September 2, 2010

Last weekend, I was in Minnesota, where I had the chance to visit the “Great Minnesota Get Together”, also known as the Minnesota State Fair.  There was a lot of buzz around solar power and the excitement was absolutely infectious!  If one thing was clear, it’s that people are extremely curious about new ways to get energy.  Luckily, the number of available resources is quickly growing!

One of the main attractions at the Minnesota State Fair was an expo hall dedicated to smart homes, including homes powered by solar, called the Eco Experience Building.  Inside the Eco Experience Building, there were several demo homes outfitted with smart solutions like cork flooring and no-VOC wallpaper.  One of the demo homes also had an entire room dedicated to home solar, with presentations, displaying information about everything from solar monitoring to solar panel equipment to solar power inverters.

Here are some of the audience’s questions from one of the smart home sessions I attended:

Do solar panels work in the harsh winters?
Solar PV Panels depend on sunlight, not heat. Production does decrease in the winter because of the shorter length of the day, but this can be accounted for and planned for when you size your system. If the panels are covered in snow, that can slow or stop can stop production, but snow generally slides off the angled panels or melts when the sun shines.  Professionally installed panels from a quality local installer will account for resistance to high winds if that is a threat.  In extreme weather situation, if panels are damaged, sometimes that is covered by a warranty or if you purchase insurance.

Can I make money by selling extra power back to the grid?
Yes and no. Local utilities have varying policies on buying back power from residential customers. In Minnesota, utility customers with a grid-tied solar system earn credits from the utility company when they generate more electricity than they use. These credits are based on market value, and they reduce a customer’s electric bill.  The concept of making a bunch of cash by putting in a big array and selling power back to the utility is a misconception in most cases.

Solar was featured in other parts of the Eco Experience Building, as well.  There were displays from Fifty Lanterns International, a solar charity, an interactive area sponsored by the Minnesota Renewable Energy Society, as well as a solar boat on display!  The curiosity and creativity buzzing around solar was thrilling; it was wonderful to see how solar technology is spreading across the country.  The Minnesota State Fair ends this Labor day, September 6, so be sure to check it out and visit the Eco Experience Building this weekend!

Curious about going solar in your home? Check out our Solar By Location pages to learn more about solar in your state!

August 20, 2010

Is saving energy as easy as flipping a switch? Yes, according to most Americans, contrary to expert findings. A new survey by the Earth Institute at Columbia University found that most American’s don’t really understand the best ways to save energy. 505 participants across 34 states were asked about their perceptions of their energy consumption and savings for a variety of activities and 30% of them chose switching off lights as the best way to save energy. Only a minority chose energy efficiency improvements, such as energy efficient appliances, cars, and home weatherization, which actually make a much bigger difference than switching off lights. The study concludes by suggesting that perhaps it’s time for the government, media, and scientists to rethink and revamp how they communicate energy conservation and climate change. We agree.

Speaking of lights, Enertia Engineering in Canada has designed the “first commercially available fully-integrated solar powered street light.”  The best part of this design is that it’s completely self-contained with no need for external wiring, mounting, or installation. You simply connect the battery to the solar cell, then attach the structure to any pole.  The street light, called EnerSolar, is compact, highly efficient, and provides 3 full nights of light on a single charge. Since EnerSolar uses a battery, though, it’s best for places that don’t get too cold (below 14 degrees Fahrenheit).

Sometimes flipping the switch can make a difference. On Thursday, Ohio Governor Ted Strickland flipped the switch on Wyandot Solar Farm, Ohio’s largest solar farm to date. At 12MW and 159,000 solar panels, the facility will generate enough energy to supply more than 9,000 homes with clean solar power. New Jersey energy firm, Public Service Enterprise Group, owns the plant and will be selling power to American Electric Power subsidiaries via a long-term power purchase agreement.

Solar power’s becoming the law in Illinois, with the signing of a new regulation that requires the state’s utilities to purchase up to 6% of their power from clean solar energy sources. The law states that a half of a percent of power provided by Illinois utilities must be solar power by June 2010. This percentage will double every year until it reaches 6% in 2015. Governor Pat Quinn estimates that this law is expected to create over 5,000 jobs in the Illinois solar power industry.

August 17, 2010

If you’ve been wondering whether solar is right for your home, check out some of the upcoming community solar events hosted by HelioPower, one of our trusted installer partners. You can learn how to take control of your rising electricity bills and talk to other homeowners in an informal and informative session about going solar. Solar experts will be present to answer any of your questions and help you determine if solar can help you reduce your electric bill.

