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  #1  
Old 09-05-2008, 10:25 AM
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pictures of my solar installation

I just put 16 solar panels on the back of my house. We have a government program here in Ontario where they buy power produced by PV for .42 cents a kilowatt. This is a nice premium over the .12 cent they sell it for.

They should produce over $1000 a year in revenue, which should cover my hydro bill. This should pay back the total cost of the panels in about 6 1/2 years. Cost after rebates is about $7000 for the system

Thats a solar water heater on the roof above the panels

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pictures of my solar installation-solar6.jpg   pictures of my solar installation-soalr-1.jpg  
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  #2  
Old 09-05-2008, 10:27 AM
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What kind of maintenance do you have to do on those, Mistel?
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  #3  
Old 09-05-2008, 10:33 AM
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If you mean the solar panels, I imagine I will have to clean the snow off of them as they are at a pretty shallow angle. The ideal angle would be 43 degrees, but you can see I had a bunch of things to deal with. The windows above limited how high I could raise them, and I needed enough headroom to walk under them at the end of the deck. I will replace the old deck next and the new deck will be 6 inches lower to improve headroom.

I will just clean them with a hose every once and a while.

The hot water tubes just need the occaisional cleaning as well.
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  #4  
Old 09-05-2008, 10:35 AM
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Thumbs up

That's pretty cool!

My new home has a solar system for heating the pool, works very well. Perhaps I should consider expanding the system to include solar electrical panels as well...hmmm
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  #5  
Old 09-05-2008, 10:54 AM
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That is pretty awesome!

With the cost of utilities (and the fact that we get little rain or snow here in Texas), those panels would pay for themselves in about a year!

I can see however from the pics, that most homeowners associations would frown on such an install. I am hoping sometime in the future that there will be an aesthetically-pleasing design that can be integrated during home construction or into existing structures.
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Last edited by G-Benz; 09-05-2008 at 11:04 AM. Reason: spelling
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  #6  
Old 09-05-2008, 10:55 AM
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How does the solar array tie into the grid? Is there a transfer switch as with a residential generator?
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  #7  
Old 09-05-2008, 11:00 AM
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Originally Posted by G-Benz View Post
I am hoping sometime in the future that there will be an aesthetically-pleasing design that can be integrated during home construction or into existing structures.
That's a great niche business idea. I'd be surprised if someone, somewhere, wasn't working on just that.
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  #8  
Old 09-05-2008, 11:13 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mistel View Post
The ideal angle would be 43 degrees, but you can see I had a bunch of things to deal with.
You must be further south than I am in the Twin Cities area on MN or your calculations are off. My lat is 45 so if your ideal is 43 the sun will be higher on average. You must be down by Toronto.

BTW- Nice set up. That is really cool. Your pay back will be much quicker than 6.5 years because of the savings on energy bills as well.
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  #9  
Old 09-05-2008, 11:22 AM
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Did that $7000 after rebates include the necessary electrical work to tie everything into your panel (inverter, storage batteries, etc) or was it just for the panels? Is that an additional panel on your roof or is it just the panels that you have set up as an awning?

I'm very interested in doing this to my home in the future. I'd kill to get off the grid, so if it works out revenue neutral that would be great. The idea of making money off of it is even better. Those panels last up to 20 years now, so if you pay back in 7 years you can expect to make money for the next 13.
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  #10  
Old 09-05-2008, 11:36 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mistel View Post
I just put 16 solar panels on the back of my house. We have a government program here in Ontario where they buy power produced by PV for .42 cents a kilowatt. This is a nice premium over the .12 cent they sell it for.

They should produce over $1000 a year in revenue, which should cover my hydro bill. This should pay back the total cost of the panels in about 6 1/2 years. Cost after rebates is about $7000 for the system

Thats a solar water heater on the roof above the panels
Very cool, Mistel! I could never get away with it in our Historic District but we have researched it quite a bit for our business and may very well do something in the near future (we've got 45K sq.ft. of roof space in full sun, all day-it'd be a shame not to utilize it).

There are a number of companies here in the states getting into leasing them now. Obviously the "payback" won't be as quick as if you bought them but you don't have the replacement costs either. We're looking at roughly $240K after incentives and rebates for a system large enough to support 50-60% of our peak needs (we're real seasonal energy-use wise). If we buy them we're looking at about 10 years to pay for itself which would give us (hopefully) 10 years of free energy, or even making some putting it back into the system during off-peak periods, which is considerable money in our pocket.

Quote:
Originally Posted by G-Benz
I can see however from the pics, that most homeowners associations would frown on such an install. I am hoping sometime in the future that there will be an aesthetically-pleasing design that can be integrated during home construction or into existing structures.
There are "roof shingle" types that get wired into an array. I definitely couldn't get away with it but they might pass HA muster. I've considered seeing if they'd approve them for use on my garage but I don't have the money to do anything about it yet.
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  #11  
Old 09-05-2008, 12:00 PM
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My administrator at the office put in solar panels on a slope in her back yard, and it is connected directly to the grid.

Her meter actually runs backwards if the power she produces is greater than their consumption.
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  #12  
Old 09-05-2008, 12:03 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SwampYankee View Post

There are "roof shingle" types that get wired into an array. I definitely couldn't get away with it but they might pass HA muster. I've considered seeing if they'd approve them for use on my garage but I don't have the money to do anything about it yet.
HA's have to be the most retarded neanderthal's standing in the way of effective use of Solar power. There is no excuse for every house in Phoenix, and I'd imagine every other southern town in the US not having these all over their roofs other than the suburb Nazi's. But what the hell is the objection? It's not as if the roofs in all these tacky subdivisions are worthy of the National Gallery or are some Frank Loyd Wright creation.

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  #13  
Old 09-05-2008, 12:05 PM
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That's an amazing payback rate! Every time I spec a system the payback is something like 40 years. Most people want to see results quick and don't plan for the long term. It really gets expensive when you add it all up - the panels, high capacity grid intertie, batteries (if you use them).

The water heating system is much more cost effective and should provide an even faster ROI. Is that one of those vacuum tube water systems? I've been planning on building a system here but I haven't gotten around to it.
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  #14  
Old 09-05-2008, 12:09 PM
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  #15  
Old 09-05-2008, 12:13 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by KarTek View Post
That's an amazing payback rate! Every time I spec a system the payback is something like 40 years. Most people want to see results quick and don't plan for the long term. It . . . . .
Forty years! Yikes. I have to show customers how to get payback within 1 1/2 to 3 years to sell the equipment I sell. Of course, this is commercial machinery, not household solar systems, but still, I would think forty years WOULD be a tough sell.

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