7000AU (~$4000 US) for a system like this, unsubsidized - then we have a 400$/kWh subsidy. Our 10kW solar system was $4000AU installed, and the payback period is 2-3 years...
• fleddr 4y ago
  I wonder what causes this high electricity use. Not because it's any of my business, it's just genuine curiosity. He never reveals actual use, only savings. Still, at 0.25$ per kwh charged and an average monthly saving of 210$, we can work out that 860 kwh/month was saved, which amounts to 10,320 kwh per year. Actual use may be (far) higher, but we don't know. Just these savings alone is triple my total electricity consumption (in the Netherlands) in a fairly similar weather pattern. And I'm not exactly frugal with electricity: big TV, washer, dryer, powerful oven, multiple PCs, and even a few small power hungry electrical heaters (due to very high gas prices). I'm not exactly projecting a personal situation. Our government has established that median/typical use of a dutch household is 2,900 kwh/year in order to qualify for the new price ceiling, a temporary measure to keep energy affordable. So here we're talking about 3 times more than an above average consumer (me), and what might be a factor of 4-6 more than our median. Yet the person is unlikely to live in a mansion as he can't afford to pay for the panels in cash. I don't mean that in a judgemental way. Large scale permanent electrical heating/cooling in every room? EV car? What would cause such enormous usage? Again, I don't ask this to justify usage, only to understand it.
  • kleton 4y ago
    Could be electric car(s) and longish daily commutes
    • fleddr 4y ago
      That sounds plausible and I had not even considered the possibility of multiple electric cars. It frankly worries me. Heat pumps and EVs are going to spike consumption dramatically, where even smallish price and taxation movements will have an outsized impact. Not to mention the grid being able to handle it at all, as most people can't ever generate anything close to that level.
  • Armisael16 4y ago
    The average New Englander uses between 567 kWh/month and 711 kWh/month (different values for different states - areas farther south generally use more). The answer is probably that you live 5-10 degrees north of him and don’t use as much air conditioning.
    • fleddr 4y ago
      I don't use any AC at all, true. But would you say that explains triple the usage? New England isn't exactly in the desert.
      • Armisael16 4y ago
        Electric heating and cooling (instead of gas, which while still energy doesn’t go in the same bucket) and probably a larger house. His usage is high by the standards of the region, so it probably is also something like an electric car or crypto mining. (For what it’s worth, a swamp is far harder to cool than a desert - five of the top six states in the US by energy usage are on the Gulf coast. The average Floridian household uses ~13700 kWh/year whereas New Mexico is ~8000 kWh/year. On the other hand, the household average in Canada is higher than in the US, so…)
  • bjelkeman-again 4y ago
    I have a house from 1909, with relatively poor insulation, by modern standards. We heat the house with a heat pump and a 100 m deep borehole. The heating of the house (180 m2 and a cellar) is the main energy consumption. The total was 22 000 kWh last year (including about 3 500 kWh for an electric car). An old house with electric heating and cooling could well be what he has. When we moved in the electric consumption per year was way higher, 35 000 kWh. We have gone through and made the house more effective, better white goods, windows, better ventilation etc. We also sold about 2 000 kWh of excess production from our solar panels.
    • fleddr 4y ago
      "An old house with electric heating and cooling could well be what he has." Definitely could be the case. Your situation is interesting in that it is opposite to the order of transitioning towards a heat pump over here. Perhaps a heat pump was your starting point as there was no gas connection? Over here we start with gas heating (almost every house) after which we try to transition towards a heat pump. They say you should first insulate your house to the maximum possible before even considering a heat pump. Fail to do this and the heat pump won't even be able to produce enough. This calculation is of course locally specific, unlikely to apply to you. In fact, many houses will never be able to transition and will end up with a hybrid pump as the maximum achievable.
      • bjelkeman-again 4y ago
        Before I owned it, our house had an old oil/wood burner. And our heat pump doesn’t need help from an electric heater until it goes below -15C or so. But then it is a 20 year old heat pump.
    • anikom15 4y ago
      An old house in California wouldn’t have electric heating. Even new houses scarcely have electric heating.
      • metadat 4y ago
  • greedo 4y ago
    We're a family of four in the Midwest (US), and we average about 40 kwh/day. Roughly 14,000kwh annually. The only gas stuff we have is our hot water heater and furnace. Our A/C gets a work out in the summer when it is pretty warm (at least this year). I do about 8 loads of laundry a week, and I'm sure that my dryer is a big user of electricity. We have a lot of computers in the house between the four of us; three desktops and four laptops. I work from home, so a pretty consistent use for at least 2 of them. I don't think the house lights or smartphones are worth even tallying. I bet A/C is a good 50% of our usage, and that's focused largely between June and September.
    • taoufix 4y ago
      Biggest culprits in energy consumptions are heating appliances. To save some bucks I usually set my thermostat 1 or 2 degrees under my ideal temperature and wear warmer clothes and I never used a dryer, I don't mind having clothes hanging on a rack on a corner of my flat.
      • greedo 4y ago
        I think my AC (even though new) is the biggest user, though the dryer is probably second.
    • fleddr 4y ago
      Thanks, always useful to hear about real world examples.
  • Jedd 4y ago
    These are good and valid questions. Relating to our solar panel install (refer another comment of mine in this thread) we went through with one of those plug in power meters and identified about spot and average power draw for about 80 different devices, spreadsheeted those data up to try to get a feel for where our power was being consumed -- as often times we would hit 40-50kWh/ day consumption. Predictably (in retrospect) the biggest culprit by far was the hot water system. While we couldn't conveniently plug a meter in-line, it was fortunately wired up on its own phase (we're on 3-phase), and with the solar system install came a smart meter, which then provided some hour-by-hour insights. A timer in the circuit-breaker box for the HWS, along with an element change (replacing the 2k4 with a 1k8 element) massively reduced consumption there -- I expect very many people have inefficient, and/or poorly configured, and/or poorly serviced electric hot water systems that are chewing through vast quantities of power. TFA seems pretty savvy, so you'd hope this kind of low-hanging fruit isn't their problem, but OTOH you're right that those figures are very high, and you'd expect someone looking in this much detail at their power profile would be off-peaking all the high-draw systems they could.
