Monitoring Our Solar Energy

Understanding how solar panels collect and store energy is difficult for me , but I do know how to read graphs, and so I am thankful for the monitoring system that comes along with the solar setup.  I just click on an icon on my desk top, and instantly I have lots of technical information about how well our panels are operating.  There's a 45 minute video that explains how to use and read the monitoring information.  It's technical, and neither Ron nor I made it to the end of the video.  I doubt if many do.

The most important thing to know is how many kilowatts your panels are producing, and more specifically which panels are NOT producing as much as they should.  The latter information is very helpful, as you can figure out why they aren't producing and do something about it.  The problem is usually shade, usually from a tree, but possibly from a neighboring house.  You can't move the house, but you can trim the tree, and move the panels if they're not in the proper location.

Getting solar is a big step.  It's expensive, but statistically we should get our investment back in about 5 1/2 years.  Or, you can finance it over 20 years, which doesn't save you much now, but it does get you off traditional electricity and on to solar energy.  Not contributing to the bottom line of SDGE warms my heart.  Our last bill was $44.  Most of that was gas, including a small fee of about $5 for SDGE's collecting and storing our energy.  I think that's what they do.  If we have extra energy at the end of the year, we sell that to SDGE.  How great is that?  Even in December with short days of sunlight, we are producing enough to power our house.  I'm so happy with our decision to go solar.