Solar panel installation is a smart investment that saves homeowners thousands on household electricity costs and increases your home value, and it is good for the planet by helping to reduce your carbon footprint and improve local air quality. The cost of putting residential solar panels on your home can be less than your electric bill, with a variety of financing options including $0 down and interest rates as low as 0.99%. Learn more about home solar panel costs and how you can save money by making your own solar power.
More Americans than ever before are discovering the benefits of residential solar panel installation. Fewer than 2% of homes across the United States have solar panels today, but solar capacity is projected to grow significantly thanks to an abundance of sunshine, falling panel prices, and favorable policies.
Many life changes can contribute to an increase in household electricity usage that may prompt you to consider solar panel installation on your home. These include moving into a larger home, adding to your family with children or older parents moving in, purchasing an electric vehicle, or installing a pool. If your electricity bills have recently gone up, now is the perfect time to see how residential solar panels can lower your bills.
Our six step solar panel installation process is a turnkey approach that makes it simple to install solar panels on your home. We oversee your entire installation and take care of every detail for you, from HOA approval to permitting to inspections. You can relax knowing that you have the most efficient and reliable solar panels available. Everything is backed by the industry’s best and most comprehensive 25-year performance, product, and service warranty. The Blue Sky Solar in-house service department is also here to help if you remodel or move to a new home.
Blue Sky Solar and our experienced, trusted partners will install, monitor and service your home solar systems. Blue Sky Solar and our partners are all certified installers that offer a wide variety of quality solar industry brands to choose from. Our expert team will help you take advantage of all federal and local solar incentives and rebates.
Other companies lease solar panels to turn a profit. They take a share of the savings generated while going through the solar panel installation process.
Sure homeowners save money by leasing solar panels compared to paying for power from utility companies, but they spend more than they would be buying their own solar panels.
Buying a solar PV system generates a significantly better lifetime return on investment, making it a wiser financial decision.
Before installing solar panels, you should ask if your roof is the right shape, type, orientation, direction and slope and whether it’s strong enough to support panels. You should also ask about local rebates and incentives, warranties, and how you can connect to the grid. More questions include determining your homeowners association (HOA) regulations, your home’s efficiency, how much energy you use, how much solar costs in your area and more.
You can tell if your house is suitable for solar panels by calculating your Sun Number Score, which represents your home’s solar power potential. Scores range between zero and 100, and a rating of 70 or higher means your house is suitable for solar panels. Your score takes various factors into account, such as the orientation of your home, regional climate, local electricity rates and cost of solar installations in your area.
The biggest consideration when installing solar panels is your installation site. Because roofs are the most common place for installation, several factors determine whether your roof is suitable for solar panels. The type of roof you have and its shape, slope, orientation and direction are all top considerations.
Before going solar, you should know the average amount of energy your household requires daily. You should also know your home’s Sun Number Score. This information will help you determine whether your house is suitable for solar panels. You should also research the type of solar panels you need. High-efficiency solar panels will generate more energy on a daily basis, and you can store that energy in a battery for backup power if needed.
Before purchasing a solar panel system, you should consider a few factors. Efficiency, yield, warranty options, durability and aesthetics (which might involve your homeowners association [HOA]) are all major considerations.
The average home requires 21 to 34 solar panels to cover its full electricity needs. This range is based on the monthly average of 877 kWh used by homes, as reported by the U.S. Energy Information Administration. However, all residential needs are different. The location of your home, the efficiency of your panels and how much energy your household consumes will determine how many solar panels you need.
The main advantages of solar energy include benefiting the environment and public health by reducing carbon emissions and improving air quality, saving money on your monthly utility bill, and reducing reliance on the grid to gain energy independence. Other advantages include increasing the resale value of your home from solar panels and avoiding rising energy costs through your utility.
Yes, theoretically. A modern solar panel system, including a battery for backup power storage, makes it possible for a house to run on solar power alone. If you have highly efficient solar panels and a premium battery, you can easily generate enough energy to power your home and daily needs.
Solar panels have an average life span of 25 to 30 years. Depending on how well you take care of your panels with periodic maintenance such as cleaning and inspections, they will likely last longer. However, their solar panel efficiency decreases by about 0.8% each year, which affects the amount of energy you can routinely generate.
The best way to calculate how many solar panels you need is to look up your home’s hourly energy requirement in kWh over a 30-day period. This will probably be on your monthly energy statements, or you can ask your utility to calculate it for you. Multiply that by the number of peak sunlight hours in your area, which you can easily search online since it differs depending on the time of year and where you live. Then, divide that number by the wattage of your panels, which is either low wattage (150W) or high wattage (360W).
