Not Going Solar Today<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Time to take a break from politics and talk about day-to-day decisions and the \u201cGreen Revolution.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n As befits a person of my age and political proclivities, I wander through Facebook from time to time.\u00a0As I was perusing the different posts, checking on friends, calling out ridiculous alt-right claims, cheering the ones that support my view, and making sure the lost dogs find their way home; I noticed a paid ad for solar panels.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSet yourself free from the power companies,\u201d they said, \u201czero money up front.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n Now I may have been born at night, but it wasn\u2019t last night (with or without solar power.) I knew that the ad was too good to be true, but I wanted to understand how solar power works on homes and with the existing power grid, and what better way to find out than to reach out for information. And, Jenn and I would like to find a way to be more \u201cgreen,\u201d becoming a renewable power provider, rather than (here in Ohio) a natural gas and coal user.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The salesman came over, a nice young man from a nearby community, and took us through the process of solar energy.\u00a0\u00a0With enough panels, he said, you can provide energy for one hundred percent of your needs.\u00a0By producing more than you need during the daytime, putting the excess out on the power grid, you offset the amount used from the power grid at night: make enough in the summer months when the solar heating is at the greatest, and offset the winter months when the sun is lower in the sky and shining on the roof less.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course it isn\u2019t cheap, it\u2019s a big capital expense.\u00a0\u00a0But the cost of panels, connections and installation are offset by: \u201cTHE END OF ELECTRIC BILLS<\/strong>.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Here’s the pitch:\u00a0\u00a0trade electric bills for capital cost financing for five to eight years.\u00a0After that, you have freedom from the electric company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s a fascinating process.\u00a0The panels are arrayed on the roof section with the most exposure, in our case, a full southern face.\u00a0\u00a0They are linked together to an inverter that translates the DC electric current produced by the panels to the AC current needed by the house.\u00a0\u00a0The AC is run into a special electric meter provided by the power company, measuring both the amount produced by the panels, and the amount used by the house.\u00a0If there is more power made than used, that power is credited to the house from the electric grid.\u00a0\u00a0Think of running the electric meter backward and forward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So we were excited when he called back with our \u201cpersonal home plan.\u201d Jenn and I did some independent investigation showing that the likely cost of powering the entire electric use for our house would be about $47000 in capital costs. I was fascinated to see what the bottom line would be from my chosen company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I had a foreshadowing of issues to come from the phone call before the meeting, \u201cI\u2019m bringing my sales manager along with me if that\u2019s OK.\u201d It was even more shadowy, when the nice young man pulled out the \u201cflip book\u201d with pictures and quizzes, taking us through a full presentation of much of the information we talked about the week before. I felt like I was no longer \u201cgoing green;\u201d instead it was the dreaded \u201cwindow guy\u201d or the kid selling Cutco knives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But Jenn and I slogged through it with him; maybe the young guy had to impress his equally young boss.\u00a0We waited an hour for the bottom line, those last few pages that would tell we wanted to know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The big excitement \u2013 after tax credits it was only a $22,000 capital cost. That was great, we would definitely be interested, even if for a few years we had to pay our \u201celectric bill plus.\u201d We wanted to be independent, and we were willing to pay for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then the first big disappointment \u2013 \u201c.,,our specially designed plan would provide sixty percent of our electric needs for the year.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Sixty percent \u2013 so we aren\u2019t \u201cfree\u201d from the electric grid at all, in fact we are still totally dependent.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cWell,\u201d the manager said, \u201cif we look at the potential increases in the cost of electricity projected over the next ten years, this will save you money.\u201d But that was only a small part of our goal:\u00a0\u00a0we wanted to become a renewable power source, not a lesser dirty power consumer.\u00a0\u00a0$22,000 for sixty percent on our little 1800 square foot house with no trees:\u00a0\u00a0that\u2019s not a great deal at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The second big disappointment \u2013 the capital cost of putting our \u201csixty percent\u201d system in place, would cost more than our current power bill, and then we would have to pay for the forty percent of additional power we needed. Twelve years of increased cost, and at the end, still only making sixty percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We pressed them for a one hundred percent solution, but they really didn\u2019t want to deal with that. They said the power company wouldn\u2019t let them do one hundred percent, and skimmed over the cost of ninety-five percent with an additional twenty panels. It must not have been part of their \u201cshtick,\u201d or they guessed that we wouldn\u2019t pay the cost. They never gave us a chance to find out. They guessed wrong, it was sixty percent, not the overall cost, that was the problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our young salesman got irritated, and the young boss closed his computer. They thanked us for saying \u201cno\u201d rather than wasting their time, but it was clear that they felt like we did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So we aren\u2019t going to get solar energy \u2013 at least from the two young men who pitched us today. But we will keep our \u201ctoes\u201d in the solar field, maybe someone else can help us \u201cgo green.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ll keep checking on Facebook. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"