    • fleddr 4y ago
      That's clever. We also have a central smart meter in the house. It has a standard port (I believe it's called "P3") that allows you to read out usage. There's devices on the market that plug into this port, connect to your Wifi and then make it available to a mobile app. It reports total power usage in real time and gas usage with a delay of 15 mins. I would recommend anyone to do such tour of the house. You're very likely to learn a lot and be in for a shock here and there. Totally agree with you that most people are far away from a state of micro managing energy, there's big wins to be had with little sacrifices in convenience. And yes, that was the background of my question: If I'd save 210$ in electricity per month, my very first question would be why I even use that much in the first place. Could be valid reasons for it, of course.
• K0balt 4y ago
  We aren’t currently grid tied (we may eventually put in a line to reduce sun-drought generator set use, but at about 100 hours a year it’s kinda a tough sell) Our little solar plant operates a small coffee plantation, 4 houses, 8 cabins, and several outbuildings , parks, and community spaces. When we do tie in we probably won’t sell power or do net metering. Instead we focus on robotic or mechanised industry where we can generate saleable goods using the excess power. (Computing power, 3d printing, dry ice manufacturing, foamed concrete block manufacturing, etc) We also manage our utility loads like bullk water production and large scale refrigeration so that they occur during excess production periods and are normally suspended while we are operating on stored power. I’m thinking of implementing an anydrous ammonia plant and distribution system so that we can store more energy useful in air conditioning and refrigeration, which are some of our largest loads. It’s getting hard to find ways to store energy that work out cheaper than just buying more batteries though. I’m really stoked about LiTo batteries coming down in price eventually (or similar tech not yet released) because they last 30 years + / 30,000 cycles…. And they can take a charge at a ridiculous rate, which solves other challenges.
• nerpderp82 4y ago
  Sounds like OP should have gotten a larger system.
• dbetteridge 4y ago
  Damn, solar panels are expensive in the USA... In Australia a 6.6kw system with 5kw inverter runs about 3500-4500AUD installed and grid connected. The rebates in WA are fairly low for exported power (about 5c/kwh) but you can fully offset your usage during the sunny parts of the day running aircon/washing machine.
  • ezzaf 4y ago
    "In Australia a 6.6kw system with 5kw inverter runs about 3500-4500AUD installed and grid connected." *after subsidies.
  • iamthemonster 4y ago
    The price has gone up of late, you are probably looking 4000-5500 depending on inverter quality (that's based on 2023 STCs) But that said, Western Power's inflexible blanket ban on any feed-in above 5kW (single phase) has had a wonderful side benefit of enabling solar companies to be ultra competitive with the 6.6/5 kW system installs because basically everybody wants the same equipment, allowing much greater standardisation. Electricity is still dirt cheap in WA (30c/kWh) but that will soon change. Interestingly, solar has penetrated so far in WA that there's almost no value to the grid operator of putting more daytime solar onto the grid.
    • dbetteridge 4y ago
      Fair point, I was going off 2022 prices. Yeah it makes sense that a limitation like that forces competition, along with cheaper import costs from China I imagine not hurting. 30c/kWh is not really cheap by most countries standards, especially when you really need aircon during summer and from this year can't build a new home with gas heating or cooking in WA. Going to be an interesting few years I think as grids start to move away from coal base loads en-mass
• Jedd 4y ago
  * In USA / America (At the very end of the article, some hint is given as to where the author is located.) Those numbers - for USA, and for 2022 - seem very high. Author obtained 7.56 kW of panels with a single phase inverter for a list price of USD$26k - which was reduced via subsidies down to USD$19k actual. Here in Australia, 24 months ago I had 12kW of panels with a 10kW three-phase inverter installed for an on-paper price of AUD$13k (USD$9k), similarly subsidised with government incentives down to AUD$8k (USD$5k). I'm about 200km north-west of Sydney ('regional' by any definition), and installation involved 3 guys for one full day (presumably they were a multi-day loop to customers in the area, as we're 3h from their base). In any case, ignoring post-subsidy delta, why are the list prices so savagely different? I know all these panels and inverters come out of China, but I'd have expected stateside pricing to be much more competitive a year ago than rural Straya pricing two years ago. In terms of finances / payback - author seems to overlook one (mostly positive) feature, which is the behavioural changes of 'free' power. It's summer here now which means regular 40C+ temperatures, and so the air conditioners (3 x 500W max draw) go on daily, automatically, for 10:00/17:00. This obviously improves QoL but also some non-obvious benefits - extends shelf life of food, takes a significant load off the fridge, etc. Basically, a raw comparison of before/after often won't be as compelling as it assumes no changes to how you consumer power. I've got $0.33 export / $0.07 per kWh, so the trade-off is slightly simpler to calculate -- along with the installation of an $80 timer switch for the 1800W HWS (only draws power during the middle of the day) I calculate effective payback for me is in the order of 3-4 years.
  • missedthecue 4y ago
    Your panels might be 3x more productive, being in sunny Australia. Where does the author live in the US? I either missed it or he didn't say. Even then, the layout of his roof could have a big effect. Another point is that certain solar panel imports are tariffed as much as 30% in the US in order to protect the (non-existent?) domestic solar panel manufacturering industry. But it appears Biden temporarily suspended it about 6 months ago. Unclear whether this added to his purchase price.
    • Jedd 4y ago
      Author mentions New England, which I gather is a large-ish area, but let's say about 44 degrees north. I'm 33 degrees south, so obviously 'better' in terms of solar potential. We probably also have fewer cloudy days (though much hotter days during summer, I'm not sure how that compares out over the year). My panels are not optimally installed, at least not optimally for capture - but definitely optimally for installation cost. I have a gable-roof shed facing roughly NW, with 22 panels on the NW side, and 11 on the SE side. Roof slope is about 9 degrees. I just start to flat-line my 10kW inverter, fed from 12kW panels, about 3 weeks (on the winter side) of the equinoxes - so there's definitely room to improve the configuration there. FYI in summer I generate average ~70kWh a day, and in winter about 30. It sounds like author put these panels on in late 2021 --which should post-date the worst of the COVID-induced shipping/trade bumps, and pre-date the Ukraine / Russia induced effects. EDIT: You mentioned "... tariffed as much as 30% in the US ..." -- I agree that kind of figure could be explained by duties, tariffs, etc, but the difference here is actually 3x (26k vs 9k) for a system that's only about 60% the capacity of mine. A like-for-like system, extrapolating from TFA's numbers, would be US$35k, or nearly 4x difference.
