Herb's Solar-Powered House
Mar 16, 2010 9:47 - 5 Comments
Now that it’s stopped raining for a while, I don’t know about you but I am thinking about sun! My neighbor recently pointed out >Rockville Central friend Herb Winkler’s amazing solar array on his roof and suggested we do a piece on it. Herb has gone way beyond signing up for wind power — he’s actually generating his own electricity.
Here’s what Herb says about his setup:
Our solar array produces 4.3 kw, which is an instantaneous power production value. It should produce 5289 kwh over the course of a year. This figure depends on the number of sunny days we have, and the orientation of the array (south facing and tilted at 39 degrees is best for our latitude). Other orientations, shade and cloudy days will compromise energy production, but are taken into account when projecting a system’s efficiency. The sidewalks were recently widened on Beall Ave, and two neighboring trees were removed. The resulting sun exposure makes our roof ideal, and the carbon offset exceeds those tree’s carbon absorption effect.
The financial incentives make the payoff much faster than the avoided cost of energy alone. Montgomery County offers a property tax credit of 50% of the system’s cost, capped at $5000. The US tax credit is 30% of the cost, and is not capped. Maryland’s grant depends on the system’s size, and it’s capped at $10,000. Additionally, because of Maryland’s participation in the regional greenhouse gas initiative, a renewable energy credit is awarded with every megawatt hour produced, and those are sold to polluters to offset carbon emissions. We get paid to generate energy even if we use it ourselves. It really pays to produce, and not pollute!
Man, that is one sweet deal. Go, Herb!
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I would like to learn more about such a system. I have a pretty good location on two upper parts of my roof that would be essentially invisible from the ground.It sounds like, with tax credits, 80% of the system’s cost is subsidized? Is that right?I also imagine there’s a fair-sized electronics and switching package required to manage 4.3kW of power and feed it back into the grid or use it in-home.Lets say I wanted to shoot for 1.5-2.0kW. What is the installed cost, what would tax subsidies pay for, and what would be my payback period? What is the service life of the system? Considering total ownership cost is a more valuable comparison.
A 2kw system could run about $14k, and qualify for 4.2k fed, 2.5k MD and 5k county, leaving you to cover the remaining 2.3k for a system that will pay for itself in avoided energy costs in 10 years at todays rates. PEPCO did announce a price hike (http://www.gazette.net/stories/12312009/montnew141730_32553.php) that’ll reduce the payback period even further. The big incentive is the renewable energy credits mentioned above but not included here because it depends on the output of the system, affected by orientation and shading. Service life is 10 years for the inverter, and 25 years for the panels which have no moving parts.We were looking at putting together a solar coop with area residents. Interested?
Hurry for Herb!! Do you have a seperate meter to count generated KwH? The Solar Co-op was talked about in the latest issue of “Solar Today” as a means of communities having lots of PV, the possibilities of “renting” roof space elsewhere locally but you own the PV for thse without optimal sun, large group buys to reduce power, etc. I suspect Carl Henn is an RE (renewable Energy) guythere is also a WECA meeting tonight (thurs) i thinkRobert 544 Beall.8,500+KWH gen since 2000
We have a new digital meter, installed in January and it read 00000 kwh. It now reads 99707kwh, which means we generated 293 more kwh than we used, and we made 896 kwh so far. That means we generate 150% of what we use. We sized the system considering an electric car in the future.
I got notice of this solar expo in Bethesda on June 12. See below or http://www.bethesdagreen.orgBethesda Green Inaugurates Solar Bethesda Expo Bethesda Green, a local non-profit model for sustainable living practices, is launching its inaugural Solar Bethesda Expo, Saturday, June 12, 2010, 10 am – 4 pm, 4825 Cordell Avenue, Suite 200, Bethesda. Solar Bethesda will offer visitors an information-packed showcase event featuring solar providers, cooperative purchasers, government and financing specialists and more. This event will provide homeowners and other interested parties an opportunity to get the latest information about solar-powered technologies, purchasing and investment opportunities, and incentives for home installation. There is no charge to attend this event. Presentations will include: Home Solar Readiness Check via Satellite Mapping, State of the Art in Solar Energy, Purchasing Co-ops, Government Incentives and Financing Options, Living with Solar (a round-table discussion with homeowners). Plus there will be activities for children to learn more about solar power. Representatives from the following organizations will be available to comment on the state of solar power in our community: Solar Energy World, Maryland Clean Energy Center, Astrum Solar, Clean Currents Solar, groSolar, Kenergy, 21st Century Power Solutions, Common Cents Solar, Leo Sunergy, Montgomery County Department of Environmental Protection, Pepco, Smith Design Construction, Standard Solar, Sunnovations and Switch Renewable Energy. RSVP for Solar Bethesda For more information, go to http://www.bethesdagreen.org or email info@bethesdagreen.org