Solar

Next Tuesday, a crew from a local solar power contractor will begin the installation of a 7.3 Kilowatt solar power unit on our roof. Then, within two weeks or less, my electrical meter will begin turning in the opposite direction as I sell my excess electricity to our power company, PG&E. I will have a fixed cost for the lifetime of the lease and that will become more valuable as the years pass and inflation makes my fixed cost even more of a value to us.

We picked Sun Power for the panels as they had the best reputation, and a local contractor does the installation. We had noted earlier that solar power sellers were springing up everywhere and they had salesmen working the home improvement stores as well as going door to door. That 'turned us off'. So we went looking for the one that had been around longer than all the rest. We went to their Solar Design Center and asked all the right questions. We got good answers. The installation won't cost us a dime. We have one monthly payment, and that is about 1/2 of what we used to pay PG&E. They said they would assign a customer relations person to us and that person would keep in close contact with us  throughout the process. And this representative has called us every two days and will do so till the final sign off.

The area where we live is seeing a flood of solar power installations. The two high schools here have covered parking and that cover is all solar panels. They've had them for close to ten years now. The local JC has been a leader in solar power installations with two large power plants. Sierra Nevada Brewery, a local company that has now gone nationwide has been using solar power for years now. We took a tour of the brewery last year and at one point we were in an open staircase that was high enough to see that the entire roof of the plant and the parking lot was covered by solar panels. They provide the brewery with over 90% of it's power needs. Sierra Nevada just opened an east coast brewery near Asheville NC and we heard that is has even more solar panels.

No, I'm not a salesman for solar power. I'm just excited at the prospect of selling electricity instead of buying it. That's a real 'turn on'.