One Household’s Experience With Solarize Charlestown – What Is Yours?
Two years ago this month, the signup period for Solarize Charlestown ended. Charlestown’s program was one of the most successful in the state, with 58 households signing contracts for solar during the four month campaign. Below is one family’s experience in the two years since the program ended.
We were very happy with SolPower, the company chosen by Charlestown for the Solarize Charlestown campaign. They surveyed our house and our electricity usage and recommended that we get 15 panels. We agreed and they applied to National Grid who cut us back to 13 panels. These were installed late 2017.
With the panels comes an excellent software program that allows the owner (and SolPower) to track the generating performance of the panels daily, weekly, monthly and yearly, plus how much CO2 we saved, and how many trees we “planted”.
So far after nearly 2 years we have saved 5,000kgs or 5 tons of CO2, which is the equivalent of planting 275 trees. So we feel good about that.
For the calendar year 2018 our panels generated 3,600 kWh, which is about 60% of the electricity that we used (5,700kWh). We are happy to have done this, but we had wished and still wish for closer to 100%. We have asked if we could add more panels but no success so far.
We were also disappointed to learn that when we have a power outage we can NOT use our solar power directly, say to keep our heating system, our well, our fridge and freezer, and computers going (TV?), and recharge our phones. We would have to invest in a very expensive battery system.
Financially we are happy, we got the large tax credit, and our electric bills are reduced substantially plus we get a check every month for the electricity that we sell to National Grid. In the summer we make a profit every month, in the winter we do not because of nearby tall trees. Overall we made over $1,250 in 2018. These payments from National Grid are counted as income and are subject to income tax. So the installation should pay for itself in about 9-10 years.
How did other Charlestown residents who installed solar panels do?
John and Frances Topping
Frances Topping is a member of the Charlestown Planning Commission, and a natural science illustrator, fine artist, educator and naturalist. Her husband John Topping is a materials scientist.
The banner image in this post is a picture of the Topping’s solar panels.
October 16, 2019 @ 10:50 am
Please ask your solar company and national grid what happens after the 15 year PBI payments stop. The selling companies tell you that you will get “net metering”, but they don’t tell you that you’ll need addtional equipment,or define what net metering will be, and there is no commitment from National Grid.