Avoid Common Pitfalls When Building A PV Solar System For Your Home
Are you considering a DIY PV system for your home? Good for you!. It is critical though, that you take the 5 essential steps to success a for DIY PV system for your home. You might already have answers for some of them. Be as diligent in your investigations and in your data collection as possible and write it all down. You will need that information when it gets the details of the design and building of the solar PV system.
1. What is your goal? Do you want to be totally off the grid and self-sufficient? That will require a fairly large system and a big battery bank. I don’t want to discourage you, just be aware of it. Do you want to install just enough solar photovoltaic capacity to reduce your electric bill by 40%, 50%, or more? To achieve the optimal combination between reducing your electric bill and having an affordable system is going to take a few iterations between size, cost, tax credits. Are you interested in a DIY solar kit to quickly and easily install at your remote cabin? Then you might not need to read this entire article, unless you are new to solar PV systems. Instead, do some research online, specifically searching for kits for cabins, maybe even RVs . Call the manufacturers and distributors and ask them lots of questions. Come back here if you get stuck.
2. The number and sizes of PV panels you will need for your solar system depends on your total electric demand. The more panels you require, the costlier the system. It makes sense, I would think, to lower your home’s electric needs. The price for a photovoltaic system currently is in the range of $6 per W to $10 per W, installed. If you lower your electric load by say 300W, by replacing incandescent light bulbs with LED lights as an example, you will be able to lower the cost of your PV system by $1,800 to $3,000.
3. Get out the old calculator for step 3. Or you can use one of the many free online tools to calculate how much sunlight, ideally direct sunlight, the PV panels will receive at the location where you intend to install them. You can also check with a PV panel manufacturer if they could do those calculations for you. Regardless which option you choose, you will have to make allowances for trees and/or neighboring houses that might cause shading on your PV panels.
4. To help you finance your system, you can still take advantage of federal tax credits for solar photovoltaic systems and maybe even use the state tax credits for solar systems. And to top it off, in many states you can find utility incentives for solar systems. It is also important to find out what you must do to be able to have your electric utility meter spin backwards so you can sell electric power back to the utility when you are not using it. Some utilities also require special equipment to be put between their meter and your solar system.
5. Almost done. The last thing is to get educated. Knowing about all the whys, hows, whats and wheres will drastically reduce, if not eliminate errors. At the minimum, you will better notice when you must ask for help. You will see when something is not as it should be.Attend a couple of classes about solar PV systems. Many books and ebooks have been published. The government’s Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy program published a tons of of very useful and educational information on their site (www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/). It could also be very helpful to invest in a set of videos which give you detailed instructions on how to go about planning and building a DIY solar PV system for your home.
Get ready for the fun part. Making it real. Look at all the notes and books, and maybe videos that you have studied. You can move forward ,knowing that you are well prepared. Use what you have learned to work with a photovoltaic panel manufacturer or supplier to select the perfect DIY solar PV system for your home.
Before you start a DIY solar PV system for your home, do the 5 steps and learn the secrets of how to successfully build your own solar PV system.
