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Old 09-18-13, 11:36 PM   #1
Geo NR Gee
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Default Solar Panel estimator guy came today

Today we had a solar panel sales company do some measurements on my house and check the proposed location to put the solar arrays. We won't get any estimates back until sometime next week. Being impatient as I am, I did a little rough figuring.

Our electrical usage is about 25kwh per day. 25 x 30 days = 750 kwh per month. Our peak sun hours are about 3.57 (which seems low). If I wanted the solar panel to offset my electricity usage by 100% then its 9103 watts total per year estimated. 9103 / 250 watt panels, then I would need 36 panels?

Does that seem right? Are we trying to offset 100% of the electricity we use?

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Old 09-19-13, 07:59 AM   #2
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That sounds right to me.

You can offset as much as you want. I personally don't feel the need to. I don't have any current plans to add power generation to my property, just minimize my usage as much as possible and maybe play around with some wind power once I get everything done and I'm bored with no projects (haha like that'll ever happen).
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Old 09-19-13, 08:39 AM   #3
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The incentives are pretty good here in Washington State for generating power from solar or wind or turbine. For solar, my power company pays .54cents a kwh production incentive for products made in Washington State or .15cents if not. Also there is a 30% Federal Tax Credit on the gross cost at installation.

I hear that the folks are getting checks in the $2500 to $3000 range from the power companies per year for generating extra power for the grid. They said that the payoff of their ROI is about 6 to 7 years.

We don't get that much wind here, so I don't see putting out any wind turbines.

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Old 09-19-13, 08:42 AM   #4
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Wow, yeah you got a good deal then.
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Old 09-19-13, 11:38 AM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Geo NR Gee View Post
The incentives are pretty good here in Washington State for generating power from solar or wind or turbine. For solar, my power company pays .54cents a kwh production incentive for products made in Washington State or .15cents if not. Also there is a 30% Federal Tax Credit on the gross cost at installation.

I hear that the folks are getting checks in the $2500 to $3000 range from the power companies per year for generating extra power for the grid. They said that the payoff of their ROI is about 6 to 7 years.

We don't get that much wind here, so I don't see putting out any wind turbines.
If I was getting .54 cents kwh I would put in as big a system as I could.
Wow.
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Old 09-19-13, 12:01 PM   #6
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Ditto, even just for the financial side... that is over 14% ROI!!!
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Old 09-19-13, 12:31 PM   #7
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In researching the panels made in WA. (where I get the .54 cent a kWh) there are only two makers.
One is Silicon Energy with a 30 year power warranty and ratings from 190w panels up to 205w panels.
The other is Itek Energy with a 25 year power warranty, but with more output of 225w panels up to 255w panels.
If I choose Itek then I would get the bluefrogsolar microinverter. The Silicon Energy doesn't have the microinverter setup that I am aware of. Plus the bluefrog has the ability to monitor each panel individually which will make it so I can have a array of panels on the south side of my roof and some on the west side when I expand as I can afford it.
From what I read, I can daisy chain more panels as I need with the microinverter system.
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Old 09-20-13, 11:45 AM   #8
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Yeah, I personally would go with microinverters as well. There might be more parts to fail, but they do seem to work better and are easier to install to begin with.
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Old 09-21-13, 11:01 AM   #9
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Geo NR Gee View Post
One is Silicon Energy with a 30 year power warranty and ratings from 190w panels up to 205w panels.
The other is Itek Energy with a 25 year power warranty, but with more output of 225w panels up to 255w panels.
Most companies that sell internationally have 25 year warranties because of some regulation about life span of warranties in some country, so instead of having a 25 year warranty in some areas and a 30 year or whatever warranty in other countries, 25 is now standard for most companies out there.
The warranty is also based off the expected half life of the panels, so with a 50+ year life span a 5-7 year pay back is pretty awesome.
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Old 09-23-13, 07:52 PM   #10
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I'm on an $.80 (on a 20 year contract) plan now but the current rate is $.396. It dropped as the cost to install dropped so that the average ROI was at least 11%. My 4kw netted me $4k last year and unfortunately, it was all I could fit on my roof.

I never heard of Bluefrog Microinverters, we can only use Enphase here because any inverter must have to have some Ontario content to get the good price.


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