• FatActor 4y ago
  I was curious how this person was paying US$0.22/kWh when that is 2x Oregon, and found this interesting table: https://www.chooseenergy.com/electricity-rates-by-state/ https://www.chooseenergy.com/electricity-rates-by-state/ Not sure how accurate it is, but what is up with New Hampshire at $0.32?! Hawaii seems like it could knock it out of the park with wind and solar, but they're at 45cents. Ouch.
• dundarious 4y ago
  There is an associated video where he goes through the article and answers many of the questions I see in the comments here: https://youtu.be/YWwJ-DsVT4A https://youtu.be/YWwJ-DsVT4A
• webinvest 4y ago
  Great summary of this man’s positive experiences with installing solar. Can anyone answer how having solar affixed to your roof affects or complicates getting a new roof on your home every 10 years?
• rektide 4y ago
  This was built by a solar company, not the author directly, but the actual parts making up this system are pretty damned cheap. ~$4200 in panels + $2000 inverter plus additional hardware (mounting, cables, fasteners). Then labor costs. Net output was 10,894 kWh, inline with a 20 year estimate of 193,545 kWh. If we just divide $6200/193545kWh (ignoring additional costs!!) that'd be $0.032/kWh. One other data-point: daily output averaged to 29.8 kWh, from this 7.56kWh array.
  • daniel_reetz 4y ago
    What are you using to estimate the raw panel cost?
    • rektide 4y ago
      The author linked the parts. The link to the Longi LR4-60HPH-360M panels shows a $200 price (x 21). I had to google for the inverter, a Solar Edge SE6000H-USS3, to find a price ($2000 x 1). > I ended up getting a 7.56 kW solar panel system consisting of 21 LONGi panels[1] and 1 Solar Edge inverter[2]. [1] https://www.solaris-shop.com/longi-solar-lr4-60hph-360m-360w-mono-solar-panel/ https://www.solaris-shop.com/longi-solar-lr4-60hph-360m-360w... [2] http://www.solardesigntool.com/components/distributeddcinverter-grid-tie-solar/Solar-Edge/846/SE6000H-USS3/specification-data-sheet.html http://www.solardesigntool.com/components/distributeddcinver...
      • mnw21cam 4y ago
        There might have been solar optimisers in there as well. They're one per panel, and they're expensive, but they tend to be pushed by installers.
  • nkurz 4y ago
    > One other data-point: daily output averaged to 29.8 kWh, from this 7.56kWh array. This is useful information that is surprisingly hard to find: if I install panels with a nameplate rating of x kW, how many kWh will I generate per day? In Bruenig's case the multiplier is just less than 4x. The linked page provides a widely available map for "Peak Sun Hours" (defined as average hours per day greater than 1000 W/m^2 of sunlight), but it's not immediately clear how this relates to the multiple. In theory, you could figure out the efficiency of the panels and their area, but this still doesn't account for the actual curve of sunlight intensity. Bruenig is (I think) in Connecticut, which according to the map has 4.2 Peak Sun Hours, which is only a little greater the the measured rated kW to kWh multiplier. Is it safe to assume that the "Peak Sun Hours" is always slightly more than the multiplier? Or is there a more better map somewhere that shows this conversion directly?
• swagasaurus-rex 4y ago
  > The unsubsidized all-in price for buying and installing the panels was $25,525.43... after counting this $6,636.61 tax credit, the subsidized price was $18,888.82 Looks like a 7 year return on investment after subsidies, 10 years without.
  • conjecTech 4y ago
    Sounds great to me. Especially considering you aren't paying any taxes on your returns when they come in the form of deferred costs. That's equivalent to a pre-tax return in the mid-teens. You won't find that in most asset classes these days, and definitely not with the risk profile of solar.
    • jjeaff 4y ago
      Especially considering most modern panels are expected to still have a good amount of life left in them after 25 years. (80% or more}
      • Nathanael_M 4y ago
        Sorry, life after 25 years? That's WAY higher than I thought. That's incredible.
        • Filligree 4y ago
          Generally you can find the degradation curve in their datasheet, and yes, 80% after 25 years sounds possible. IIRC they fade faster with time, so it might be 50% after 50, but ... that's still pretty good.
          • jeffbee 4y ago
            I don't see anything in the NREL data that suggests panel degradation accelerates. Most of the panels in their data have higher initial degradation, then less in subsequent years. This LG panel seems to be getting stronger as it ages: https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy22osti/81172.pdf#page=28 https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy22osti/81172.pdf#page=28
• csense 4y ago
  Interesting to see a post about this from someone else who I'm assuming is in a northern climate (they say New England). One of my biggest questions about solar is, what happens when it snows? Do you have to get up on the roof and clean them off by hand? Or do they have built-in defrosters?
  • cogman10 4y ago
    > One of my biggest questions about solar is, what happens when it snows? Do you have to get up on the roof and clean them off by hand? Or do they have built-in defrosters? Nothing. In northern climates rooftops usually have more of a pitch to them so snow doesn't accumulate (because you don't want the roof to collapse). The panels, because they are black, will generally collect enough heat to melt the snow in a day or 2 after a snowstorm. If you want to clean the panels, you risk damaging them. So the common advice is don't do anything and let the sun do the work.
    • treis 4y ago
      >The panels, because they are black Doesn't seem like that would matter once covered by a few inches of snow. But otherwise your points seem solid.
      • dashundchen 4y ago
        All it takes is a little snow to melt or blow off and the exposed panel will heat and cause the rest of the snow to melt and slide off. The panels are relatively slippery so a little melt at a pitch will clear them in no time.
        • acomjean 4y ago
          my partner has panels on her house around boston. They work well. The snow slides off, usually with a great "wump" as it drops 2 stories into the yard. Its acually a little startling at first. They work better in the summer, but provide most of the house power. Doesn't help much with the EV she got since except in the summer. She got a electric water heater as well.
