chaitov52

Had to get in a better shot down the line of those pinstripes. Hope you don't mind.

And for the curious, those red utility looking things hanging on the wall behind the car, they're DC/AC converters that generate about 90% of our annual household electricity from solar electric panels we have on our roof. Total electric bill last year was <$1,100 compared to $11,000 we were paying before we went "green."

Mesca

iTrader: (28)

Nice, it looks good! How much did the initial purchase of the solar panels cost?

Yang1815

iTrader: (1)

11 grand for electrical bill?!

are you inventing a time machine in your basement or something?!

chaitov52

System cost $68,762 but we understand that we got the last of the big CA rebates and then a $2,000 Federal income tax credit. Our out of pocket expense came to $36,762. They projected that it would take 7 years to pay back (based on their lowest output estimates 1,300kwh on average), but we have gotten the highest estimated yield (1,650 kwh on average) from our Kyocera solar panels (they were performing better than Sharp's or BP's panels at the time of our purchase) that we will break even in less than 5 years. The panels have a 20 year life expectancy.

In fairness, I should mention that since the time we had the $11,000 electric bill, we had no landscaping shelter from the sun and we replaced all of our contractor installed low-efficient A/C units (3 of them) to 16 SEER and upgraded all to 5 tons, plus installed the new 3M window tinting, etc. Over four years, we have seen our backyard temperature dip 10 degrees just from the landscaping shelter growth. This has allowed us to keep our house at 75 degrees F during the summer when before, we kept it at 82 degrees and still had the high electric bills because the low output A/Cs couldn't keep the house cool . . . they constantly ran.

We're going into our fourth summer now and have actually seen an improvement in kwh output since the first year of operation, when we saw the So Cal rates jump significantly (remember the Gray Davis/energy crisis debacle here in CA?). Don't know what the costs would be now or if there are any more rebates . . .

Know this is a car forum; if you need more I'd suggest a private message; don't want to get into trouble or get off the track talking about cars.

Cheers

chaitov52

YANG,

I forgot to mention that that $11,000 electric bill . . . the average temperature in Rancho Mirage that summer (June through September) was 118 degrees and from mid-July to the end of August, the temperatures soared to 126 degrees on most days and never went below 115 degrees at night. I remember it well because we moved into our house on the 30th of July and it was 126 degrees that day. It was one of the hottest/worst summers people around the desert could remember. It was a real shock to our system having moved from Manhattan Beach, CA where the temps were in the low 70s. That's a delta increase of 56 degrees in two hours driving distance. Ouch!

Cheers.