Solar Power Information – How Much Does It Cost?

The cost of your solar powered generator to run your home or business depends a lot upon the electric load you have today and your estimate of any changes in the future.  That is why it is recommended the first thing you do is to reduce your electric load though conservation and better insulation.

Solar Power Information – Steps to Estimate Cost

Step 1 – Determine Your Current Electric Load

Collect your electric bills for the last one or two years.  Add up the amount of electricity consumed and divide by the number of months.  This will give you an average monthly electric load.  Now multiply that load times the current rate you pay for electricity.  That is your average cost per month for electricity.  Please not the highest and lowest month consumption.  You may want to use the highest monthly load as your load so you cover all of your electric needs.

Step 2 – Estimate Your Future Load Increases.

You may not see any changes in your load but if you are moving from gas or oil heat to electric heat, that would be an increase.  Remember we want to estimate the load not the cost increases.

Step 3 – How Much Sun Does Your Home or Business Receive

The more sun exposure your building gets the easier it is to build a solar powered generator that will meet all of your electric needs.  So how much sun exposure do your get?  Here is a link  to a site where you can determine your average sun exposure – http://rredc.nrel.gov/solar/pubs/redbook/

Step 4 -Size Your System

Once you have determined the load, sun exposure and turned that into KW/day needed.  All you need to do is find a system that will deliver that amount of energy in your location.  I will be posting more information on this in the near future.

Step 5 – Rebates

Rebates for solar powered installations are available but many are ending.  So you need to check to see what is available to you to offset some of the cost of your system.

Solar Power Information – The Installation

Now you have all the basic information you need to build or purchase a system.

For more information on solar panels see Solar Power Information – PV Solar Panel.

The more solar power information you know the more informed decisions you can make about solar energy.