Solar power systems for the home

[the-rasta-masta]

Originally Posted by Wormius

Thanks for the reminder! I completely forgot that we applied for the grant a couple of years ago and then some door-to-door guy came by and the general price range of our panel system came out looking pretty favourable.

We weren’t approached by these guys, but good thing to be careful with who you go with and get a few quotes.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...ales-1.7619501

We’re looking at Solar YYC since after looking at their proposal they didn’t fudge some of the numbers like another place did. Which would have given us more panels, but it seems like Enmax can give you grief if your system is overloaded. We’re not a big home though, so we can only get 13 panels.

Anybody have their home insurance affected by getting panels?

There's a strong push from MLAs to get Door to Door Solar put on the banned list for what can be sold door to door. The amount of nightmare stories I've heard over the years is insane in terms of high pressure tactics, crazy high prices, and even clients who got put on some financing plan and were making multiple payments and never getting installed.

Enmax doesn't necessarily give you grief if you end up overproducing after the system is permitted (or if your electricity use falls as you make your home more efficient). It's the permitting process itself that is a bit of a dance in trying to get the highest possible system size based on what the homeowner qualifies for.

I work at Solar YYC on the sales team, (maybe I quoted you!) but you're in good hands with any of the team here.

[Bigtime]

I knew before I even clicked that link that it would be Northern PWR that screwed that person.

[ken0042]

I've started telling door to door solar people "sorry, but we are renting."

[Bigtime]

These door to door types have even come and talked with us, fully acknowledging we have solar but taking the opportunity to say they are "protecting people from less reputable companies like Skyfire"... wait wut?

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by the-rasta-masta

There's a strong push from MLAs to get Door to Door Solar put on the banned list for what can be sold door to door. The amount of nightmare stories I've heard over the years is insane in terms of high pressure tactics, crazy high prices, and even clients who got put on some financing plan and were making multiple payments and never getting installed.

Enmax doesn't necessarily give you grief if you end up overproducing after the system is permitted (or if your electricity use falls as you make your home more efficient). It's the permitting process itself that is a bit of a dance in trying to get the highest possible system size based on what the homeowner qualifies for.

I work at Solar YYC on the sales team, (maybe I quoted you!) but you're in good hands with any of the team here.

That’s good to know.

The one door-to-door place, Nuvo, did some weird stuff with our monthly consumption numbers in their Aurora system. Didn’t match our Enmax bill at all which made the quote from Solar YYC kind of confusing at first - I was like, “how come we got quotes for 15 panels from this other place but you’re adamant about 13 being the right amount?”. The only thing was our recent PHEV purchase that isn’t reflected in all of our Enmax bills yet.

Anyway, I am not entirely sure if we are dealing with you or somebody else at the moment, but we’re in Hidden Valley if that sounds familiar. The person we’re dealing with is nice and quite patient with all of our dumb questions. But if that’s you, thanks!

[fotze2]

I replied to one of those solar places that claim you don’t pay anything to install. I’ve put lots on wellsite but it get vandalized or stolen 90% of the time and takes forever to payout. Is this gonna be a scam/moneypit? Very skeptical.

[#-3]

Originally Posted by fotze2

I replied to one of those solar places that claim you don’t pay anything to install. I’ve put lots on wellsite but it get vandalized or stolen 90% of the time and takes forever to payout. Is this gonna be a scam/moneypit? Very skeptical.

Yes most of the places that say you are getting something for nothing are capturing all if not excess value from you. In General when a guy nocks on your door and says at no cost to you he is looking to extract something that will eventually have monetary value.

Solar generally has a very realistic ROI in the 5-12 years range in Alberta depending on a number of factors. For some projects that's not good enough, for others it is, it's more of a choice about how you want to allocate your capital recourses than a money pit.

As for the vandalism comment, I can't really say. The way some have a tendency to politicize and demonize specific technologies or changes is really sad, and it makes me sad to hear that they may have driven people to criminal behavior if they are specifically targeting small scale renewables infrastructure.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by #-3

Yes most of the places that say you are getting something for nothing are capturing all if not excess value from you. In General when a guy nocks on your door and says at no cost to you he is looking to extract something that will eventually have monetary value.

Solar generally has a very realistic ROI in the 5-12 years range in Alberta depending on a number of factors. For some projects that's not good enough, for others it is, it's more of a choice about how you want to allocate your capital recourses than a money pit.

As for the vandalism comment, I can't really say. The way some have a tendency to politicize and demonize specific technologies or changes is really sad, and it makes me sad to hear that they may have driven people to criminal behavior if they are specifically targeting small scale renewables infrastructure.

I don't think theft of solar panels from wellsites is politically motivated. They're unsupervised and a solar panel is safe and easy to remove and has obvious value. If oil companies put up copper busts of Ayn Rand at their wellsites those would get stolen too.

[the-rasta-masta]

Originally Posted by fotze2

I replied to one of those solar places that claim you don’t pay anything to install. I’ve put lots on wellsite but it get vandalized or stolen 90% of the time and takes forever to payout. Is this gonna be a scam/moneypit? Very skeptical.

It's a very disingenuous sales tactic used to draw in leads by some of the more high pressure solar companies out there.

