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garycook_gw

Thinking about a Solar panel system,???s

garycook
18 years ago

I am thinking about a solar system and am just starting to explore the costs and viability.Has anybody got any experience? advice?

I live in N.Nevada and have a flat roof condo,2000sqft,3br,3bth. I use about 1.3kwhr per month.I believe there is a credit of 4.00 a watt by my utility. At $68 oil I am getting interested and want to beat the rush when oil hits $120 in 2years,any help would be appreciated.

Gary

Comment (1)

  • RCMJr
    18 years ago

    .

    You're looking at a pretty good sized system . . if you wanna come close to generating your usage over any period of time . . . though as best I know Nevada has a fair amount of sunshine available.

    My usage was 160 to 320 kWh / month ( over a 5 year period / 1800 sq ft ) . . ended up putting in 2.8 kW array and grid-tie / inverter / batteries etc. I meet about 80% of my usage on an annual basis. I'm in central New York state; the weather here ( solar-wise ) is abomnible at times. A sunnier clime would produce more electricity for sure. Know that if considering such a system; that every dollar spent reducing consumption; provides about $20 reduction of system cost. NY has a pretty good incentive; at the time of my installation it was $4 per watt of PV panel rated capacity. Toss in a state tax credit, and a federal one too . . all told they ate about half the cost of the system; which was ~ $30k for the whole shootin' match; installed. This include the WHOLE thing; including dealing with the local utility which can be no small nightmare. You don't wanna do this strictly for financial reasons; at least here and in most places it just doesn't "work" well in that sense. Do it for other reasons as well . . such as independence during power outages, environmental reasons . . etc.

    I'll agree that it is cheaper / faster payback to do other types of solar . . . such as water / space heating etc; than PV stuff. PV continues to get cheaper, and rates continue to go up . . some day it WILL "pay" to do; right now most places it just isn't the case . .

    Good luck . . .

    Bob

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