Solar Feasability

With solar panels coming down in prices, I was wondering if anyone has experience with the effectiveness of panels in this area. My roof in the rear of the house faces south, so I should be able to leverage the bulk of the days sun.

Just wondering if people are getting the advertised returns on investments. If we lived in the southwest, it would be a no brainer, but here I wonder if it makes sense.

 

I also wonder how the HOA would feel about this. Solar panels can be installed to not be as ugly as they were before, depending on your home's orientation.

 

kaos, check your design guidelines. There is a section for this topic. To quote an example: "Solar collectors (panels) shall be selected, located and installed so as to minimize their appearance on the house and visibility from neighboring properties and the street."

I was also looking into the idea of installing a solar-powered hot water heater.

 

Why would you want to heat hot water? Isn't it already hot? :notfunny:

 

Hot water heater is kind of like future posterity.

 

My parents installed solar panels in the late 80s/early 90s (I can't remember exactly when) and we used it for heating, including hot water. I was the oldest of 4 kids, and before the solar panels were installed only the first two to shower got hot water. After the panels, we never ran out of hot water. Plus, my parents have said many times that the cost to install them was repaid many times over. They still use them today, even though they're not the "pretty ones" that they have now.

 

Are your parents "local"? Reading up some more on the "cheaper" panels, they might be sacrificing longevity, and have some nasty compounds in the recipe that will not be "easy" to get rid.

I have thought about getting a solar water heater to augment the regular hot water heater as a first step.

 

No, they're in southern virginia. I know that they need to add rock salt regularly to "soften" the water, but that's also from using well water.

 

The solar shingles they have now look really nice, and blend into your existing shingles.... I would like to know the cost of a typical system and how much it offsets your electricity costs. I know they basically feed back into the grid any "extra" energy the array creates.

Here's a cool site I found on the subject.... lots of pix too:

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bgoodsel/solar/blog.htm

 

Looks cool, but I wonder what the lifetime of the shingles would be, especially with the seasonal weather we can get.

I was thinking of doing the sheeple thing and contacting These Guys for a design proposal...

 

Re: Solar Feasibility

merky1 and others--

Check out my thread under "Homeowners Corner" and the post called "Solar Home Tour..." for info regarding Solar Home Tour and other ideas.

Great info--

Enjoy--

Foodie