Here’s a schedule of events, and you can register your seat on the  HelioPower website. All events are free and begin at 6:30pm.

• Tuesday, August 17 – Tierrasanta Library, San Diego, CA
• Wednesday, August 18 – Historic Community Room, Corona, CA
• Wednesday, August 25 – Joslyn Senior Center, Redlands, CA
• Wednesday, September 1, 2010 – Valley Center Library, CA

The first step towards going solar is making sure solar is right for your home, so be sure to attend if you’re interested in home solar power!

August 16, 2010

For the past six years, Bob Schildgen has been writing the popular environmental advice column, Hey Mr. Green, for Sierra, the national magazine of the Sierra Club.”  He often receives questions from his readers about getting solar for their homes. Curious, we asked Mr. Green to guestblog for Sweet Solar Home and let us in on some of the most frequently asked questions about home solar power. This is his first SunRun guest post, but we hope not the last!

“I’d like to go solar, but it seem to cost so much. Does it really pay? What can I do to reduce the price of solar? I don’t seem to have enough room on my roof to meet our needs.” These are the most common questions I get about solar from the readers of the environmental advice column I write for Sierra, the national magazine of the Sierra Club.

I don’t answer these questions right away, for the simple reason that most people don’t know how much solar capacity they really need to purchase, and they often overestimate their actual requirements. So, I recommend that before installing solar, they carefully monitor their electricity consumption and take steps to reduce it as much as possible. Most households use far more power than they really need. For example, in the U.S. we use about twice as much electricity per capita as, for example, Germany or Italy. Air-conditioning accounts for over 30

Two uses, which are extremely easy to reduce, air-conditioning, account for over 30% of average household electricity consumption.

There are many excellent, common-sense sources for information on reducing electrical (and all other) energy consumption, including tips from the Environmental Protection Agency and the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy’s (ACEEE). (If this country were to follow the energy advice and energy policies advocated by ACEEE we wouldn’t have to build another power plant, let alone some of the nuclear monstrosities that have been proposed.)

Once you’ve slashed your electricity use by following as much of this free advice as possible, your usage in kilowatt hours should be substantially reduced.  This will be obvious when you compare bills from the same periods of the year before you tightened things up. (If you want to find out instantly how much you’ve managed to cut your use, there are now a number of power monitors available.)

After this, you might be surprised to find that home solar is more affordable than you thought, and that you, in fact, have plenty of space for it.

Once you have determined how much solar power you truly need, it is important to take advantage of all incentives in state, local, and federal tax breaks, or rebates. For example, you can get a federal tax credit of up to 30% of the cost of a solar electric system. (For details on this, and all other types of federal tax credits, see the U.S. Department of Energy’s Consumer Energy Tax Incentives. Your prospective solar company should be able to provide up-to-date information on every aspect of solar economics.)

You can also get a rough estimate of costs by using online solar calculators, but local installers will also be able to give you a precise estimate.

August 13, 2010

This week’s news is a bit California-centric, but it’s been an exciting week for clean energy in California!

The Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) has created a new interactive map highlighting California’s fast growing green economy. You can search the map by different types of green businesses – green buildings, energy generation, energy efficiency, transportation, green practices, academic/government/non-profit, and carbon markets.  You can even filter your results by county, senate district, or assembly district. Check out the green economic growth in your district! Here’s SunRun:

According to The New York Times, Southern California is poised to become the world’s solar power capital as Tessera Solar and BrightSource Energy Inc received their final environmental impact statements (EISs) from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management for their solar plants, planned to be built in eastern San Bernardino County. These final EISs represent the removal of the last major regulatory hurdle to getting their solar plans off the ground. Tessera Solar’s two plants and BrightSource Energy’s plants are projected to produce more than triple the amount of solar currently produced in the country. Three more plants are expected to receive their EISs by the end of August, and another three by the end of 2010. These nine California solar plants would cover 41,229 acres of federal land and be able to produce 4,580 MW of solar electricity – enough to power 3.8 million businesses and homes.

San Diego schools are going solar with power purchase agreements! The San Diego Unified School District just signed a 22 year solar power purchase agreement with Amsolar, similar to last week’s story about Arizona public schools going solar with the SRP Community solar program. 20 San Diego schools will pay Amsolar for the electricity generated by the 23,000 solar panels placed throughout 80 rooftops and 1,500 solar carports. Amsolar will own, operate, and maintain the solar systems.  Each school will get 64% of their energy from solar power.

