Thanks so much Clayton. Good midday everyone.
My name is Cam Patterson. I'm the development officer at GRID Alternatives Colorado. We
put up a little presentation here. The goal for me this time around is tell you a
little bit about GRID Alternatives Colorado. We're a solar non-profit to build a little bit
more awareness about our organization and then as Clayton said in my first 101 I went in the
weeds of of trying to answer some questions around solar for your home. We talked
briefly about community solar as well. I can definitely when and if there's questions
about that I can go back in there. I started after some time in the Peace Corps in West Africa.
I came back and I I sold residential solar for a year and a half before that company ended up uh
going under and joined grid on uh on their on a commercial construction team we did we did Five
Denver public schools in 2020 so I've had some install experience on the commercial side and now
I'm kind of the development fundraiser side so um I have a little bit of unique experience
in the Solar realm so I'm I'm you know I've sold it for a while I'm happy to kind of
talk through any questions or concerns about solar but what I want to add on
this year is I'm sure everybody's been seeing all these tax credits tax credits
and the IRA the inflation reduction act um so I I'm I'm hoping if people are interested
we can just go through kind of what all these um tax credits are what's new what's old all of
that and kind of walk through Maybe an idea of how to go about electrifying your home with all these
new tax credits coming out so I kind of I was gonna leave a lot of time here to walk us through
what uh full home electrification might look like incorporating solar as an additional for the 201s
so that's the goal is hopefully for everyone to end with an idea of kind of the next steps they
can take towards really electrifying a lot of their home and getting a lot of money back to do
it um so hopefully that sounds good to everyone but yes so we are grid Alternatives uh grid
Alternatives is the largest solar nonprofit in the United States we have seven offices in
California including our headquarters in Oakland um it is Greg Colorado's 10-year anniversary we
started in 2013.
And we have a DC office that is our Mid-Atlantic office a tribal program that
works on tribal lands all over the United States including Alaska and then our international
program works in Mexico Nicaragua and Nepal um and I really what I love about
grid is grids work really to me is exemplary of what environmental justice looks
like and it it's right at this middle of energy Justice and social justice and I think grid
really takes a lens of accessibility that a lot of renewable energy or you know um addressing
environmental Injustice and communities that faced disproportionate amounts of pollution or
environmental harm you know need to be at the center of this work and need to be able to access
the solutions to it um and that's where grid really is at we have four pillars of work or three
pillars of work our first is accessing renewable energy technology so we do free solar installs
from residential all the way up to large-scale community solar we did a two megawatt Community
solar array down in Pueblo in 2020 um so really making sure that solar renewable energy and the
benefits are accessible to the communities that need it the most really need it the most um
and we also have a clean Mobility Program so we're helping Excel Energy administer income
qualified rebates for electric vehicles as well um and then our second pillar of accessibility
is Workforce Development ensuring that renewable energy jobs are accessible and helping people get
and maintain careers in the renewable energy field so Greg Colorado now has two and a half years
worth of paid Workforce Development training we're hosting our our two-week solar Training Academy
right now and we you know pay people to come in um and we train them on how to become
a solar installer and then have a huge network of employer partners that come out and
hire hire our graduates and our third pillar of accessibility is education and ensuring that
students understand what renewable energy is um and get to have some hands-on experience
of installing solar or seeing you know seeing solar solar work and understanding how
it works so um those are kind of our three pillars of access and how we address
kind of energy Justice and social justice and this is our vision rapid Equitable
transition to a world powered by renewable energy that benefits everyone so we really do that I
think what I love too is this community powered right and we try and build our programs Community
up and listening to those Community organizations that are saying there's just not enough paid
Workforce Development opportunities that our clients can go to all right we build those out
because there's huge demand for uh qualified uh applicants in the renewable energy and solar
Industries so making sure we're addressing Community concerns and then Building Solutions
around that um taking that listen first approach and as I said those are kind of our three main
pillars of work is that accessing technology accessing work you know Equitable Workforce
Development and then um renewable energy education um and this is our triple bottom line people
Planet employment right and ensuring that all of our work is addressing you know energy burden
and reducing costs for families that they can reinvest in their families and communities um
while also you know doing this in a way that's um contributing to a better environment cleaner
environment for uh the community and ensuring that that's all um that's all centered around
employment and you know sustainable system meaning having finding ways of sustainable