• prettychill 4y ago
  I am surprised at these power bills, at least in my area the implied "savings" are 2-3 times what my bill is on any given month. Huge house maybe?
  • 0cf8612b2e1e 4y ago
    That was not takeaway as well -this person seemingly lives on an estate. I do not think most roofs even have the space for 21 panels.
    • jefftk 4y ago
      Having 21 panels requires a rectangle 17ft by 24ft (each panel is 5.4ft by 3.25ft). That's far from an estate: if it's a two story home with a flat roof you're talking 816sqft compared to a US median of 2,300sqft.
      • VintageLight 4y ago
        1. Most roofs aren't flat. 2. For pitched roofs, you're only going to want to install on the south or west facing sides. So only some percentage of your roof area is ideal.
        • _whiteCaps_ 4y ago
          Wouldn't the panels be the same pitch as the roof, so you'd reduce the footprint there as well?
        • kube-system 4y ago
          And if you have a hip roof, it may be an exercise in fitting a rectangular peg in a triangular hole. https://www.infiniteenergy.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/powerwall3.jpg https://www.infiniteenergy.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/06...
        • jefftk 4y ago
          A pitched roof and installing on only half doesn't change it that much. If your roof is 45deg then you're talking about a 24x24 building. If that's two stories this is 1152sqft, still less than half the size of the median US house. There are roof designs where even on a large house 21 panels won't fit, but looking around my neigborhood most houses could easily do that many.
• bushbaba 4y ago
  I paid ~15k to install solar in 2019. After tax rebates it was ~11k. I’m generating ~12MWh per year. My break even period is less than 5 years. I’m based out of California, and generate excess energy. My electric bill is now just ~$100/year.
  • mesarvagya 4y ago
    ~12MWh or ~12KWh ?
    • drdrey 4y ago
      12kWh is what a typical rooftop solar system can produce in a day so OP's number of 12MWh checks out for a whole year
  • perfectstorm 4y ago
    if you generate excess energy, can you store it for a later time when you need more energy (presumably summer time)?
    • pkaye 4y ago
      You would need batteries which are quite expensive at this time.
      • mnw21cam 4y ago
        There are no sensible storage methods that would allow you to store enough energy from summer to make any reasonable contribution towards winter. Batteries a great for powering your house for a few days. Not really beyond that. Unless you buy a ridiculous amount of batteries.
        • edmundsauto 4y ago
          Batteries are also great for using at night!
    • 4y ago
• CorrectHorseBat 4y ago
  I'm always surprised about the price of solar panels in the US, I think we paid about €1.2/W. It's not like labor is cheap in Belgium.
  • rhn_mk1 4y ago
    Surely you mean 1.2 Eur/W?
    • CorrectHorseBat 4y ago
      Yes, fixed.
  • r00fus 4y ago
    Is that the subsidized (ie, including tax rebates) price, or the raw cost?
    • CorrectHorseBat 4y ago
      There are no tax rebates here, cost including tax and labor.
  • mnw21cam 4y ago
    It varies. A lot of solar installers will push the benefits of microinverters or optimisers, because they can make your system cope better with partial shading or panel failure. However, the microinverters or optimisers are expensive, and can easily double the cost of the system. They also have dubious merit, because if you design your system properly in the first place it will cope with partial shading and panel failure quite happily anyway. However, selling the units makes sense for the installer, because it's more money that passes through their hands. Remember, the installers are not necessarily working for your best interests. You can buy panels off Amazon at about £0.73/W. Add in the various bits that you need to go along with it, and that probably pushes it up to around £1.10/W, if you're doing it yourself.
    • CorrectHorseBat 4y ago
• micromacrofoot 4y ago
  That's a pretty good return. I paid around $20k for my system (parts and installation) and get ~$1700 a year out of it (I live pretty far north). After tax credits and other state incentives I break even in 7 years. Output is warrantied by the manufacturer for 25 years (there's a schedule, but should still be 85% at 25 years IIRC). It's a great time to get solar if you own your home.
• jackmott42 4y ago
  My parents had panels installed on their house, it is a large single story house in Austin, Texas, which is pretty ideal (more surface area for panels, less volume inside vs two story). No trees in the way either. They haven't had to pay anything for electricity yet. And that is with an EV charging in the garage. We have panels on our roof, a two story house, also in Austin Texas, not so lucky as my parents. With the area maxed out we still have to pay for about 25% of the electricity we use.
  • jjeaff 4y ago
    It sounds like they have a good net energy metering plan that is crediting them for their solar being put back to the grid. (So they don't have to pay for charging the electric car in the evening when solar stops working) I wonder if Texas is working to walk that back like California is right now.
    • scarby2 4y ago
      almost certainly. Net metering is ultimately unsustainable. Realistically we should be paying homeowners wholesale electricity rates + an amount to cover transmission savings + whatever incentive we decide on for the energy they produce (along with time of use based consumption charges). This would likely incentivize storage, and could be extremely valuable with V2G technologies that are incoming.
      • jackmott42 4y ago
        Agreed, incentivizing storage right now is a great idea because there are many creative ways to get it done. From used EV battery packs to EVs that can run the power both ways, and who knows what else people will think of depending on their location and skills.
    • bgentry 4y ago
      I'm in the Austin suburbs on Pedernales Electric Coop (not Austin Energy as in the city proper). In 2022 they switched away from net metering to a scheme that pays just over 50% of the cost for power returned to the grid. So I now pay $0.090337/kWh for power consumed from the grid, and am credited only $0.05377/kWh for power returned to the grid. https://www.pec.coop/your-service/distributed-generation/interconnection-rates/ https://www.pec.coop/your-service/distributed-generation/int... This has changed the payback equation quite a bit. I'm now incentivized to do everything I can to use the power I generate rather than returning it to the grid, whether running more A/C during daylight, running laundry during the day, or storing it on my Powerwalls for using off hours. Although the payback equation doesn't really make sense anymore, we're still happy with our decision to install solar + powerwalls because we can run the A/C as much as we want without feeling guilty, and also get a solid backup in case of major storm events like the 2021 winter storms. We both work from home and have an infant so keeping the house comfortable is important.
