Solar panels installed!

Well it only took two days to install the solar system. Everything turned out great and we're really happy with it.

The system got turned on for the first time today which was also the day the building inspector would sign off on our permit. While it was on for testing we generated 10kWh of power which is worth about $2 or $4 depending on which tier of power you are offsetting.

We're allowed to offset the power we use at night or on cloudy days but not sell back more than we end up using. There are no batteries, the electrical grid is effectively our battery. If there is a power outage, our inverter notices and refuses to output any power (to stop us electrocuting people working on restoring power).

Now we just need to wait for the utility company to come out and give us a fancy smart meter (for time of usage billing) and to bless the system and we'll be allowed to leave it on all the time.

From 20110607solarinstalled

The coolest thing was seeing our electric meter running backwards while the system was running!