wage and income to support all that work so yeah as I said we really solarized we run
the gamut we do um single family homes uh to multi-family multi-family and Commercial um I
can tell you more grid is doing five Denver area non-profits this year so we're helping nonprofits
Go Solar as well and reduce their operating costs so if you know any non-profits that are located
in the city of Denver that own their building uh let me know we can probably help them go solar
and we do also do a lot of um off-grid systems for tribal communities and international
communities as well so we we can do it all um and again yeah we have two and a half years
of paid Workforce Development training our training graduates we now have almost an
80 79 of graduates get hired within three months to a full-time living wage position
the solar industry after graduation so um we're really proud of that and we just see
immense demand coming from the industry as well um and this is kind of our standard installation
basic training it's a six-week paid training um and grid is the only nonprofit that has Hands-On
real world solar installation experience so um our trainees get two weeks in the classroom
and on the mock roof this is our our warehouse and building out in Montbello um and then
they get to go out with our construction team and actually install two or three
Real World Systems so that they can go to employers and say yep I've been out there
I've done it um I have literal experience installing solar and I'm ready to join so
and that's proved to be really effective cool so if you're interested you know how do I
get involved in Grid I love this Mission um if your company has a you know CSR Corporate social
responsibility program feel free to reach out to me we do corporate work days where we can host uh
teams of eight employees out on a build for a day um up to 15 on our kind of commercial non-profit
builds um so if your company might be interested in supporting grid we could do that and post
you and your colleagues out on a build for a day we are getting back into events this year um and
so it's our 10-year anniversary coming up so we might be having a 10-year bash as well has a
women in energy build called we build so we try and uh you know bring together women who
are you know interested or working renewable energy and have them out on a solar install
for a day so looking to do that and then of course becoming a donor is a huge part of of
what makes grid run so we're always grateful for anyone who decides to be a one-time donor or
a monthly donor uh at any amount it really makes a huge difference so feel free to reach out I'm the
development officer so if you have any ideas for um fundraising for grade I'm I'm all ears there
um but yeah uh here's a little bit of what we've done we've installed 514 systems in Colorado
42 million in savings for those Community organizations and mainly families of those 514
systems while also preventing 352 000 tons of um of CO2 emissions and Training 2 256 people in
solar so have people plan employment bottom line um and just a little bit of
kind of what's happening in 2023 the Denver 2A Amendment which was kind of a
climate tax amendment um is now in full effect and um one thing that the Caster the Denver office
of climate action sustainability and resiliency has decided to use those funds is a three million
dollar annual rotating fund to help nonprofits Go Solar so we are at the you know we are at the
leading kind of edge of helping denver-based nonprofits you know design solar systems to
meet the criteria uh for that fund and we've gotten now six non-profits contracted to get free
solar systems through that program so along with doing 130 homes this year uh in the greater Denver
metro area we're also helping those nonprofits Go Solar and continuing to build out our Workforce
Development and clean Mobility programs as well so yeah that was my quick grid intro um if there's
any questions feel free to throw them in the chat but um I wanted to jump in a little bit to
these Ira the inflation reduction act Energy Efficiency tax credits um and there's so many of
them and it's a little overwhelming that I thought instead of trying to build out a bunch of slides
we could all just go to this link together and I find this one to be kind of well designed and
visual let me put it in the chat here first um and then if there's any ones or people
have any that are really interesting to them I'd be happy to kind of dive into those
specifically but did I share my screen sorry there we go so the inflation
reduction Act was passed last year and on the solar side of things it re-ups
the solar tax credit to 30 percent um the solar tax rebate through to 30 all the
way through 2033 and then it starts to go down again to 26 in 2034 and 22 and 2035 I believe
something along that it's a long ways away um so the solar tax guy is back up to 30 but uh
a huge element of this is that you know a major focus of this is having people Electrify
their homes and they want to make it as economically feasible as possible for homeowners
to really invest in fully electrifying their home um and to do that what
they've done is created both tax incentives and yet to be fully fleshed
out upfront rebates um that you can also combine so it's a little there's it's a
little confusing but if you um this is a really you know Well Done calculator and you can
put in what's a liquid zip code if someone mines yeah eight zero two two six eight zero two two
six sure and we'll be a homeowner and let's just say you know um sure let's just say uh 70
000 for household income and we're a joints to person um household okay so when you go
down here what you have is electrification rebates and then the tax credits okay and
this is the list of all of them which are um quite a bit and so for rebates if you'll
