The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Trivial Pursuits => Science & Nature => Topic started by: Arachno-capitalist on December 01, 2010, 11:56:15 am
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Theres a company jumping up and down around here about how they can solar power your home for free. When I looked into it, it looks like a lease plan where they put the panels in, I get the tax breaks, and they get the power? I'm not clear yet on how this all goes down, so I was wondering if any of you have also looked into going solar.
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historical neighborhood, rainforest canopy. nope.
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It's on the agenda. We have a number of other home projects that need to be done first. But we have a big-ass south-facing room with little tree cover, so it has some potential.
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I interviewed a guy who had it done and was selling power back to the electric company when he had extra. He said sometimes he would enjoy watching the meter running backwards.
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I've looked into it in PDX. Where we're at, the homeowner sells any excess back to the utility. There are a lot of houses in our neighborhood with panels, and I have a nice flattish garage roof for them with great southern exposure. I have to get my basement wrapped up and then my chimney rebuilt. Probably next year it'll happen.
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I've got lots of southern footage and plenty of rooftop. Had a talk with a guy last weekend but he couldn't answer (damn sales puke) any of my engineering and design questions and he crapped out on the financing side as well.
He's kicking me over to the next level, we'll see how they do.
The way he was propping it was with zero money up front, financing set to a monthly payment level that is equivalent to our average monthly electric bill.
So of course my questions are around system lifespan, maintenance and expected annual cost, warranty and support along with loan term, interest and how (against what) it is secured.
We'll see if I like the answers or not.
Please report back. That sounds interesting.
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We're on a 4 year plan of getting away from this house and moving into PDX from the Here There Be Dragons, USA.
Any large scale renovations are off the table. Though I would LOVE to do that in the new house.
I'll be watching, Nabu.
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So of course my questions are around system lifespan, maintenance and expected annual cost, warranty and support along with loan term, interest and how (against what) it is secured.
Especially with maintenance costs and so on it seems like the sort of thing you're not going to get a straight answer on from the people selling it to you. Any related forums or just folks you know in real life that have it?
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Smick, I'll let you know if things work out. We're almost done with the cosmic fuckery that has been our basement remodel. Holy fuck do I hope those guys get jailed. Also, the chimney is going to be a bit of a hassle, but i think we can knock both projects out next year.
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Guys with their shit together and the brass balls to do that kinda shit are priceless.
I now assume you're being sold solar panels by Alec Baldwin from Glengarry Glenross.
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Always
Be
Charging
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Always
Be
Charging
People don't walk on the lot unless they want to go solar....'Who am I? Who am I? I drove here in a self-charging customized hybrid, you drove here in a diesel truck and all you're hauling is 200lbs of moron. Thats who I am, and thats who you are."
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Put. The organic sun-brewed fair-trade herbal tea. Down. Tea is for closers.
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We're adding a little something to this month's sales contest. As you all know, first prize is a Tesla Roadster. Anybody want to see second prize? Second prize is a juicer. Third prize is you're fired.
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I hate that I am This Person, but I would be much more gung-ho about going solar if my front lawn wasn't also facing south. But realistically I need to worry about putting new shingles on the roof before I put solar panels on it.
Plus I think we're in the end days of our current photovoltaic tech.
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Well yeah there comes a point where the average consumer wants in and the primal technology is no longer optimal. Lets cross this bridge.
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You're like yeah man, I wanna upgrade and you wind up putting the solar equivalent of an 8-track player on your roof.
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With all the talk about "Smart Grid" being a necessary step towards distributed power production, it just might be a compatibility problem to install solar at the moment. Hopefully it will only be a matter of buying the right adaptor or something.