Blast from the past? Back in the 1990s, NREL (National Renewable Energy Lab) scientists developed a “transpired air” solar collector that allows commercial and industrial buildings to bring in warmed air, increasing energy efficiency during the colder, winter months. A transpired solar collector is a dark, perforated metal plate on the south side of buildings that gets heated by the sun. A fan added to a ventilation system already in place brings in pre-heated air into the building through the warmed plate. The hot plate warms the air flowing through it.  Pretty simple idea, but according to Earth Techling, one that “can efficiently preheat the air going into a building by as much as 40 degrees F.”

Why talk about this now? Because NREL is putting this technology in action for a new Research Support Facility and there’s reason to believe that it is a simple and affordable enough design to prove important to commercial/industrial buildings across the country.

August 12, 2010

New Jersey homeowners can’t get enough of residential home solar with The Home Depot and SunRun.

Over 50 homeowners flocked to a recent after-work SunRun home solar workshop at a The Home Depot store in South Plainfield, New Jersey Tuesday, August 10th. They bonded over their current electricity bills and discussed SunRun home solar plans as an affordable and renewable solution for their rising energy costs.  The interactive hour-long work-shop included a hefty question and answer session tackling some big solar questions, including:

Q: What is the best roof for solar?
A: The best roofs get several hours of sun a day, face south or southwest, and don’t have a lot of shade.

Q: How long will a home solar system last?
A: Most solar systems will last anywhere between 25 and 35 years.

Q: How long is my customer agreement and what happens at the end of it?
A: Your SunRun customer agreement lasts 20 years. At the end of your agreement, you can either purchase the solar equipment, renew your SunRun agreement, or we will remove the system at no cost to you.

Q: What if I move before the end of my SunRun agreement?
A: The solar system stays with the home. You can simply transfer the agreement to the new homeowner, who will then pay the same low rate for solar electricity, or purchase the system from SunRun and sell it with your home.

Q: How does SunRun impact my relationship with my utility company?
A: Your house will remain connected to the electricity grid and your utility for traditional electricity as needed. Your utility will credit you when your system produces more electricity than you use. You can use these credits to pull from the grid when you use more electricity than your system produces.

Learn more about going solar in New Jersey with SunRun and SunRun’s partnership with The Home Depot.

August 11, 2010

We’re excited to announce that Pennsylvania has joined Arizona, California, Colorado, Massachusetts, and New Jersey as a SunRun state!

With SunRun, Pennsylvania homeowners can now switch to clean, solar electricity for little or no cost. And just in time – Pennsylvania utility rate caps are set to expire by January 1, 2011. According to the PA Public Utility Commission, once the generation rate caps expire, “the PUC expects that customers may see an increase in their bills.”

Going solar will not only keep electric bills low, but also make a big difference in the environment and the local economy. “We are excited to welcome SunRun to Pennsylvania to grow the solar industry and drive local job creation,” said John Hanger, Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.  SunRun has partnered with the leading local solar installers in Pennsylvania – Alteris Renewables, groSolar, Mercury Solar Systems, and Trinity solar.

SunRun allows homeowners to finally take control of their electricity costs by locking in low, controlled rates for their solar electricity today, for the next 20 years. A typical homeowner can save 5-15% on their electricity costs in their first year, and much more over time. And customers don’t have to worry about their panels producing, since SunRun takes complete care of their systems – including monitoring, maintenance and repair, insurance, and a money-back performance guarantee. Request a free solar quote for your home and join more than 5,000 homeowners across the nation who have already made the switch with SunRun.

Hello, Pennsylvania!  We can’t wait to help you get started with clean, affordable solar electricity.

August 9, 2010

What counts as a green job?

Recently, I was at a dinner party when the conversation turned to green jobs.  Manufacturing jobs in wind and solar power seemed to be on the top of everyone’s minds.  Then, the conversation shifted to activists, fundraisers, and campaigners for grass-roots environmental agencies and conservation groups.  But, no one mentioned me – what about my job?  I work in renewable energy, and I consider my work a green job.  I decided to speak up.  I told the group that my job doesn’t require me to be up on a roof, or out asking for signatures. Most days, I work at my desk, applying skills I had developed outside the cleantech arena.

