New to Grid Tied Home Solar...

[Redneck in training]

I just put 3.84 kW of solar panels on a house we bought in town. 12 320 W panels to fill whole south facing roof. But I bought 7.7 kW inverter because I see electric car in our future. So we could add another 6 kW on the east facing roof. The total investment in hardware before tax credit was 6940 USD. Our utility allows DIY so I hired a helper (younger guy) for two days to help me with the installation on the roof. The sweet spot of current cost of the solar panels is 320W for 205 USD or 64 cents/W or about $1.65/W (before tax credit) including the, rapid shutdown modules, wiring, racking, breakers, disconnect switch and 5 kW inverter. Tax credit for 2020 is 26%. It drops to 22% in 2021. Estimated break even point (assuming constant cost of electric power) about 7 years.


Day 1


Day 2

 

[MossRoad]

Good luck with it. I find this stuff interesting. :thumbsup:

 

[Redneck in training]

Our current house has 24 kW of solar because we heat with electricity. We produce about double of our consumption but we still have electric bill about 139 USD/month. Our rural utility doesn't offer net metering. With net metering we would make about 200-300/month. Nevertheless we are approaching the break even point. Th e problem with solar is cost of installation. But I found that it is very DIY. In fact it is almost impossible to do it wrong.

 

[Alien]

We only have a 3.9 kW inverter (21 panels) about 8 years old now so I guess, old technology. Last couple of power bills we were in credit about $50 and that is using Reverse cycle air for heating. (I'm a sook) We are lucky as we get 50c per kW for excess so it helps a lot. Locked in for another 7 years.
By then I will have installed a larger system so that we should never have to pay for grid power again.

I should mention, our bills are 3 monthly. Most we have had to pay was $200 and that was a year or two ago.
I used to monitor it, it has paid for itself 3 times over now and original cost back then with extra bracket framing was $11,000
Now you get a lot more for less than half the price.
No maintenance whatsoever so far.

 

[ultrarunner]

Expecting a check again for excess... helps offset the high cost of water and sewer runs about $125 per month BEFORE a drop of water used... so I'm pleased to not have an electric bill.... water pencils out at about a penny a gallon.

Many of the 19 year old system are being replaced...

One of the Docs offered his 2009 3kW system for $1,000.

He is increasing 3 fold due to electric vehicle...

 

[Redneck in training]

We only have a 3.9 kW inverter (21 panels) about 8 years old now so I guess, old technology. Last couple of power bills we were in credit about $50 and that is using Reverse cycle air for heating. (I'm a sook) We are lucky as we get 50c per kW for excess so it helps a lot. Locked in for another 7 years.
By then I will have installed a larger system so that we should never have to pay for grid power again.

I should mention, our bills are 3 monthly. Most we have had to pay was $200 and that was a year or two ago.
I used to monitor it, it has paid for itself 3 times over now and original cost back then with extra bracket framing was $11,000
Now you get a lot more for less than half the price.
No maintenance whatsoever so far.

We installed our first system at the end of 2012 right after the cost of the panels collapsed below a $1/W. We have 96 250W panels with microinverters.

 

[Jim Nelson]

I learned something Thursday,12-3-20, when our power co turned the power off from 2:00 am til 8:00 pm. I checked my production the next day after power was restored and it said 0 production for 12-3-20. Later that day I went to get my mail and there was a service truck at the neighbors so I stopped and asked him why. He said that the solar system needs power either from a battery system, like the Tesla wall, or a generator system when the power is out. He was a real nice guy who lives in a rural area like ours and has solar, He said he told his wife that he was going to start the generator and she complained about the noise disturbing neighbors. He took her outside and all you could hear was generators.
I called the next day to have an electrician come out and wire my gen. set to the house so this doesn't happen again, he said it would be a while as he was getting calls every few minutes for the same thing.

Just a warning in case any of you, like me, were not aware of this.

 

[orezok]

I learned something Thursday,12-3-20, when our power co turned the power off from 2:00 am til 8:00 pm. I checked my production the next day after power was restored and it said 0 production for 12-3-20. Later that day I went to get my mail and there was a service truck at the neighbors so I stopped and asked him why. He said that the solar system needs power either from a battery system, like the Tesla wall, or a generator system when the power is out. He was a real nice guy who lives in a rural area like ours and has solar, He said he told his wife that he was going to start the generator and she complained about the noise disturbing neighbors. He took her outside and all you could hear was generators.
I called the next day to have an electrician come out and wire my gen. set to the house so this doesn't happen again, he said it would be a while as he was getting calls every few minutes for the same thing.

Just a warning in case any of you, like me, were not aware of this.

The reason your solar shuts down when the grid power goes out is to keep from electrocuting a lineman from a back feed.

 

[ultrarunner]

I think it would still be down with generator because it is grid tied?

 

[Jim Nelson]

Well the service guy from S.D.G.&E. said that if you have a generator running it will work, this of course requires that the generator is properly wired into the house so that it cannot feed back into the system. He told me that he has this system and it works great and the solar will supply power over what the gen. set puts out. As I understood him the solar needs the a.c. to act like an exciter for the system.

I am clueless and that is why I asked him in the first place. I can't imagine why he would tell me to do something that may kill him but as I said I'm clueless.