Planning Home Solar Installations

There is some planning that is involved in converting your home into a primary source of solar power. These transformations of your home can cost a good deal of money up front but can save you a ton of money on the back end.

The first thing you want to do is to calculate the amount of electricity that is required for your home to function daily. If you are not doing a full conversion but yet just a partial, just calculate the percentage based on a portion of the daily electricity.

Most utility bills can be easy to calculate cause most of them will show you exactly how much are using for not only the month you are in but also the month past in that year. If you plan on completely eliminating your utilities company than you need to do your calculations based on the peak demand.

Figuring out how much electricity is required for you home on a monthly or yearly basis is easy and takes rather simple arithmetic. Based on the amount of peak electricity used will allow you figure out how many PV modules you will need. Just take the area of the south-facing rooftop section of your home to the number and size of the PV modules needed.

For a decent sized home the panels will run in the range of $10,000-$16,000 at the prices listed today. But keep in mind that there are ways to offset some of them invest with tax rebates and other programs. The power that each module will generate will come at a certain cost. But as you can see finding the total output and cost is pretty easy.

There are other costs that you have to factor into your estimate as well. Everything adds up, even connectors, wires, clamps, and other components. The prices on these materials will vary based on brand and where you get them from. The other cost is installation, because most homeowners are not experienced enough to install them themselves.

The one thing that you have to understand is that the sun only shines during the day therefore you only produce solar energy during the day. At night the cloud cover, darkness, and rain will reduce the insulation. The best thing for you to do if you are completely going off grid is to get a battery storage system. During these times the batteries can draw power from the local utility company.

Your meter normally runs forward if you are drawing power from the utility companies system. However, if you system is generating more than what you need to use at any given time most utility companies will set up an agreement for your excess energy. That usually is done by you running your meter backward actually supplying the utility company with power.

Before a utility company will sign an agreement they will want to make sure that your system is safe and operational. During a power outage they have to assume that there’s no power running through the lines, and that your system is installed in a way that guarantees that. As a matter of fact most municipalities will require that you have your system inspected and approved even before you are entirely of grid, so that they make sure its safe for local lineman.

Now using this method is a heavy upfront cost and you won’t be able to take advantage of the savings over night. This will take a bit to recoup your money but in the long run will save you tons. This is said because most panel, installations, wires, and batteries will cost you somewhere around $32,000-$50,000 depending on who installs it.

As you can see, solar powered energy is going to save you quite a bit of money over time. Due to the rising cost of electricity it may very well be worth your while to have solar panels installed.