The home is powered by two solar arrays delivering
4.9 Kw. It is known as a grid tie system. When the solar photovoltaic
panels are running at full capacity the power is fed back into the
electrical grid and the home's meter spins backward. At night, rainy or
snowy days the house feeds off the grid and the meter spins forward and
power is consumed from the utility. There are no batteries involved. The
grid acts as a big battery. A wireless power cost monitor is used to
keep tabs on power on daily power consumption . This allows us to
see what devices are consuming the most power and when. It
also displays the cost of the power consumed. The home has had all of the
incandescent bulbs replaced with
LED light bulbs. There are federal and
state tax rebates for both solar electric and solar hot water systems. All
of the power generated by the solar electric panels is also sold as
renewable energy credits helping to defer the cost of the system.
The Massachusetts Technology Collaborative grant program paid for a
portion of the system.
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Pair of Inverters
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