CA drivers with solar

[Mokuzai]

My bill for one month is 3 times as much as yours for a year. Hopefully we will get the solar up this year, but it is not looking likely because of roof issues

Hah...well if I look at all the bills since we got solar...we installed in June of 2015 so I have 49 bills/credits from SCE. Total cost of electricity for the past 4 years and 1 month is $74.31. Of course back then we'd see bills for less than $2 and I didn't have the Tesla until 2017 so things have changed.

That averages to $1.52 per month in electricity costs.

 

[jboy210]

Sounds like you should be able to fit roughly 9 modules in that space. With typical 330 W modules, which potentially could give 3kW peak in middle of day assuming perfect orientation and pitch. Probably not a "Big" difference, yet substantial. If you are still in the same house I think you are in, then I'd consider getting optimizers on the modules so that potential shading of a couple modules would not affect the whole array as much.

Definitely going with optimizer, thanks to your suggestions. Panasonic panels and SolarEdge Optimizers and HD Wave Inverter

 

[jboy210]

Hah...well if I look at all the bills since we got solar...we installed in June of 2015 so I have 49 bills/credits from SCE. Total cost of electricity for the past 4 years and 1 month is $74.31. Of course back then we'd see bills for less than $2 and I didn't have the Tesla until 2017 so things have changed.

That averages to $1.52 per month in electricity costs.

So jealous!! Hopefully we will get their this year.

 

[brucet999]

I have been thinking about getting solar to try to get out of tier 3 (most expensive). The issue is we have a 60 foot tall heritage Oak tree in our back yard, so their is only one of the 3 south-facing roof areas that is not shaded most of the day. Would a 10' X 15' array make a big difference to my power bill?

Do not discount west-facing roof pitches, if you have them, or even east. West exposure is something like 85% as strong as south and reaches its peak in afternoon when TOD Grid rates are highest. If you use optimizers, even with only one inverter, your various panels can work together at different sun intensities without being limited to the rate of the lowest-performing panel, as would be the case in a simple string array.

 

[jboy210]

Do not discount west-facing roof pitches, if you have them, or even east. West exposure is something like 85% as strong as south and reaches its peak in afternoon when TOD Grid rates are highest. If you use optimizers, even with only one inverter, your various panels can work together at different sun intensities without being limited to the rate of the lowest-performing panel, as would be the case in a simple string array.

I hope this all works this way. As I mentioned we have optimizers in the config. There will be 9.6 kw of panels up there, mostly south, but some to the west. Unfortunately there are pine trees 10 foot off the west roof that will partially block the panels and 1000 foot hill that will cut them off entirely by 7 pm in the summer.