Understanding The Cost of Solar Panels

The majority of home and business owners that install solar panels are doing so typically to “do the right thing” a few are taking the deep look at the return on investment down the road. As well as those who may be on the fence about whether to invest in a solar electricity systems, knowing how to calculate your return on investment would be invaluable in helping you make a decision.

But go ahead and Google “ROI solar energy”  you’ll be flooded by various statistics and formulas each claiming to have the answer to your question. The simple answer is, calculating your prospective return on investment can be time consuming, but there’s no shortcuts to this process without having short changing your results.

Regarding Solar Panel Installation

Solar Power Return on Investment Calculations and Payback Period

The first step in calculating the solar panel cost and ROI is to establish your payback period also known as the point at which your current savings equal the cost of the photovoltaic (pv) system and also you break thru into pure earnings from your solar panel system. You do this in a 5-step process:

1. Establish your solar energy system net cost. Keep in mind that this is not automatically what you paid for the system. You will need to deduct any rebates or perhaps tax credits to come up with an exact cost. Local Pro Solar files all the required paperwork for you to claim almost all government incentives. Our method is a true turn-key system.

2. Determine how much energy the solar panels will collect based on the installation of your system. Local Pro Solar can help provide you with this exact information that may vary based on the amount of sunlight around your home or business and the placement of your solar panels, etc.

3. Look on your overall electric bill from your utility provider to find out how much you pay per kw hour (kWh). Many people forget to account for distribution charges. The precise way to calculate your genuine usage charges is to split your total bill by the level of hours of usage. Put another way, if you just increase the number of hours on your expenses by the kilowatt per hour fee your should see your total bill is higher than this particular calculation.

4. Calculate the whole benefit of a solar system including the power it generates per year and the SRECs that can be sold for additional income in return for the extra power generated.

5. Calculate the payback period and return on investment. The payback period could be the initial net investment split by the yearly benefit. Alternatively, the return on investment is calculated by dividing the initial investment into the yearly benefit to obtain a percentage of the initial investment that is returned each year. Typically it is our experience that a solar panel system returns 15% to 20% on initial investment!

How Complicated are the Forms?

Local Pro Solar will use his expertise set up your solar panel system, and we will file for all the necessary records on your behalf to receive federal local and state grants, rebates, and incentives. Local Pro Solar will also perform the necessary administrative tasks to acquire SRECs to generate extra cash from your photovoltaic energy system. Included in the installation process each solar electric system also comes with a computer monitoring dashboard system which allows you to monitor your system’s performance.

Typical Costs of a Solar Power System

Depending on the desired location and design of your system, a conventional home installation ranges from 7 to 3 kilowatts and expenses between $18,000 to $40,500 to purchase.

Equipment Costs are about 45%

Solar panels: About a third with the cost of a residential solar system comes from the cost of solar panel systems, which can cost around $4,500-$12,1000.

Power inverter: The inverter converts DC to AC so you can connect directly to the grid, will surely cost $1,000-$3,000.

Mounting hardware: Based on your roof, you may need standoffs, rails, clips, etc., which cost all around $800 – $2,000.

Wiring: Wires along with wiring boxes, disconnects, conduits, as well as other electrical components often price around $1,000-$2,000.

Installation along with Permitting Costs

System Installation: Before your systems installation starts generating electricity, you’ll need to pay for that cost of installation, which varies from $2,000-$4,000.

Permits & Fees: Nearby permitting and inspection fees can add over $2,500 for your solar costs. All in, permitting costs can total between $3,000-$6,000.

Sales, Advertising and marketing, and Operational Costs

Monitoring: Monitoring equipment and/or providers can cost up to a few 1000 dollars.

Maintenance/Repairs: These costs will be different, depending on the situation, and include the price of replacing the power inverted. Inverters typically must be replaced one or two times during the duration of your system.

Additional: Operational and also overhead costs can total about $4,000-$9,000 per installation.

Solar Rebate Offers

Incentives can help lower the expense of solar power systems. As a homeowner, you’re eligible to receive 30% off the total price of your photovoltaic (solar panel) system from the federal government in the form of a National Solar Tax Credit. If you do buy a home solar energy system, you could end up having to wait so long as 16 months to receive the main benefit of the tax credit.

Based on Local Pro Solar extensive experience, we have found our customers average a 15-20% return on investment according to a typical payback period of involving 4-7 years.

Do More, Live Green

To ensure your payback period is as short as you possibly can, Local Pro Solar can help you research and apply for grants, incentives, rebates as well as tax credits that lessen your out-of-pocket cost for solar panel system installation while recommending the best system to maximize your daily energy savings.

How much for a solar panel system?

In order to determine how much it would cost you to get solar panels installed to cover your power bill or at least reduce your costs, you need to determine the following:

• How many kilowatt hours will your home use per month? (discover the details of your electric bill)
• How much roof area do you have to install panels on? (south facing roof is preferred)
• How many sun hours will your desired location get per day on average? (this is averaged over the course of a year)
• How much are you able to afford to invest in order to offset your energy expenses?