What ends up happening is that you install solar panels, and then as a result your $200/month electricity bill drops down to $30/month. However, that savings of $170 is usually replaced with the interest free loan payment for the first 10 years. Most of the time, the savings are pretty equivalent to that loan payment.

So, essentially your savings pay for your loan, and you end up paying around the same price monthly during the loan term. This is the reason the interest free loan makes so much sense for people, instead of that money going to Enmax each month, it's being re-invested into a value add in your home. Once the loan falls off your laughing (and usually with electricity price increases you are already in a cash flow positive position as soon as your next fixed term hike on your electricity rate even before loan is paid out).

However, to call that "free solar" like you see in a lot of these social media ads isn't really explaining the concept as it works. You're still paying for it.

In regards to vandalism, I could see it on wellsites that are located in remote areas and aren't monitored. The company I work for has over 2500 installations in Calgary alone over the past 10 years and we've never had vandalism or theft. Probably not very easy to climb up on a roof and remove 70 pound panels inconspicuously compared to ground mounted solar on a rural wellsite.

[fotze2]

Interest free loan is SOOO not free so I will be telling someone to fata off tomorrow very aggressively. Let’s hope I get in a fist fight.

[Fighting Banana Slug]

It certainly not "free solar", but the interest free loan is an incentive (if we are talking about the government program, $40k max payable in 10 years).

[Wolven]

Originally Posted by Fighting Banana Slug

It certainly not "free solar", but the interest free loan is an incentive (if we are talking about the government program, $40k max payable in 10 years).

Yes, the government 40K loan program is an excellent opportunity to drive more people into solar. Hopefully with Carney in place the program gets an upgrade (there were rumours it may be ending soon?).

Getting away from the door-to-door guys was a big deal for me. I used the first guy to trigger an RFP process. Posted our info onto the RFP page on SolarAlberta.ca and got a number of companies to come out and quote.

Once we compared the quotes, we quickly found out that the door-to-door company was by far the worst option as they were the most expensive and did not give the best results (dollars spent to KWH).

Solar YYC was the best (IMO).

The whole exercise was a great reason to use all those spreadsheet skills for an activity at home.

[fotze2]

So they are 100% lying in their marketing? And yes they are, it’s not arguable.

[Barnes]

Approaching day 50 of having 13.95 kW system from Solar YYC turned on and couldn't be happier. Despite some very cloudy and smokey days in August / September, it performed better than estimated.

So far we have produced 2,491 kWh, Exported 1,671 kWh.

I too put together a spreadsheet based on a user (can't remember who) from this thread to track everything so far. My billing is obviously lagging and I went through a provider change and a switch to the solar club hi rate so it's just a running estimate at this point with the exception of Jul 25 to Aug 7.

For from the time we had it switched on, our electricity bill totals without solar would have been $381.67.

With solar our electricity bill is -104.62.

I was only able to switch to the high solar club rate on Aug 13th and we haven't had to make a monthly loan payment yet but even with the loan payment factored in, we still would have seen savings over not having solar. Looking forward to tracking it over the year.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Barnes

Approaching day 50 of having 13.95 kW system from Solar YYC turned on and couldn't be happier. Despite some very cloudy and smokey days in August / September, it performed better than estimated.

So far we have produced 2,491 kWh, Exported 1,671 kWh.

I too put together a spreadsheet based on a user (can't remember who) from this thread to track everything so far. My billing is obviously lagging and I went through a provider change and a switch to the solar club hi rate so it's just a running estimate at this point with the exception of Jul 25 to Aug 7.

For from the time we had it switched on, our electricity bill totals without solar would have been $381.67.

With solar our electricity bill is -104.62.

I was only able to switch to the high solar club rate on Aug 13th and we haven't had to make a monthly loan payment yet but even with the loan payment factored in, we still would have seen savings over not having solar. Looking forward to tracking it over the year.

I am curious about the wide range of panels people have. How big is your house?

[Barnes]

Originally Posted by Wormius

I am curious about the wide range of panels people have. How big is your house?

2 Story attached garage. 2,278 sqft.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Barnes

2 Story attached garage. 2,278 sqft.

Okay. That’s not too far off from us. We’re kind of averaging 700kWh per month usage and given a 13 panel design for 6.5kW. I suppose we can tack on more later.

[the-rasta-masta]

Originally Posted by Barnes

Approaching day 50 of having 13.95 kW system from Solar YYC turned on and couldn't be happier. Despite some very cloudy and smokey days in August / September, it performed better than estimated.

So far we have produced 2,491 kWh, Exported 1,671 kWh.

I too put together a spreadsheet based on a user (can't remember who) from this thread to track everything so far. My billing is obviously lagging and I went through a provider change and a switch to the solar club hi rate so it's just a running estimate at this point with the exception of Jul 25 to Aug 7.

For from the time we had it switched on, our electricity bill totals without solar would have been $381.67.

With solar our electricity bill is -104.62.

I was only able to switch to the high solar club rate on Aug 13th and we haven't had to make a monthly loan payment yet but even with the loan payment factored in, we still would have seen savings over not having solar. Looking forward to tracking it over the year.

That's awesome to hear that the results have been better than expected! Always fun to work with a fellow CPer on a Solar Project!