Solar panels
Last week we got our own solar system: a solar PV system installed by Southern Energy Management. Friday morning, I flipped the breaker that officially “tied” it to the power grid. The rooftop panels then began feeding electricity to both our home and the neighborhood.
It’s been a long journey to get here and we’re not done yet. It was two years ago that we first considered getting solar panels. We got the roof surveyed and a quote generated but didn’t feel the need to jump on it yet. Then in February, the rapid rise of stupidity in our state legislature made me wonder if the many incentives now in place to encourage solar adoption might soon vanish with the setting sun. I also knew the price of solar had dropped considerably in that time so it was wise to revisit the decision.
We got a quote, got an incentive thrown in by SEM, and soon signed a contract for our solar PV system.
Then, nothing. Weeks went by and nothing took place. Fortunately, we were told ahead of time that work was being done behind the scenes, as paperwork and permits got filed to create the system. By mid-April we were scheduling SEM site visits and sizing up our roof. Then over a frenetic span of a few days our system got installed. Yay!
So what do we have? We have a grid-tie system, meaning our power generation is tied with the power company’s power. If this “grid” loses power, so do we. On the bright side, any excess power generation gets fed back to the grid and removed from our power bill. That’s the way it’s supposed to work, anyway. Our existing electric meter doesn’t know what to do with the extra power and clocks it as energy used, rather than energy generated. Until Duke Energy Progress gets around to installing our bidirectional meter, we’ll not only be giving Duke free power, we’ll be getting charged to do it! I’m told that getting Duke to install the bidirectional meter has been known to take a while. We’ve opted not to power up our system until we can be credited for it. We don’t want to give Duke any more money than we have to!
One of the most disappointing things of the system is that it’s kind of … well, boring! There’s nothing really to show off. The panels just sit there on the roof, the inverter hums and displays statistics, the “Tigo Maximizer” monitoring unit doesn’t really display anything. It’s a bit anticlimatic, really. Yet, point a web browser to our eGauge power monitor and one’s computer screen fills with a beautiful red and green bar graph showing power being used and generated. The panels silently and reliably pull power out of the sky and nothing moves but the electrons.
We’ve got one or maybe two more visits by SEM to officially bless the system, followed by a visit from Duke Energy for their blessing and the installation of the bidirectional meter. Once that gets done, we’ll be producing power whenever the sun’s shining. That’s a future that’s pretty darn bright.