An average home in the United States requires approximately 20 – 24 kWh of electricity everyday. An array of panels able to produce this much power are about 4 kW or more in size (based on 5 sunlight hours per day) and the price runs from $15,500 – $20,000 installed (not implementing any incentives).

Determined by within pricing as of August 2012, a 24 cell 786 kWh grid tie system could be approximately $8,630 before any suitable financial incentives. The price does include the cost of installation or racks into consideration.

Looking at worldwide prices as of 2009, the average cost per W installed of a 2-5 KW residential solar energy system was $4.70 within Japan, $7.70 in Philippines and from $5-$11 in the United States based on a report completed by (Renewable & Sustainable Energy Reviews).

Prices vary based on building and techniques used in the configuration, the type and model of equipment used and what company does the installation. The type superiority panel as well as the size of your array affects the final expense of an installation. Manufacturers price each panel based on the effectiveness and longevity. Panels that will retain their efficiency in great length are usually more expensive. Monocrystalline panels include the most costly but generate the most watts per area, so you will need fewer panels and will not need as much space. Building completely integrated panels are also on the expensive side, but they are the best choice when appearance is crucial.

Your neighborhood and city can also have a big impact on the ultimate price of a solar energy project. The federal government and local governments in many countries offer financial incentives to make buying and installing programs more affordable. Prices are also depend on local weather conditions. Due to limited sun hours per day, the fee per kilowatt installed will be higher than in sunnier countries like Mexico.

Types and Benefits  with Solar Panels

Crystalline panels are the most popular type of solar panel. This technology has existed for about 50 years and was first developed in order to power satellites. They are capable of being up to 20% efficient. This technology are highly reliable (Twenty-five year warranties are common) and produce related results in terms of output effectiveness. The primary downsides of using crystalline are generally that they can be bulky, pricey, prone to damage, are rigid and require a lot of labor to set up. That said, they are often the best choice for any residential solar energy system. They are available in two varieties: monocrystalline and polycrystalline.

Monocrystalline plastic panels are made up of single-crystal wafer cells cut from, cylindrical crystal ingots. They can be cut completely round to minimize waste, but they are frequently trimmed into other, a lot more square-like shapes (see below). Considering that each is made from a single gem, the cells have a uniform, fast color. They are the most efficient cells available today (they produce much more power per square foot), nonetheless they cost more than all others.

Polycrystalline plastic panels are made of multi-crystal wafer cells lower from square ingots that are manufactured by pouring molten silicon into a mold. So it can be cut into square wafers to minimize waste. Each is made up of a lot of random crystal formations which make it various colours of blue. These are slightly less energy efficient, and also cheaper than monocrystalline panels.

Thin motion picture modules are very inexpensive, and also quite inefficient (require more area per watt produced). Their efficiency is 10% or less and their long-term durability is often questioned. They are less expensive given that they require less of the active material to function. In fact, they can be made microscopically thin, flexible and lightweight and are lodged on a sheet of goblet or metal instead of needing to grow ingots and slice wafers. Cadmium telluride (CdTe) is among the most cost effective thin film technology. Amorphous silicon is material used to create panels that can be molded to the shape of almost any surface. Almost all of the research and development of solar cells is currently being focused on thin film systems.

Building integrated photovoltaic solar panels (BIPV)  look like an integral part of a roof since they are the same size and shape while shingles. They have lower efficiency and are more expensive as compared to other panel types because of their size. These are most effective on large roofing in very sunny areas.

Solar Panels Cost Matrix Water Home heating Solar Panels:

Low End water heating Solar Panels

• Range $100 – $3,500 – Water heating for 2 or Three bedroom apartments

Medium end water heating Solar Panels

• Range $3,500 – $7,000 – Swimming Pool heat and home drinking water heating

High End water heating system Solar Panels

• Range $7,000 : $10,000 –  Water Heating for entire individual family home (2500 Sq ft ) along with Solar Swimming Pool Heaters.

Solar power systems Cost Matrix air Heating Solar power systems:

Low end air heat solar panels

• Range $500 – $2,500 – Heating one particular room in a house along with self installation

Medium end air heating solar panels

• Range $5,000 – $20,000 – Heating apartments Two bedroom apartments, townhouses( 1600 Sq feet) with professional installations

High end air heating solar panels

• Range $25,000 and above – Heating an entire single family homes usually with professional installations

Solar power panels Cost Matrix Photovoltaic Solar Panels:

Low end Photovoltaic solar panels

• Range $10,000 – $15,000 – For a home which needs simply 1KW electric power

Medium end PV solar panels

• Range $15,000 – $25,000 – For a home which needs 3KW electric power

High end Sun Solar Panels

• Range $25,000 – 45,000 – For a home which needs 5KW electric power.