• ShakataGaNai 4y ago
  My system generated 14.36 MWh in 2022, which comes out to roughly $4,308 USD. The ROI is about 5-6 years for the system itself. But a new roof was also in order.... so more like 10-12 years. Still a great deal if you can afford to invest for the long term. Especially with a 30 year warranty on most of the equipment.
  • timerol 4y ago
    Another way to say that is that you installed solar panels and they paid for your new roof
    • webinvest 4y ago
      How does having solar affixed to your roof affect or complicate getting a new roof on your home every 10 years?
      • ShakataGaNai 4y ago
        Well you need to have the solar removed before you can get your roofing work done. Then re-installed afterwards. Typically roofing and solar work is very different, so two different companies involved - just makes things a little more complicated. Most solar companies that I've spoken to won't (or will strongly recommend against) installing solar on roofs with less than 10 years of useful life remaining. That being said, roofs typically have a 30 to 50 year lifespan. Depending on the material, location, etc. Most quality solar panels have a warrantied life of at least 25 years. So if you're like me and had an old roof, that gets replaced first before solar gets installed. And by the time the solar panels are EOL, the roof will be close to it as well. So they'll both get replaced again. Assuming I'm still in the same house in 30 years time.
  • koolba 4y ago
    > Especially with a 30 year warranty on most of the equipment. Warranted by who exactly? A 30-year warranty from a company that’s been in existence for 2-3 years doesn’t quite have the same weight.
• ars 4y ago
  "per-kWh price of electricity was around 25 cents" This sounds like the total price of electricity, including distribution. However my understanding of net-metering means that you have to pay distribution fees to put your power on the grid, so you don't get back the full 25 cents, only around half that (the generation portion). If the author of this post is on here, could you please clarify?
  • bcrosby95 4y ago
    It depends on your state and the laws surrounding net metering. Some will let you put it back into the grid at the full per-kwh price, even if some of that is for distribution. California used to, but they're rolling this back (I think old installs are grandfathered in).
• mg 4y ago
  It's surprising that it's possible to produce electricity at home for a lower cost than the wholesale price. I can't think of any other commodity for which this is possible. You couldn't make your own steel, bread or printer paper at home and beat manufacturing at scale. Why is electricity different?
  • ars 4y ago
    Grid scale solar is half the price of home electricity. Also about half your bill is distribution fees. And, BTW, making bread at home is cheaper than buying it. Get a bread machine, put in ingredients, wait a bit, and you have bread.
  • jefftk 4y ago
    Subsidies, primarily net metering. With panels on your house the grid is still providing you a key service, providing you with any power you need in excess of what you produce, and sinking any extra for you. But with net metering you only pay in proportion to your net usage, effectively compensating you at retail rates for the power you supply to the grid.
  • sbradford26 4y ago
    Largely it is because you don't have to pay for delivery. It is very similar to having a well. If the water is available at your house already it is most likely cheaper to just pump it versus paying someone to supply water to your house.
  • alexose 4y ago
    The short answer is delivery costs. And that's what makes this current era of solar power so exciting, in my opinion! The market is practically begging us for microgrids.
  • nightfly 4y ago
    The equipment needed is hardly cheap though. And bread is a bad example, you can easily make that cheaper than retail price at home.
  • NotYourLawyer 4y ago
• ernestipark 4y ago
  I have a large 20kw system for an old leaky farmhouse and it provides me about $6k in energy and credits a year. I like thinking about it as a near guaranteed, medium return long term investment that's good for the environment. Each year is roughly 13% returns and I should get that for at least 20 years or so.
  • edmundsauto 4y ago
    This may change - California, for example, just passed an adjustment to the payback prices that will drop them by 75%.
• Nathanael_M 4y ago
  Does anyone have any detailed, up-to-date resources for personal solar use? I'd love to learn more, in particular the cost/output/lifespan progress by time. Last time I checked in my area it seemed that you didn't quite break even, but that was a while ago and my understanding was/is very limited.
  • edmundsauto 4y ago
    It's fragmented information due to so much lead gen content out there, which is of course all very rose tinted. /r/solar is a decent community.
    • Nathanael_M 4y ago
      Thanks!
• NotYourLawyer 4y ago
  I looked into solar in 2022. The bid I got for a 9.5 kW system and one Tesla Powerwall ended up being right around $50,000. No thanks.
  • jefftk 4y ago
    Why a Powerwall?
    • NotYourLawyer 4y ago
      Not sure, that’s just the way the company wrote up the bid. The Powerwall portion was around $16k I think.
      • acomjean 4y ago
        I know someone who did 5000W system for around 15,000 in 2018. Battert/Powerwalls let the solar work when the power goes out. (the dc to ac converters use the 60hz out of the grid to sync. There is no shutoff to the grid so for safety reasons her system shuts down when the power is out).
        • NotYourLawyer 4y ago
          Oh sure, and I wanted a battery of some kind to keep things running in an outage. I just mean I don’t know why they bid a Powerwall specifically instead of some other battery system.
          • jefftk 4y ago
            Any sort of battery system that lets you keep running in an outage is going to be pretty expensive, unfortunately. But at that point your question isn't "what would be the payback period if I got solar" but "how much is it worth to me to have power when the grid is down". And so not surprisingly many people get solar but don't install a battery. (Systems that provide a small amount of best-effort when-the-sun-is-shining emergency power when the grid is down seem like they should be a sweet spot here, because they can be implemented very efficiently. Unfortunately a combination of consumers not wanting it, the NEC not prioritizing it, and the shift to microinverters means that instead of adding ~$200 like it did when I got solar several years ago it's now more like $7k)
• JustSomeNobody 4y ago
  Hmmm.. I have a 2400 sq ft home in FL. The electricity portion of my utility bill averages roughly $150/month. They must be in a really large home.
  • jefftk 4y ago
    FL electricity is ~$0.14/kwh, compared to about twice that in New England.