see here first these are all going to be kind of released in late 2023 because the IRS hasn't
quite announced how exactly they're going to work but my understanding the rebates is that they will
be kind of upfront um with kind of your contractor um just to reduce the immediate costs up front um so what is a good one to start on so heat
pumps we can definitely get into um and so The Upfront discount would be um on these rebates for
low-income households which is under 80 percent of area median income this will cover a hundred
percent of the cost up to eight thousand dollars and then for moderate income households 80 to 150
percent it will cover up to eight thousand dollars um up front and then you can include as well a
tax credit on that so 25c is the other part the tax credits provides a 30 tax credit for heat
pumps capped at two thousand dollars a year um and or and then as well another three percent
tax credit uh for an electrical panel upgrade so um on you know on a 1500 square foot home
this is you know two people um that these might be about eight thousand dollars a year
um that you can get and then get the tax credit um back uh afterwards so you can claim that tax
credit so this is kind of the back and forth here where these electrification rebates for an
electrical panel electric stove rewiring are all going to come out in 2023 and be app upfront
rebates and costs and then you'll be able to come back and include those tax credits once
those projects are completed on the back end um so for solar we can start there
it's back up at 30 percent um and this is an uncapped tax credit so there's
there's no limit how expensive your solar system can be um and as you see here the average
system is a 6K dub that's about right six kilowatt rooftop solar install for about fifteen hundred
dollars and so you get four thousand six four thousand six hundred dollars back on your tax um
taxes afterwards it you know when you file those um and these can also include an electrical
panel upgrade many of ours are really old from the 50s and to add all that solar solar
coming into your system you might need an electric panel upgrade there's additional
um it includes a 30 credit on that as well um so this is really exciting that it's back up
and has a has a really long term but what I would say for people that are starting out it's a little
overwhelming is to start with an energy audit if you haven't done an energy audit yet it's the best
way to just get almost like a a map of your home and the energy situation of your home there is a
hundred and fifty dollar uh tax rebate for energy audits as a part of this that I am looking
for I thought it was in weatherization um but yeah so you can get a tax rebate of 150 for
your energy audit and if you do that through Excel they also have rebates from 150 for your
Baseline energy audit all the way up to 250 um for like an infrared uh blower door energy
on it so you can most likely get around 90 of the energy on it covered with the Excel rebate
and this tax credit um as well so I would start with an energy audit and that what that's going
to help you do is really decide here are my main priorities definitely need to add insulation in
my attic or my windows are you know my windows are really not double pane or not insulated
could get some really good Windows to start and start there to really map out kind of
what are going to be the most effective steps um to go with and part of that is because with
these tax credits on weatherization there's a twelve hundred dollar cap on um [Music] um on
the on the doors the insulation that you can do annually so the tax credit can only be 1200
right here 1200 per year and here's some of the breakdowns so for Windows that's 600 or 30 of your
windows there's the energy audits at 150 um doors 250 per door 500 total and insulation and air
ceiling twelve hundred dollars so if your energy audit comes back and you've got really low levels
of insulation in your attic maybe you think all right this year let's do installation that's going
to max out my twelve hundred dollar tax credit um for this year on weatherization then
next year let's look at doors and windows and start and start kind of looking at
all right we need three new doors right um we could get 500 backup nodes on tax credits
so the weatherization upgrades for kind of these insulation doors windows and the energy out as
well is maxed at 1200 per year that you can do um on weatherization so that energy ads can be
a great place to kind of figure out where you want to start then when you really want to when
you're really ready to make a big investment I wouldn't I would probably wait until late
2023 because these rebates are really um kind of um how would you say it they are about a
large-scale project they're based on kind of a full um a full revamping I'm totally
losing the word um where you're doing kind of multiple things all at the same time you
can add in multiple of these rebates up front um so your electric panel for example um
would be four thousand dollars up front to reduce the cost up front and then the 30 the
600 tax credit on the back end but there is a I'm sorry I know I'm jumping around a
bunch okay so here's the efficiency rebates so this is the whole home energy reduction rebates
um and what these are designed to do retrofits was the r word I was looking for so the Energy
rebates are designed to reward Energy Efficiency retrofits that are modeled to achieve or have
achieved variable verifiable minimum energy use reductions so if you are planning kind of
a multi-purpose where you're going to get some a new electric panel and a heat pump and all of
this these retrofits then can uh if they're gonna save 35 or more of your energy you can get four
