Update on my solar install

[John Rogers]

The street I live on only has two houses with out solar and they are rentals that the owners were original to the small development we have.

[T77911S]

Originally Posted by Evans, Marv

OK, I just got my year "true up" from S.D.G.&E for this past year. I was really curious about what the situation would be. Like John, part of my motivation was to get away from "paying those crooks at S.D.G.&E." My system went on line June 15th of last year, so I'm missing about half a sunny month of generation because the "true up" ended the end of the month before the system went on line. Here are some numbers. My system cost $27K. With the tax credit I got $8.1K back from the Feds, so net cost was $18.9K. My average monthly electric bill was something like $250/mo. (IIRC) or very close to $3K/yr. My "true up" statement gave me a credit of $41.57 after S.D.G.&E.'s fees were deducted. (The company said they tried to match generation and usage.) So if this past year is any indication, the system should pay for itself in about 6.3 years. The company said approximately 5 years for pay off. I have 25 panels that can generate a max of 300-315 W/hr./panel so max is 7.5 KW/hr. Unlike John's, my system doesn't generate the same if it's not sunny or it's raining, so during winter months, generation is down. My system generated a net of 255+ KWh in Nov. '16. This past April and May the system generated 1.4MWh+ each month. On balance, it looks like this thing is going to work out OK if there is no damage/disruption to the system. Congrats again, John. I'm hoping we & lots of others who got in on the net metering program will be able to stick it to S.D.G.&E. on a long term basis.

we looked into this too. I don't remember all the numbers so some may be wrong.
we looked at the same size, around 8kw. price was much different, around 40k. they managed to drop it down a lot, I think in the 20'smaybe 30k.
they also wanted to add insulation in the attic and some kind of barrier which I don't think they could have put up.
when I got online to check the size I kept coming up with around 15kw system.
I found the price of the panels and inverter and I think it totaled about 12k. add in installation and that price was waaaaay lower than my purchase price.
I backed out until I could research it more.

[Evans, Marv]

When I first checked out a solar system almost ten years ago, I got bids for around $50K. I decided to wait for costs to go down. My house is all electric, & I live in a rural area and always intended to convert to a solar system. Prices here are running in the $1K+ per panel range around here. Since our net metering program has closed out and demand has declined somewhat, the price may have gone down more. You can't install your own system here unless you are a licensed electrician for doing that. My roof isn't the usual pitched roof where they could just install the panels against the roof. It's a low pitch roof with a parapet wall, so they had to make a supporting structure for the panels. The company kept referring to it as a "flat" roof even though I'd correct them & say it had a shallow pitch. Consequently I think it cost them more in man hours to install it than they anticipated. I'll post a pic of it. If you can do it yourself or have friends do it, that's all well & good. Otherwise I think a realistic ROI is in the six to seven year range as far as cost is concerned.

[T77911S]

are any you having any kind of insulation upgrade done to your house to make it more efficient?
I think that is where I was suppose to make up some of the differences.
I want to say I am using around 20kw a month???
and they wanted to install an 8kw system I think.


yea, that's considered a flat roof.

[red-beard]

Originally Posted by T77911S

are any you having any kind of insulation upgrade done to your house to make it more efficient?
I think that is where I was suppose to make up some of the differences.
I want to say I am using around 20kw a month???
and they wanted to install an 8kw system I think.


yea, that's considered a flat roof.

Energy usage is in kWh and power is in kW.

Look at your bill and see how many kWh you are using per month. Divide this by 150 and that should be the approximate size of your solar energy system.

If you are in a super sunny area like San Diego, you might divide by 180. If you cannot get net metering, you need to look deeper and see what your maximum usage is at various points during the day and design a system to cut your usage down to that level.

If I was in San Diego and without Net Metering, I would still install a system, I just would install a much smaller system. If I read things correctly, San Diego is now not paying for any power generated and sent out of the system. You can do it "two ways" but it is better just to lose the excess power.