  • whycombagator 4y ago
    There are more factors involved than home size
• nightski 4y ago
  Wow that is impressive! My electric bill in total is well under $1000/year... We average about $60-$70/mo
• ck2 4y ago
  Weird question and probably rare but what happens if solar array is hit by lighting? Are they insured? Do they get damaged? Does the inverter/batteries get damaged or is there likely a circuit breaker?
  • bonzini 4y ago
    My installation has separate circuit breakers for the various components (grid, home, backup that is on even if grid is off, panels), plus some extra protection against overcurrent in the inverter and batteries.
  • heythere22 4y ago
    > Are they insured? You are better off if you add them to your already existing coverage for your roof. So probably yes. > Do they get damaged? You typically don't expect trees to fall onto your solar panels. So where should any damage come from?
    • foobiekr 4y ago
      Hail.
• aimor 4y ago
  This is interesting to me, I like reading people's experiences with solar panels since I'm waiting for the price to make sense for my own home. But as someone spending about $1,000/year, it's just not there yet. My options seem to be: diy, 20-30 year roi, find more ways to use electricity, or wait.
  • isanengineer 4y ago
    > find more ways to use electricity I’m not sure if you were serious with this comment, but for the sake of other readers I wanted to point out this is a legitimate strategy. Many people tend to pair solar with installing mini splits, EV chargers, or some other home upgrade that will offer value at the expense or a higher electric bill. This can make the solar investment make sense where it previously didn’t.
  • giantrobot 4y ago
    Residential solar changes the calculus for some appliances. You can go with all electric appliances and have their use covered by your solar. Same with EVs, your solar can offset your charging costs.
• isanengineer 4y ago
  I worked in the solar industry for years and this is a very good summary of the residential install process from the customer side. I’ll also second one of the main points of the author: do NOT get a solar lease. Either finance it through a solar loan or pay cash. A good solar company will not push you into a lease. If they try, talk to someone else.
  • stronglikedan 4y ago
    Also should be noted to get multiple estimates, even though that's kind of common sense. I had them vary wildly, where the most expensive one was literally twice as much as the cheapest one.
    • roryisok 4y ago
      I got three estimates. Huge variety in price. All three companies sent someone out to survey the house. Two were very friendly salesmen who took photos of the roof and told me how much I would save, but couldn't answer technical questions. The third company sent out an engineer, who came into the house and talked me through where the inverter would be best situated, how the batteries worked, the benefits of a diverter etc. Third company instilled the most confidence and they were also the cheapest. Went with them.
  • moffkalast 4y ago
    Why are the leases so problematic? If you don't have the funds nor credit score to finance it, why not just rent out the roof space so to speak? Any return you get from it is better than nothing.
    • itake 4y ago
      My understanding is the leases are a challenge when you want to sell the house. New buyers would have to also agree to the lease's terms or you have to pay to break the lease and remove them.
    • bichiliad 4y ago
      Solar leases are the problematic ones (where you pay a percent of the energy you generated). It sounds like a good deal, but the rates increase yearly and the compounded cost doesn't end up being worth it. The author was cash-flow positive on a fixed-rate lease immediately and it doesn't come with a contract with a 3rd-party provider, although I guess that depends on how much sunlight you have.
• maerF0x0 4y ago
  >Realizing that the solar company was in quite the pickle insofar as repossessing the panels would require costly legal actions on top of paying people to take out the system, I just waited on the payment. They would contact me periodically asking me to make payment and offering to help me get approved for a new loan. But I just ignored all of that. Seems pretty unethical tbh. The solar company delivered, but now this guy is going to refuse to pay? Sure he did later, but not without blackmailing them for $5k discount.
  • deleted 4y ago
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  • pizza234 4y ago
    Based on his explanation, the company has at least some level of fault: > my non-payment would not be a default because default is defined by a breach of contract and no such contract existed. Indeed, if anyone breached the contract, it was the solar company by not installing in the six-month period.
    • maerF0x0 4y ago
      but they did install it in the 7th month, and we see no real hardship applied to the author, perhaps save for $200 per month lost opportunity for savings (less interest applied, would have to think that through more) ...
  • __derek__ 4y ago
    IIRC, the author is part of the so-called "dirt-bag left" so that's just connecting theory and praxis.
  • throwaquestion5 4y ago
    They took 7 months to install the panels. I'm sure times during all that the OP thought if they forgot about him, called them to ask for a installation date, etc. As a way to curb any thought about undue wait time, the company made a contract guaranteeing installation between 6 month after signing. They didn't comply and the loan lapsed. Now the company needed to negotiate a new contract with OP or go for the legal route. There is nothing unethical about this. The company had everything to lose going the the legal option, with all the long terms procedures, paying money for a pay back that may never come. They are probably grateful that OP just asked for a discount instead.
• irrational 4y ago
  We had solar panels on our last house. Even in the cloudy PNW, we generated enough electricity to cover 100% of our electrical needs. And, the monthly cost of the loan payment was about $30 less than our previous cheapest monthly electrical payment. Unfortunately our new house doesn't have a roof configuration that allows for solar panels. I wonder if new home architecture and alignment will change to make solar panels work better?
  • CTmystery 4y ago
    > Even in the cloudy PNW, we generated enough electricity to cover 100% of our electrical needs. I'm curious, was your heat and stove electric or natural gas (or other)?
    • irrational 4y ago
      Our stove was electric. The furnace was electric, but the water heater was gas.
• RivieraKid 4y ago
  Electricity from utility solar (large power plants) is about 2x cheaper than electricity from residential solar if you don't count subsidies. So residential solar really doesn't make a lot of sense to me on a societal level, assuming blackouts are rare.
• hbarka 4y ago
  Assuming you are grid-tied, the reduction of electric bills is predicated on net metering, where the utility company gives you (ideally) 1-for-1 credit for the electricity you produce. In California, this was called NEM 1.0 and NEM 2.0. Every few years the California utilities lobby the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) to chip away at the NEM program. This year the PUC voted unanimously to cut net energy metering and any new solar owner will fall under the NEM 3.0 rules. Net energy metering is essentially dead in California. In addition there are additional fixed fees customers have to pay. This will disincentivize solar-only installation. If you want fair compensation of what you generate you’ll have to store it and pay yourself. PG&E will find a way to keep their profit margin. https://www.npr.org/2022/12/15/1142927418/california-plans-to-cut-incentives-for-home-solar-worrying-environmentalists https://www.npr.org/2022/12/15/1142927418/california-plans-t...
