Solar Panels
We’ve had solar panels on our roof for about 6 months now, and they’ve been operating for about 3 months. I’ve had quite a few questions about them and will attempt to answer some of these questions here.
The most common question has been “How are they working out?” I assume people are wondering whether we are recouping the money we spent on them. Well… since we are leasing the panels for 15 years we pay about $40 per month with no upfront cost. Our February bill was the first full bill with the panels turned on. I did the math and we would have spent $21 dollars more on our power bill without the panels. So we spent $19 to help save the environment. Our March bill would have been $27 more so we spent $13. At this rate we will at least break even. With the electricity price increasing in May and the day length increasing as well we may even make a little money.
One of the benefits of the lease is that the monitoring is provided free of charge (I’d have to pay for monitoring if I purchased the panels outright). Monitoring the panels refers to the inverter sending production information to Solar City. They in turn publish my production information on a website that they monitor in case the panels start to fail, and allows me to see how much electricity has been produced on my roof. Anyone can see this website: Link.
It seems that many people are skeptical of it being a wise financial investment to put solar panels on their roof. Rumors and heresay permeate the atmosphere when it comes to new technology. I can’t say for sure, I haven’t had them for an entire year, but even if all we do is break even, we’re helping the environment with no out of pocket expense. We are also hedging our power bill against further rate increases from SRP; rate increases that have become an annual occurance lately.
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What is the wattage rating on your panels and how much do they actually produce? I am seriously considering putting some panels on my roof.
The system is rated at 3.8 KW. That rating is defined based on lab tests under very specific conditions that rarely occur on a roof. That said I typically run around 2800 to 3000 watts during the height of the day, provided it isn’t smoggy or dusty or cloudy, and the panels don’t have a thick layer of dust. You can figure out what I am getting if you look at the graph from the link in the article. each green line represents 30 minutes, so just double the value and that is the average wattage produced during that 30 minute period. Our panels are flush mounted on our roof too, so they will get better wattage when the angle of the sun is just right. I have seen the wattage readout on the inverter jump above 4000 watts when the edge of a cloud magnifies the sunlight. Speaking of that we should get up there with a couple big mirrors before it gets too hot to see if it makes a difference.