Capturing the wonderful Sonoma sun in my new solar installation

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• Renewable Energy
• Solar Power

Location

Project Started On

Start with 285 days of sunlight a year and a flat entry way roof with just the right sun angle, one sales “consultant” told me, and I was ready to seek the right solar installation.

It was partly guilt, our energy gluttony was growing every year, with a pool and hot tub---but no AC—we get great breezes from the nearby bay and ocean---9 irrigation centers, a small but demanding vineyard and a house not always occupied by just two adults.

And there are bragging rights, since you still don’t see many Sonoma rooftops sprouting solar arrays. See photos of our gem a little after sunrise.

And serious short term savings on our electric and gas bills—which average about $440 per month---in return for a one time investment and if I live long enough, getting off the grid for good.

So how to find a solar vendor, get estimates, get going? Some web searching located Real Goods as a major solar vendor in our Sonoma and northwards areas. I knew of their longtime reputation for all things green, as well as a record of having done thousands of solar installations. I called and convinced them I was serious about going ahead, and got their application via snail mail. I trumped them by attaching a google earth plot of our rooftop showing the way it faced.

A week later an accommodating and knowledgeable sales person, Jason, was on our entry way roof, measuring, computing sun angles, giving us the lowdown on the photovoltaic panel choices, layouts, inverters, meter connections, time of use electric rates and of course lower bills.

He speced an aluminum SolarMount tilted array of Sharp 167 watt panels, with a clean, “skylight” look, linked by a simple conduit to a Xantrex Grid Tie Inverter mounted in an out-of-the-way location in our garage. The Inverter converts the DC electricity generated by the panels into AC current that works with the utility grid. The power generated is fed back through our utility panel so it powers our house through our regular electrical system, and when we’re producing more than we’re using, sends the surplus power back to the grid. An LCD screen on the Inverter displays the power being produced at that moment, and the cumulative energy generated that day.

At 5PM on this October day of morning fog—afternoon sun, we are generating 1114 watts max and had rolled up 15.26 KWh for the day and not a dial was turning on the electric meter.

We set out to kill the whole bill with an 8 Kilowatt system, but the first estimate came in at $66,000, $50,000 after a $16,000 California rebate and with a $2,000 credit to come on 2007 federal taxes. That seemed a little rich to come up with out-of-pocket and what if the technology/efficiency/cost of panels improved dramatically in the next year or two?

So how about ½ to 2/3 reduction---that would make a dent in the bills at least. This was a 4 Kilowatt system which came to $33,800 with taxes and installation. The state rebate of $8,000 brought it down to $25,800 and the standard $2,000 IRS credit. This would cover about 2/3s of the roof and leave us room to add at least two more rows of panels when we were ready. And that was about what we set aside to replace our trusty Subaru, but we haven’t seen any really exciting, major mileage improving non-SUV station wagons on the market

Then a blizzard exchange of paperwork—we send copies of our Pacific Gas &Electric bills, we complete an online energy audit, we provide a declaration page showing we have home insurance. Real Goods sent us their installation contract---pretty straightforward actually—and prepared our application for the California Solar Initiative—the state-funded program that provides the rebate $$ (administered by PG&E) which resembled a college application form and blessedly was filled out for us by Real Goods, who seem to have a whole team standing by just to move the paper for these projects. And they applied to our county for the installation permit.

April 26 we get the “California Solar Initiative, Confirmed Reservation Notice Letter and Incentive Claim Form” (good for one year), hooray, we’ve been accepted, and we are good to go, or at least going.

And now another free but required energy audit, this time a home visit by a new kind of auditor with an interesting young San Francisco company, Sustainable Spaces, paid for by Real Goods as part of their agreement with PG&E. With the diligence of a government tax inspector, Tom poked around our attic, crawled under the house where rattlesnakes are known to hang out, and wheeled in a major fan, then sealed the doors and windows to see where air was leaking throughout the house. He was a serious energy efficiency sleuth and I was relieved when he left near sundown with some straightforward recommendations to seal some leaks, improve our insulation in lots of spots and install carbon monoxide detectors—that one I hadn’t anticipated. Later we got a very thorough 20 page online report documenting his findings. But we weren’t ready to pay for any more improvements until we have swallowed the bills for the solar installation and started seeing some return.

By then it was late July and we came home from a brief vacation to find this gleaming structure on our roof, --hidden nicely away so that it can only be seen from our driveway ---and almost ready ---the final PG &E inspection and connection still to come.

The switch was thrown early in August---five months from our first inquiry---and I could see that inverter ka-ching the KWh like crazy.

Were the delays unusual or is this what to expect? We had a couple of glitches out of the ordinary, I’m told:

• Confusion over a difference in our house address on the application and the billing address where our meter is read on an adjacent property, set us back about a month. The Real Goods support person did 90% of the calls and paperwork but still a hassle.
• Our Real Goods installation guy ( a contractor for them but not an employe) reported that delays in availability of solar panels and a special installation rig to mount all the panels in one structure would delay us another month.

So how are we doing on the big question? First bill for August was $157, September shot up to $263---what happened---I’m still investigating? At that rate it could take 10 years to pay off but that assumes electricity costs won’t rise, At least my bills will never increase.

That’s close enough to our expectations to feel like we made the right choice and to get me to watch our monthly usage and bills more carefully, a side benefit. And I’m still trying to calibrate the daily ups and downs of our KWh---which would be helped if the Inverter made monthly calculations.

Things we didn’t do we probably should have done:

• Shopped our deal to more installers: there are more major installers covering larger territories in California, so we might have saved some $$ through competitive bidding.
• Shopped for financing—some of the major banks, B of A, Citi, Morgan and specialized financiers like www.cleanpowerfinance.com will arrange a loan that attempts to make it no more expensive than your current electric bills. What you save on solar goes to pay the cost of financing the installation, so that when it’s paid off, your electricity is free.

Stay tuned as we monitor our bills and figure out when to add to our system. So far, we’ve just begun to brag.

Useful Links

http://www.cleanpowerfinance.com

Clean Power Finance