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  • AlexandrB 4y ago
    Was the California grid always private or was it run by the state government at one point? To me it makes no sense to privatize services where no competition is possible. You just end up with perverse incentives to do stuff like the above.
    • beembeem 4y ago
      A few data points as the picture is murky and mixed: The wider "grid" is managed by CAISO - the independent system operator. LA's utility is municipally run, in contrast to the big 3 IOUs in the state - PGE, SDGE, SCE. SDGE had a 50 year exclusive franchise agreement with the city of San Diego that recently renewed under slightly different terms. Notably, and I'm paraphrasing: the city has the option after 10 years to terminate under certain conditions. [1] Enron lobbied for, contributed to, and profited off of utility deregulation over 20 years ago. [2] [1] https://www.kpbs.org/news/midday-edition/2020/07/27/sdges-50-year-contract-san-diego-expires-january-s https://www.kpbs.org/news/midday-edition/2020/07/27/sdges-50... [2] https://www.consumerwatchdog.org/newsrelease/lesson-enron-electricity-deregulation-disaster https://www.consumerwatchdog.org/newsrelease/lesson-enron-el...
• vanderZwan 4y ago
  My mom tells me she's practically been making money with hers in the last years. She had them installed when my parents were still running a GP practice together in a small village. That was only a few years before they retired though, so now half of the building is basically storage space that's barely used and unheated (also no sterilizing equipment in autoclaves, fewer fridges needed, etc). She also has a solar water heater, she cooks with gas, and her house is very well insulated. As a result of all this she ended up producing more electricity than she uses. However, she's also still on an "old" contract with her energy provider that is quite beneficial towards her because they didn't anticipate this scenario - this will likely change soon when she has to renew it. This is in the Netherlands, can't speak for other countries.
• brianbreslin 4y ago
  Slightly off topic, but is there a service that would quote out a new roof + solar install? We're waiting on doing solar until we need a new roof as ours is ~9-10 years old, and not near EOL.
  • Jemaclus 4y ago
    You could consider getting a solar roof! I have no particular expertise here, but a guy down the street from me got one, and he loves it so far (~1.5 years into it). Here's an article about it with a few vendors, including Tesla, that might help: https://www.forbes.com/home-improvement/solar/solar-shingles-buying-guide/ https://www.forbes.com/home-improvement/solar/solar-shingles...
    • brianbreslin 4y ago
      from what I understand the tesla solar shingles aren't hurricane code compliant in Florida yet. So the thing would make the house uninsurable.
      • Jemaclus 4y ago
        Ah, fair enough! I'm in California so that's not a problem. Dang. Hope you can find something good, then!
• Proven 4y ago
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• sedatk 4y ago
  One side benefit of solar for me was reducing cooling requirements of the top floor, which I anticipated but didn't expect it to be this significant. Expectedly but interestingly, installing solar panels didn't make any difference, but starting energy production did. Physics is fascinating.
  • gofreddygo 4y ago
    Aha! Did not think about this side effect at all. Interesting !
• AndrewGaspar 4y ago
  Can somebody explain where the return on investment comes from in residential solar? It just strikes me that if there was easy money to be had on solar installations, we'd just get tons of utility scale solar installs (which would likely by more capital efficient) and my utility bill would over time converge on the expected total utility bill for a home with residential solar. Is it just because we're in that transitional period where utility scale solar _is_ being installed, but in the mean time residential solar install internalizes the savings to your own residence? Or is it because most of the testimonials are hiding the ball a bit (only net savings reported due to buyer's remorse, etc.)? Or is it because government subsidies for residential solar are distorting the true capital cost, and thus profitability, of solar at scale?
  • shawndrost 4y ago
    Residential solar reduces retail power costs @ $0.30/kWh, whereas grid-scale solar supplies wholesale power @ $0.02/kWh. (Representative figures from California.) NEM (net energy metering) amplifies this effect. If you look at a system-cost ROI analysis, the difference between residential and grid-scale is that the latter requires more transmission lines and provides fewer jobs (which is a key part of the political economics), but residential solar comes out looking very bad. Explicit subsidies -- which pay a part of residential solar capital costs -- are a much smaller force.
  • jasonpbecker 4y ago
    We are getting tons of utility scale solar: > Utility-scale solar power generation in the U.S. is surging. This year, almost half the 46.1 gigawatts (GW) of generating capacity added to the grid will be solar, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, and solar has contributed more than 30% of all new capacity in five of the last six years. https://news.sap.com/2022/11/the-take-utility-scale-solar-surge/ https://news.sap.com/2022/11/the-take-utility-scale-solar-su... Residential solar has no complexity for siting, transmission infrastructure, takes different skills to install, and let's relatively wealthy people move fast.
  • theptip 4y ago
    > we'd just get tons of utility scale solar installs This is happening, in a big way: https://emp.lbl.gov/utility-scale-solar/ https://emp.lbl.gov/utility-scale-solar/ The main limitation AIUI is grid interconnections, i.e. there are a lot of projects in the backlog that can't be built until the utility approves and prepares for it. https://emp.lbl.gov/queues https://emp.lbl.gov/queues > The lists of projects in this process are known as “interconnection queues”. The amount of new electric capacity in these queues is growing dramatically, with over 1,400 gigawatts (GW) of total generation and storage capacity now seeking connection to the grid (over 90% of which is for zero-carbon resources like solar, wind, and battery storage).
• foobarian 4y ago
  I have a pretty ideally angled roof near Boston and was considering a solar setup. However as far as I can tell we won't get paid for excess generation in any given month, so since we don't really use much electricity it seems this is not a good investment. Are there any common updates possible to take advantage of the excess power? Before ETH switched to POS I thought about mining crypto... otherwise we could switch to electric heat but that is a huge outlay.
