House and Garden

Archive for the ‘Home’ Category

1) Reduce usage first. For every you spend on conservation, that’s about less you need to spend on your solar system. It costs less to use less electricity than to make your own.

2) Research solar hot water. Solar hot water is ~ 85% efficient, as opposed to ~20% for solar electric. You get a better bang for your buck installing solar thermal than solar electric.

3) Install solar electric. Prices for solar panels have dropped dramatically this year as the demand in Europe has dropped and people are having trouble getting home equity loans in the US. You can get better pricing if you buy by the pallet (depending on the panel, 20 – 30 panels). You are right that you don’t need to generate all that you use, and if you do steps 1 and 2, you’ll be using less anyways.

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