thousand or fifty percent of the project cost um reduce upfront and then those tax credits again
can also be added on on the back end um so this is and this is all waiting pending IRS kind of how
how this is going to work which will come out later in 2023 so again start with that energy on
it now and start kind of making a plan of what are your most critical things and then wait I think
for later this year until a lot of this kind of retrofitting um rebates all that information comes
out and then I'm sure there's going to be lots of contractors doing a lot of advertising
and door knocking trying to get people to um Electrify their homes with all these different
systems and uh if you're there and ready with a plan of kind of the steps you want to take it's
going to help a lot in in helping to understand kind of how you're going to go about taking the
most advantage of of these rebates and tax credits so I'm sorry I know that was a
little um fuzzy or just a little discombobulated his taxes always are but
I would prefer if anybody has kind of one of these things they want to hear more
about uh whether we want to dive in the Solar more specifically again I'm happy to do that
but is there any of these kind of rebates or tax credits that you're like how does this work
what you know why should I get a used electric vehicle now or look in the geothermal heating and
I can do my best to answer any specific questions um foreign I have a question for you that I think
might be helpful for others to understand um you know the the supply chain issues
we've heard um a couple years ago are they still there for on-site solar you know if if a
liquid resident wants to install rooftop solar now yeah is what's that wait time like
what's that turnaround time and and have prices stabilized or decreased at all uh the past
couple years great question Jeff thanks for asking um it has somewhat stabilized my understanding
is that Joe Biden or President Biden put on a two-year moratorium or a kind of a two-year pause
on the um potential uh Commerce departments um like ban on on solar panel Imports uh due to kind
of this this investigation that was going on that of of malpractice on the side of the of Chinese
Industries um and so yes the supply chain has kind of reopen that that major kind of scary
hurdle where all these companies were kind of buying in huge bulk orders before any sort
of ban went into place has been a bit kicked down the road uh for another year plus until the
end of 2024.
Um and so what I'm currently seeing is obviously there's huge demand but the major
headwind right now is actually that Excel Energy needs to do a lot of hiring and hasn't been able
to but their wait times for approving systems um is is taking now kind of almost three months
it can take up to three months and so a lot of people have had solar systems solar systems
installed and then um they're waiting on Excel to do a final approval of that install once
the city inspector comes verifies it and the um then the Solar Company takes that City
inspection sends it to Excel and Excel does a final review and that final review before Excel
will allow a customer to turn the solar system on is now taking three it's some people have been
waiting six months um and so that is actually it's not so much getting the panels on your
roof but now final approval from Excel and Excel has to come in and replace your meter with a net
meter which reads both the power that your system produces and puts it pushes into the grid and then
the um Power that comes from your grade at night to power your home so it kind of reads forwards
and backwards and all doing all that has really um been very frustrating with Excel for
the last uh six months to a year where um systems aren't getting turned on for three six
months so your total right now if you decide to go solar I would say from you know initial contact
with the Solar Company through installation of the system and like final inspection from the city
is about two months one to two months um depending on the company and and where they're at but about
one to two months and then Excel you could expect anywhere from another one to three months for
your system to get fully approved with Excel and turned on so it's taking about six months
but I'm less worried about the supply chain and more worried about excel's ever growing backlog
of um of systems that need to be final approved did I see a q a yeah there's
one q a that's come in um the consumer experience their upfront
cost do XYZ access rebates with ABC um sure so I'm assuming kind of on a uh Lauren do you mean kind of solar in
experience or kind of a home electrification yes solar okay perfect um yeah I
can totally walk you through that um Okay so the solar experience what I would recommend is um getting I would say
try and get get bids from three solar companies you know now often especially post covid most
solar companies can give you a can do a full layout of your potential system online um and
kind of map out where the panels would go on your roof online we have all that capability through
satellite software systems and so you can request an online bid and then sit down with these solar
companies and they can kind of walk you through um they're you know they're different pitches and
often you might find you get a really high bid a medium bid and a low low bid cost wise and I often
kind of you know will often go with the middle bid but um it really depends on what's important
to you some companies will have longer labor warranties for example where they'll you know
guarantee their labor um on a system for 10 years instead of five so there's some you know different
things that uh can can be more important often I will just preface that solar doesn't need a lot of
Maintenance because there's no moving parts and so not a lot really like wears down uh as things do