  • Someone1234 4y ago
    > otherwise we could switch to electric heat but that is a huge outlay. You can walk into any major retailer, buy a space heater, and plug it into any outlet in your home. Keep in mind that your gas furnace is turned on/off using a thermostat and temperature setting, so if you reduce the set-point e.g. 1 degree, and then either locate the coldest parts of your home or areas you want to prioritize (e.g. livingrooms/bedrooms), you can then target space heaters into that location to offset the savings from gas. In terms of deployment heating or cooling, electric heat is the cheapest and easiest. You're just thinking that it must be whole-home or nothing, which isn't the case, you can reduce your whole-home and spot-heat as needed.
    • foobarian 4y ago
      Sure but I don't want a bunch of random space heaters around the house. Regardless of whether they are safe or not it's a waste of space if there is an existing central heating system.
      • Someone1234 4y ago
        What about Electric Baseboard Heaters instead? They don't take up space like a freestanding space heater does.
        • foobarian 4y ago
          That's one of the options I've been considering. Another is to switch to heat pumps instead of natural gas burners, which has the benefit of being drop-in for the existing furnace.
• ravivooda 4y ago
  Does solar make sense for anyone in Seattle area?
• hnburnsy 4y ago
  Don't kid yourself that residential electricity prices have tremendous price jumps every year. Nationally prices have increased 2 cents per Kwh from about 2009 to 2021. That is a 1.47% CAGR, CPI inflation was 1.55% per year over that same time. https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/browser/#/topic/7?agg=0,1&geo=vvvvvvvvvvvvo&endsec=vg&linechart=ELEC.PRICE.US-RES.A&columnchart=&map=&freq=A&start=2001&end=2021&ctype=linechart&ltype=pin&rtype=s&maptype=0&rse=0&pin= https://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/browser/#/topic/7?agg=0...
• hippich 4y ago
  Any1 built their own battery-arrays? I am interested in solar in part to avoid blackouts. But for that I will need batteries. And my house being 100% electric, tesla's powerwall quickly becomes expensive. On a first glance, using lead-acid batteries appears to be straightforward, but I wonder what edge-cases and gotchas others experienced with it. How much time is needed to maintain it. So far 10kW gas generator was able to power most of the house's essentials before resistive heater kicks in in HVAC system (two heatpump units, each has a 7.5kw resistive heater as a backup when outside temperature drops too much.) But I would feel better if I did not have to rely on availability of propane/gas and clean roads during periods like 2021 blizzard in Texas.
  • punkrex 4y ago
    The DIY part of the solar market and now most none Tesla options have moved towards Lithium Phosphate batteries, particularly in rack mount format. They're denser and way easier to handle then lead acid. 30kwh of batteries is about $10k wholesale, and inverters run about $1500, although most of the time you need 2 if you want to supply 240v. Sample system: https://signaturesolar.com/off-grid-eg4-system-13kw-120-240v-output-48vdc-30-72kwh-lithium-battery-bank-2-x-eg4-6500ex/ https://signaturesolar.com/off-grid-eg4-system-13kw-120-240v...
• gnicholas 4y ago
  > if you use a 5 percent discount rate, 20 years of $2,677 of annual electricity bill savings yields a net present value of $33,361. Yes, but with an 8% discount rate, the PV is $26,283. It's true that the cost of electricity will probably rise over time, as he notes. But current interest rates make this a much less attractive proposition from a financial perspective (that is, assuming you don't care about solar generation for environmental reasons). The homeowner takes on significant risk, and the gain is not all that great. Your panels can be destroyed by hurricane, earthquake, or falling trees, rendering them worthless, for example. I'm not saying this isn't worth doing, just that the financial calculations seem a bit flawed in today's economic environment.
  • ceejayoz 4y ago
    > Your panels can be destroyed by hurricane, earthquake, or falling trees, rendering them worthless, for example. That’s what homeowners insurance is for.
    • gnicholas 4y ago
      Good point! I guess I view panels as being especially vulnerable because of their fragility and exterior location. I've also heard that one way to get booted from your homeowner's insurance is to ever file a claim. I know several people who lost coverage after their first claim (decades after becoming a customer).
      • ceejayoz 4y ago
        Anecdotally, I know plenty of people who've filed claims without repercussions. Rates might go up a bit, though. Your friends might consider contacting their state's insurance regulator.
• deadcore 4y ago
  I've just installed solar & batteries (not 2 weeks ago we turned them on!). Be interesting to see how things will unfold and I love reading stories on how people have got on with theirs. It was roughly ~£12,900 installed (in the UK) and we pay 32.596p/kWh & 42.290p/day standing charge... Will either pay off well or be an expensive lesson
  • permalac 4y ago
    Can you share the cost brakedown ? How much did you pay for the installed kwh?
• latchkey 4y ago
  If you're interested in learning a lot about doing home/campervan installations, I highly suggest watching/reading everything that Will Prowse has published.
• sampo 4y ago
  Location is revealed only at the very end of the text: > My residential-scale solar installation in New England
• KaiserPro 4y ago
  In the UK, I've had a battery plus solar for just over a year. its a 5kwp set of panels and a 13kwhr battery. From mid march to late November, we only drew from the grid once (that was because we had a portable hottub setup, which took ~28kwhr to heat up.) Its raining and january and december are shit months for solar, well mostly because of the short days. December we were 45% independent from the grid. Currently we do not have heating or cooling from electricity. If that were the case we'd need 10kwp plus more storage.
• jacquesm 4y ago
  if you don't have net metering you should consume as much as you can yourself, cook when the sun is out, run your washer / dryer / vacuum / dishwasher and whatever else you have when you have excess power and minimize during the times the sun is below the horizon. 60% self consumption is doable without too much effort, 70 is work and if you get to 80%+ please let me know how you are doing that. Also: the big trick to running of renewables is conservation comes first, solar second and finally the grid as a fallback for the remainder.
• jksmith 4y ago
  The conversation here seems a bit binary. Maybe I missed a few posts. The whole solar thing is not realized until cooperatives de-grid in favor of their own local grids, along with an arbitrage sharing model. That has the potential to to manage all power needs (including electrical cars). It's a scaling issue sort of in between entirely centralized and rugged individualism. Of course the tech for this is a real threat for utilities, so it wouldn't surprise me if they would go to any length to stop such and effort. Same could be said for any deflationary tech like micro reactors.