Hello solar enthusiasts. I haven’t sent out an update in a while. It’s tax free weekend and it seemed appropriate to send out this email/rant/lecture on energy efficiency. By now, many of you have or will shortly have a proposal from Solarflair and are deciding if you can afford to move forward or not.
There’s a truism in the industry that the cheapest alternative energy you can buy is the electricity you don’t need to make in the first place. That means energy efficiency is the first place to start. There’s been a rule of thumb that for every one dollar spent on energy efficiency improvements, between $3.00 and $5.00 can be saved on photovoltaic installation costs for the same amount of electricity offset. Under the Solarize program, with the excellent pricing and the generous incentives we have in MA, I would estimate that ratio is down to 1:2, but that’s still a fantastic way to reduce the cost of your PV system or increase the amount of electricity offset from solar.
Why am I rambling on about this? This weekend is a great time go out and buy those LED bulbs or upgrade some old inefficient appliances. Rather than spending many thousands upgrading to the higher performance panels, think about spending $2-3K on replacing that old inefficient washer and dryer and some LED bulbs. If you have an electric dryer, think about at least upgrading your washer and changing over to gas if possible. The newer washers spin at high speed and remove so much more water that the dryer needs to run for a much shorter amount of time. Newer dryers can also sense how dry the clothes are and will shut off rather than running for a fixed amount of time. Heating anything with electricity is the most expensive way to go. If you can possibly shift heating loads such as cooking, and drying to other forms of energy, you can seriously cut your energy bill or reduce the size of your PV system. If your domestic hot water is heated with oil, propane, or especially electricity, consider downsizing your PV system and including a solar hot water system. Most people don’t realize that about 25-30% of their utility bill is heating water that goes practically straight down the drain. There’s a separate rebate program for SHW systems and all the same Federal and State tax incentives apply. Solarflair installs SHW systems too and they can work efficiently in places that PV won’t. If your refrigerator is older and not energy star rated, this is the time to upgrade it. A newer fridge will pay for itself in energy savings in just a couple of years and can be the equivalent of removing a PV panel or two or greatly increase the amount of electricity you can offset with solar. Do you really need to have that second half full fridge in the garage? Another trick is to switch to a laundry detergent that is designed entirely for cold water. Tide makes one and I’m told it works well (we don’t pay for hot water). Washing your clothes in hot water for a year uses more electricity than leaving the refrigerator door open 24 hours a day. Front loader’s will reduce the amount of hot water used by more than half.
My house has 17 “recessed can” style lights in the ceilings and by far my favorite upgrade has been to replace all the bulbs using LED kits from Home Depot. There are several styles and brands to choose from and I bought one of each to test. I ended up choosing a kit from Cooper Lighting called The All-Pro LED. This kit replaces not only the bulb, but the trim ring as well. It has an integrated heat sink, LED array and diffuser all built into a single unit which can fit both 5 and 6 inch housings. There are other kits for the smaller cans. They take less than 5 minutes to install. My second choice, which I recently installed in my mothers home is the CREE brand. The CREE’s are not quite as bright but have a more universal mounting system that fits more brands of cans. I was disappointed with the pure “bulb” style replacements. Although it’s rated at 65 watts equivalent, I find the All-Pro to be much brighter than the 85 watt equivalent CFL bulbs I was replacing. Frankly, I hated those CFL’s in the cans. The dimmable ones never seemed to last, the color was poor, the dimming was non-linear and a couple minutes after setting the dimmer the room as too bright after they warmed up – I left half as regular incandescent bulbs. A 100 watt incandescent bulb converts only about 4 watts into useful light – the other 96 watts is wasted as heat. This is often the cause of ice dams on cathedral ceilings and is energy you need to fight with more air conditioning in the summer. These LED’s are the greatest thing since sliced bread. They use 14.6 watts (Cooper) or 9.5 watts (CREE) vs 100 for the incandescent and 26 for the CFL. They will last 20+ years, the color is far better, they are nearly instantly on at full brightness and the dimming is much more linear than the CFL’s. The Cooper package claims that each bulb will save $250 in electricity and $100 in replacement costs over its lifetime. That’s based on 6 hours per day and an electric rate of ten cents per kWh. Here in Hopkinton we pay sixteen cents so the total savings is actually 250 x 1.6 +100 or $500 for each bulb replaced. Dimming the lights to what you actually need will save even more energy so consider installing a dimmer switch. The All-Pro kits cost about $37 each and the CREE’s cost $25 at Home Depot under a subsidized price program by National Grid. No rebates are required and it’s tax free this weekend. Use your cash rewards card and save even more.
The Hopkinton Sustainable Green Committee has provided the library with several “Kill-A-Watt” devices that can be checked out for a few days. You can use them to measure the corded devices in your house to see how much electricity they use. Keep in mind that any device that has either a clock or a remote control is never truly “off”. Printers, computer/cell phone chargers, video games, some ceiling fans and many more devices in your home are notorious “vampire loads”. Consider putting them on plug strips to be switched off when not in use and set your TV to energy efficient mode. It takes a few seconds longer for the TV to turn on but it isn’t wasting electricity all day and night staying warm. LED TV’s are much more efficient than plasma. In addition, there are books on solar hot water, solar PV, wind and a subscription to Home Power magazine at the library.
One other thing to keep in mind – especially if you are considering a Power Purchase Agreement. You’re agreeing to purchase all the power from the panels over the next 20 years. Your house will likely get more efficient over the next twenty years as appliances, computers, TV’s etc… get replaced and kids move out. If you’ve covered 100% of your electric with a PPA, you might end up paying for electricity you aren’t using down the road so talk to Solarflair to ensure your system is sized appropriately. If you’re thinking about a PPA, you should also talk to one of the banks that does FHA backed solar loans first. One of them is Admiral’s Bank in Providence but there are many others. Admirals has put together a spreadsheet that will help you determine the ROI. Cash or an equity loan is best but the solar loans can be a better deal than a PPA with no money down and you don’t have to deal with transferring the PPA to someone if you sell your home. I’m not endorsing Admirals in any way, they have simply reached out to the Solarize communities. If you would like their contact info or the spreadsheet, send me a note.
Thanks to everyone who attended the Solarize Open House last Thursday. Lots of people came and kicked the tires on working PV and Hot Water systems and learned more about the program. Nine more people signed up. We’re now approaching 280 businesses and residents interested in going solar. I believe we crossed into the 2nd tier of discount this week and there are currently about 30 people waiting to hear from their banks before they can sign a contract.
Andy Boyce
solarizehopkinton@gmail.com