when there's moving Parts but it there can be you know some electrical things but often those will
happen in the first five years and every company has labor warranties in the first five years and
then all the solar the panels and the inverters have a manufacturer warranty for 20 to 25 years
and so if anything breaks um the your Solar Company will get a new product from the from
the manufacturer and come in and reinstall it um free of charge on on the product and then if
your labor warranty is still in place totally free so you can get three bids
from these solar companies um and then choose one [Music] will happen then
you'll get assigned a project manager with that company whose main goal is really going to be kind
of walking you through what the next steps are um the first step is going to be a site visit and
someone from the company will probably come out and spend maybe 20 30 minutes at your house
you'll have to go in your attic take photos of your attic structure make sure it can
support the solar system as well as your electrical system look at your electrical
panel take photos of that all of which the design team needs to make sure that they design
a system that's you know meets code and if your electrical panel is full and needs an upgrade
that's going to be a factor um so once the site visit ends the solar install will go through
design and the designers will come through or will from the company will Design out your system
this might be a point in time where they'll let you know hey we can't add this big of a solar
system without upgrading your electric panel um and that electric panel upgrade would be
included in the 30 tax credit so it's a good time you know to get that all include because
they can cost four to five thousand dollars um say visit design and then once the design is
completed the company will take care of Permitting for you um so they'll get that design all laid out
sent to the city and county or the ahj as well as Excel for preliminary approvals once permitting
is all done that can take two to three weeks uh company will come out install the install
really should only take a day unless unless there's a electric panel upgrade but often can
take can be done within the day so it's not a long construction process at all day two days most
likely um and then once the installation is done this the company will schedule a final inspection
from the city that inspector will come out that can take you know one to two weeks it'll come
out he or she they'll come out approve the system the company takes that final inspection
and submits it all to Excel for final approval once Excel approves the system they will then come
out and replace your meter with a net meter that again reads the electricity that you push into
their grid and you'll see on your Excel bill um kind of a credit system so often in the
spring and early summer where it's still kind of cool you're not using your air conditioning
if you haven't your system will produce more electricity than you need and so all that extra
electricity will go into the grid and will be used by your neighbors and so you'll produce all
these credits your net meter Will Roll negative and so you'll produce all these credits in the
spring and then maybe in the late summer it's really hot you're using AC so you're about at 100
percent your system's producing just enough for what your usages are and then in the winter the
sun goes down it's cloudy it's snowy Etc you might not produce as much electricity as you use even
though you're using less you're using more gas um and so oh and here I can pull this up but those
credits will then be used to cover the Gap so um your credits will come in and cover the
Gap and you'll just see kind of what your pre-monthly balance of credits was and then um
credits that were used to cover any electrical Gap and it'll roll over um and so Excel does
give you the possibility the choice to roll credits over year over year so if you have extra
credits um that you didn't use you can roll those over and build like a bank of credits and that's
what I would recommend because the other option is them buying those credits back from you but
they pay you like 0.02 cents per kilowatt hour or you know two cents per kilowatt hour but
you buy it at a little a minimum of eight but all the way up now with time of use to like
26 Cents a kilowatt hour so they're buying that back from you at a very low rate so I would
recommend banking those credits uh for future use um and then there's a for the tax credit on
solar there's a really quick form I don't know how you do your taxes but with your CPA
you just say hey I got solar this year it's a 540 form it's been a while um but you just
fill out that tax form it takes 20 seconds um where you just say this was the total cost
of my system and as long as you have enough tax liability you get all of that tax credit you
know back so let's say it's 4 600 and you have eight thousand dollars of tax liability you know
you get forty six hundred dollars off your taxes um or your rebate gets bigger if it um if it
covers you know more of your tax liability so um it's a quick form and then you'll get that 4600
back the last thing I'll say most people will do a solar loan um and this is one thing that's changed
since I've been out of the sales industry but um those loans a lot of people will do a 15-year
or a 20-year loan and the loans are fixed um for the length of the term but um they're
all built in where they want you to take that tax credit and put it towards the loan
so if you take your tax credit put that towards the loan within 18 months um then your
cost will remain fixed and usually at or below what your average electric bill is per month