Sometimes, I feel like when people hear the term “green job”, they think of someone who either plants trees, retrofits homes and buildings, or has a degree in sustainability management. In reality, a green job means all of that and more.  It’s a job that advances green objectives.  To have a green job, you don’t need a LEED certificate,  a degree in environmental science, training in manufacturing and installing – though all of these are helpful in some green jobs.

But, consider my situation.  I am the Brand and Events Marketing Manager at SunRun.  It’s a dynamic job in a fast-paced environment.  While most of my work is on a project-to-project basis, I am generally working on about five different marketing projects on any given day.  Some days I work with artists on creative development, but if I’m on a fast turn deadline, I will produce the creative myself.  I develop the set of images used on SunRun’s web and print collateral, and have been working with several photographers to produce a suite of images that can accurately reflect the SunRun brand.  I lend interdepartmental support to develop materials, help brainstorm new programs, and manage our event presence.  It’s a hands-on kind of job, but I still have the opportunity to be strategic about how our team executes on these projects.  And did I mention that I love the job and the folks I work with each day?

I may not be climbing on a roof to install solar panels or heading environmental cleanup efforts, but I am working towards sustainability and a clean, renewable world by helping the public connect to SunRun’s core message of sustainability by creating a consistent brand for my company.  That’s a green job.

When she’s not working on SunRun’s marketing endeavors, Allana Helland enjoys watercolor painting, weekend trips, and entertaining.

August 6, 2010

This week kicked off with some big news in the solar industry from Stanford University. A research group at the University announced that it had discovered a way to more than double the current efficiency of solar power production. The technology is called photon enhanced thermionic emissions, or PETE. PETE would be able to convert both light and heat into electricity at high temperatures (light is usually converted at relatively low temperatures, and heat at very high temperatures). This technology is expected to be most effective when used with solar concentrators, such as parabolic mirrors on solar farms.

On a more colorful note, ten winners from Crayola’s “How I Dream in Green” coloring contest last spring were selected to comprise the crayon company’s “Green Team.” The contestants had been asked to draw and color their vision for making homes, schools, and neighborhoods greener. The Green Team was honored this week at the dedication of Crayola’s new 15-acre solar system made of 25,000 panels. Crayola’s new solar system is predicted to provide enough power to make a third of their 3 billion crayons produced annually.

Across the globe, Thailand’s going solar – in a big way. The largest solar farm in Southeast Asia is planned to be built right outside of Bangkok by the end of 2011. This 44 MW solar farm is part of the country’s efforts to receive 20% of its energy from renewable resources by 2022. While Suntech Power will install the panels, the solar farm will be owned and maintained by Solartron and Bangchak Petroleum, a Thai oil company. According to journalist Candace Lombardi of CNET, this Thai solar deal reveals several important trends in the industry:

“The deal affirms a recent United Nations report that sees Asia leading the way in green investment.  The deal also speaks to the trend of solar companies offering turnkey solar solutions. The project also illustrates how oil companies are seeking to branch out into renewable energy resources.”

Salt River Project is making it easier for Arizona public schools to go solar — without actually paying for the panels. They just launched a pilot program – SRP Community Solar – that allows public schools in their territory to purchase solar power from a solar photovoltaic power plant that will be built in 2011. Schools districts will be able to purchase solar electricity at a fixed price of 9.9 cents per kWh for 10 years and each school’s share will be individually metered. The best thing about this program?  According to PennEnergy, “Schools can invest in solar energy without the upfront costs of purchasing and installing solar panels and will not incur any maintenance or repair costs that may be associated with a rooftop system. In addition, the KWh cost for the energy produced by the solar system is locked in for ten years.” As providers of solar leases and power purchase agreements, we here at SunRun wholeheartedly agree.

August 5, 2010

This is Marcelo’s first (but not last) post on Sweet Solar Home. Currently a SunRun Solar Consultant, Marcelo (first one on the right) completed the 2010 JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge with his co-workers.  A cold evening for the race, but SunRun brought the sunshine.

The cold, foggy San Francisco summer didn’t stop these dedicated SunRunners from participating in the 2010 JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge. After a hard day of work, they ran a 3.5 mile loop in downtown San Francisco, around ATT Park where the Giants play, and back to Piers 30 and 32 where the race began. Humbling for some, an easy jog up for others, the race attracted more than 6,500 runners from hundreds of San Francisco companies.