this post was submitted on 07 Aug 2023
215 points (99.1% liked)
Asklemmy
43392 readers
1607 users here now
A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions
Search asklemmy π
If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!
- Open-ended question
- Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
- Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
- Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
- An actual topic of discussion
Looking for support?
Looking for a community?
- Lemmyverse: community search
- sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
- !lemmy411@lemmy.ca: a community for finding communities
~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I'm an electrical engineer who designs commercial and Utility Scale PV systems (i.e. Multi acre solar power plants), though I've done a couple dozen residential systems as well.
@evranch@lemmy.ca chimed in with some really good advice, but I wanted to add a few things.
If I were to do my own system I'd go with micro inverters, enphase IQ8 most likely, as they can be setup to operate during a grid outage, either with a battery backup, or with a load balancing panel.
Careful of the downfalls of going the DIY route, not sure how it is in your state, but in some states I've worked in you will forfeit incentives if you don't use a qualified installer.
Get familiar with your utilities net metering policies, if they don't net meter power at or near retail rates then you'll end up giving them your power for free/cheap whenever you overgenerate. Some utilities will also make it difficult if you're not going through a qualified installer.
Lastly, and this is coming from someone who understands the industry intimately, really take a look at the numbers and decide if this makes sense for you. Most residential solar will take 5-10 years to pay for itself (after incentives) and start to generate a profit. Compare that with the same sum invested in a general s&p500 index fund which would likely have doubled in value during that time.
Ultimately I decided not to install solar on my home, despite the ability to 100% DIY the whole thing and get parts at steep discounts, and instead installed a backup generator and signed up with a local community solar array (which is not something that all states/utilities allow).
Happy to answer any questions you may have!
One guy from Poland posted a video in polish on YT where he calculated that his roof solar in last 10 years of operation provided significantly less RoI than if he simply bought gold at market price 10 years ago and sold it now.
This is a freaking scam over here. We need power mostly in winter, especially with the push to install more heat pumps. Solar is not working in the winter here, people literally got scammed by government that subsidized solar and heat pumps installations for lower income families on the condition that they remove coal or wood powered heating. Now they canβt afford to run those heat pumps!
in poland specifically:
if you want to reduce your carbon footprint, or you want to use it all without selling energy, or such, you'll be fine. if you believed robocalls that say that it will get you net passive income from that, tough luck
if you want to get a better deal, get solar water heater. it works always if there are no clouds, even in winter you can get 40C on a clear day
Thanks for this reply! I put off the professional install of panels as the ROI was just too far out. Self install did come up as I'm fairly competent but your points still highlight the problems. Sometimes the numbers just don't work, even if you can do it cheap