um and but if you don't if you take that tax credit and invest in something else your rates
your kind of fixed monthly cost for that loan will probably rise above what your average
electric bill was um so choice is yours there um but that yeah that loan now what I have heard
is that solar loan interest rates have gone up from I was selling like uh 20-year loan at uh 2.5
2.9 or like three percent uh 20-year loans and I've heard now that those loans have gone up to
more like six or eight percent which may only be um an extra 9 or 11 15 a month but interest
rates on solar loans have gone up quite a bit so that would be another reason to get
three different bids because each Solar Company might have different loan structures
that might fit your financial needs the best um some have like no payments for 12 you know
for 12 months um et cetera et cetera but just know that those loans are often built where
structured where they want you to take your 30 tax credit and put it towards the loan
in order to keep your fixed cost at or below um at or below what you pay currently
on average per month to excel that hopefully and again as I said it can be
a two to six month process I would say overall um depending on kind of
Excel and also how you know how much work there is if electrical
panel and design and all of that but did that answer your question do you
have any follow-up questions on that and Jeff had a great source for yep the Colorado
clean energy fund I haven't seen yeah in the renew program so renew is an is another great
program to look into you can ask those um uh the companies you get bids from if
uh if they use renew and that's another interesting interesting loan option for sure um Jeff has used energy Sage um and I yeah I like
energy Sage as well as solar reviews for sure all right um Lauren I hope
that I answer your questions um oh I'll follow up with Lauren no you
don't need any available cash to start um you can certainly put you know pay cash
or put cash down um on your loan when you first get it but you don't need any cash to
start up front for solar [Music] um Doug what are the pros and cons of owning a solar system
compared to leasing uh the solar lease yeah um solar leases were kind of the first iteration of
solar and how it really kind of got off the ground um solar leases are where essentially the Solar
Company leases your roof space installs a solar system on it um and then you pay back you pay
instead of paying Excel or you kind of have two bills you pay you know Excel for any remaining
electric needs that you have and then you pay you purchase the electricity produced from
the system on your roof from the Solar Company um and people like that because the system
becomes the solar companies problem right so if it breaks down it's the solar company that
owns it they need to repair it that sort of thing um so there's just a little less worry about
that um and then I believe there's a point in time where after like 10 years you can buy the
system out from them um I'm not sure I haven't seen a lease in a long time there are very few
companies that do leases anymore um they're messy they're hard to manage when people move
it can be a total nightmare because you don't own everything on your home and you try and sell
your home that you don't own and everything on the biggest nightmare I've heard is that someone moved
in got you know got qualified by the bank for the mortgage but then because they took on this big
mortgage they didn't qualify for the solar loan and so they had to not move into that house um so
that it it's certainly messy if you want to move um for sure I think the benefits of owning solar
right are if you can fix your costs um with the solar loan you have options on on your payout
whether you want a 10-year 15 year 12 year 20-year um you can fix your cost at something
that feels comfortable to you and then once you pay it off you're done right and you
could sell a home that has no electric bill um that sort of thing so it's an added
bonus when you sell your home for sure um and the maintenance is usually very very low
again like I said so one of the biggest benefits I would argue of leasing is you don't have to
worry about maintenance but often even when the system isn't you know working the company might
be take a really long time to come and fix your leased system where you have to go back to paying
Excel and time of use rates and all of that so I've only seen really the benefits the ROI to me
the return on investment seems a lot better with solar um with owning solar and just knowing that
you know it's your system and you don't have to you know keep dealing with a Solar Company that
kind of um owns a solar system on your roof so um but I never sold leases so I might not be
the best um I believe Sunrun is the only Solar Company I know of that's still doing leases so
if you want a side-by-side comparison reaching out to Sunrun who probably wouldn't be my
first choice they have like one and a half stars on energy sage and solarreviews.com um
but they're the only Solar Company I know of that's still doing leases so which might be
indicative um ah yes the insurance question no so most alert most solar systems
are fully covered fully covered um by your current by your current insurance
it's certainly worth an ask the most I've ever seen Insurance increase is like ten dollars a
month um so it's not going to be extravagant but almost every time the current level of
homeowners insurance covers covers the system so very typically no insurance coverage always
important to ask because [Music] um you need to make sure it's covered and that your insurance
knows about it um because if there is a hail storm the panels are more hail resistant than shingle
roofs so often the roof around the system will be damaged and need replacing over the system
itself and your insurance company will pay the Solar Company to come out what's called a DNR
will remove the system have the roofers come in replace the roof and put the system back
on and insurance covers that whole process to replace your roof and then again if panels
are damaged in a hail storm they have a 25 year warranty so those your Solar Company will
come out will you know order new panels for you um and replace those if you're within the labor
warranty free of cost if if you're not you might have to pay labor for you know an hour or two to
replace a couple panels uh rewire and all of that um yeah so great question there um lifespan of
panels um so this is a great Insight question you can ask the solar companies when you're getting
a bid but panels will last 25 years is their manufacturer kind of um end date except those will
still be 90 or better efficient after 25 years so um there's every different type of panel has a
degradation rate and it's a great way to judge like premium premium panels versus kind of your
Mainline panels so some of the best panels today have a degradation rate of like 0.03 meaning after
25 years they're going to still be 95 efficient um your Mainline panels are anywhere from like 87
efficient to 92 percent efficient after 25 years so the panels will produce electricity for 35 or
40 years but the degradation rate will let you know um how efficient those panels are proven
to be after 25 years which is typically in the low to mid 90 so they only lose five percent
efficiency after 25 years the best panels all right how am I doing recycling is
also coming around Mark that's a great question there's a lot of startups um but yes
there are Now official solar recyclers that um companies will send panels to to get
recycled I know I don't quite know they're certainly way more for like the utility scale
side where there's you know thousands of panels um I'm not quite sure that you know your local
Solar Company is um is kind of recycling panels quite yet for you but there are solar recyclers
that are recycling a lot of the materials you know up to I think 90 of a panel is getting recycled
but um it's a really Rising industry so there is it is it is out there it's getting better and
better you're constantly seeing new articles of they've done it you know and they've pulled out
100 of the silicone and made fully recycled panels um but it's all kind of in that pilot to scale
phase right now but it is coming around yeah great we have one person who has his hand
raised Adam I'll unmute you if you can talk hello can you hear me yeah I can hear you great um thanks cam uh was one question is it possible
to have a um because we also have that um sunshare program we're a customer of sunshare and um we
were wondering if it's possible to uh have a battery backup without putting panels on your
house it is it is absolutely and that is a new tax credit as well battery storage installation
is 30 tax credit um and you can add a battery with or without solar you can add solar and add a
battery later you can just have a battery back up um so absolutely um I would say this is about
16 000 seems a little I think a Tesla power wall when I was selling two years ago was
about twelve thousand five hundred dollars um so 16 000 but with labor
and um yes so yes you can batteries make a lot more sense with time of use
because uh if you've switched to time of use you can set your battery to turn on at like 4 pm when
peak hours start and run through you know seven or eight pm when peak hours end and so you can cover
those points of the day with your battery um or a lot of it hopefully where you would be paying 24
uh cents a kilowatt hour 28 whatever it is um you can cover that with your battery and then have it
recharge overnight with the cheaper power from the Grid or if you have solar you know um have your
solar system power charge it up in the morning so um yes I would say especially if you've been
pushed on a time of use already by Excel the return on investment makes a lot more sense um
if you're not on time of use uh uh it doesn't the return is quite a bit longer could be 10 12 years
to get your money back but absolutely yeah you can do a battery okay and uh piggyback question do
you know much about the technology of battery moving away from lithium and into some other
Alternatives or is that like still a long way off um yeah there's some there's some solid
uh what are they solid iron phosphate uh batteries that are a lot safer
of course more expensive Sonnen is one to look up so and then enen I think
there's cyan solid iron iron phosphate um same thing too yes a lot coming out of like
this is the new battery the new great battery um you know there's stuff with salts and sand
and you know molten salt and all this stuff so but the two I know are really lithium and then
the um solid iron phosphate which Sonnen and some others so you could start there you're
gonna be a little bit more expensive they might be uh more durable as well though they
might last uh 15 to 20 years instead of kind of the 10 to 12 of lithium ion ones so they've
got some upsides with some potential increased cost uh Sonnen is one I know but batteries
aren't totally my strong suit okay thanks yeah um great I hope that was helpful it always goes
so fast but um I am here to be an independent you know if you get these bids and you're overwhelmed
I work for a non-profit I don't have any ties um I can recommend you some companies that I trust
the most for my time um in the industry so if you want some ideas of companies to get bids from
I'm happy to do that I'm happy to look over bids um and there's my email um yeah so if your
company is interested in working with and volunteering with grid if you've got any
follow-up questions to take to reach out so