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In 1931, Thomas Edison had a conversation with Henry Ford and Harvey Firestone. He said, “I’d put my money on the sun and solar generated electricity. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until our natural resources run out before we tackle that.” The American homeowner has waited 76 years, but a green energy company has finally produced an alternative. The sun supplies enough power to earth in one hour to supply all of our power needs for an entire year. But currently solar power supplies less than one half of 1 percent of our residential energy requirements. Why? In the past, solar generated electricity has been too expensive and too complex. To switch to solar power, U.S. residents had to invest their children’s college fund. The average customer pays $40,000 to switch their home to solar power; plus customer are responsible for the installation, maintaining the equipment, taking out permits. Who has the patients (or the resources) for this? A fresh company has a new strategy to restrict all of the problematic barriers to solar generated electricity. This new company offers: No solar panels purchase. No installation investment. No maintenance costs. No permit administration. No equipment problems. No rate increases. No doubt! When we first found out about this solar service, we were so intrigued that we investigated this new company. It seemed almost crazy. Like most grassroots initiatives, their model is so non-complicated it makes you question why some inventor didn’t think of upgrading homes to solar power before. You simply pay this solar rental company the same rate per kilowatt for power that you used to send to your utility company, but it gets more interesting. This solar rental company will guarantee that your rate per kilowatt for up to 25 yrs. With constantly rising electricity rates, this gives U.S. residents comfort and can equate to significant cost saves. This innovator even have a solar energy service on their site that displays how much you may recoup over 1, 5, and 25 yrs. Personally, we saved over $18,000 and by using solar power; it is the same as taking 27 trucks off the road or planting 400 trees. Fantastic! In the past, “upgrading to solar” implied expensive solar equipment. Now, you get to feel empowered about saving the planet but most “green” products are more expensive than their “dirty” alternatives. this innovator, going green can actually be really easy to do. This is all made possible by net metering laws that require the utility companies to allow solar generated electricity to flow into the energy infrastructure and then permit the consumer to pull that same amount of electricity off of the grid at no cost to the consumer. In essence, the grid becomes a energy container. The electricity meter spins in reverse during the day when the sun is producing power and forwards at night when the consumer pulls that power back off the grid. These net-metering laws were drafted because residential power production was the highest cause of pollution in the United States last year. There are still 9 states that have not drafted net-metering laws. People may be still a little apprehensive about this new concept. We asked some difficult questions. Detailed FAQs: Q. How can this solar rental company afford to install this complete residential solar power system with no upfront cost to the homeowner? A. Because the company handles everything; from the solar grade silicon to the final installation, they squeeze costs at each stage of the production. Plus they are building the largest manufacturing plant for solar power in the world. When you combine their vertical integration with our economies of scale, they are able to produce the solar equipment at half the cost of the competitors. Q. This sounds like this green company required a large amount of investment to to get rolling? A. $650 million. Q. When does the customer pay the security deposit for the solar rental? A. They do not pay the security deposit until after the solar engineer comes to their house and designs the solar energy system. They will show you exactly what the solar energy system will look like and only after the customer signs off on the design does the customer pay the deposit. The deposit is 100% refundable at the end of the rental term. Q. How long of a contract does the homeowner have to sign? A. 1, 5, or 25 years. Over 80% of the residential solar energy customers sign the 25 year contract because that locks in the electricity rate for the entire term of the agreement. If the customer signs a shorter contract, the rate is recalculated according to current power rates at the end of the term. Q. What happens if the homeowner signs a 25 year agreement and they want to sell their house in 10 years? A. The homeowner has three selections. First, they can ask the company to move the system to their new house. The company will do this one time for free. Second, the homeowner can transfer the solar rental agreement to the new owner. This can potentially add value to the existing house because if power rates keep going up and they are 40% higher in 10 years, then the buyer would get a 40% decrease on their energy bill because of the existing solar rental agreement. The final option is that the customer can contact the company, tell them that they want to end the contract. The company will remove the residential solar energy system. With this third option, the customer will forfeit their security deposit. Q. So is the customer’s security deposit the most they have at risk? Is that the only risk? A. Obviously if the customer does not pay their rental fees there will be late charges or if one of our franchisees comes out to their house to remove the solar system and they refuse to allow them access, the company will have to take an alternate path to recover their solar unit. Q. Okay. A customer wants a residential solar energy system on their house. How does it work? What is the process? A. The homeowner reserves their system online and one of the Solar Energy Consultants will help them each step of the way. There are some simple questions to answer about the amount of shade, the direction of the roof line, the power consumption, etc. After the customer signs the contract, a solar engineer will come to the location to design the residential solar energy system. This last step will not happen until the company has the solar equipment ready to install. Q. What if the homeowner does not like the solar system design? Are they still obligated to the solar rental agreement? A. No. They can back out of the solar rental service with no penalty. As mentioned, the customer doesn’t submit the deposit until after you approve the residential solar energy system design. Q. Okay. The customer likes the design. They want the solar energy system. What's next? A. The installation usually takes about a day. The permit process can take as much as 90 days depending on how cooperative the local utility is, but they company handles every step of the process and the customer doesn’t pay anything until the residential solar energy unit is producing renewable, clean solar electricity for their home. Q. What exactly does the homeowner pay? How is solar rental fee calculated? A. The customer pays a rental for the amount of energy that their solar unit produces. The customer is producing their own power from the sun. The solar engineer will go through the resident’s past power bills. If the customer is interested, the solar engineer will walk through the house and show how to save power. Taking all this into consideration, solar engineer will calculate how much energy the homeowner’s personal residential solar power system will need to produce in order to supply power for all of the homeowner’s needs. They will then design the residential solar power unit to generate that power. The customer simply pays the rate per kilowatt hour that is on the rental contract for all the green, renewable solar power that the residential solar energy equipment produces. Q. Does the company have any hidden fees or maintenance expenses? A. Nothing is added. The company has no grid-tied fees or any of those "extras" charges that other companies like to add on. The government is not trying to charge for the sun’s power - yet. Q. So, will the homeowner have two invoices; one from the solar rental company and one from the regular utility company? A. Yes. The customer will pay the company a rental fee for the solar panels that will generate the electricity and the homeowner will pay the electricity company the same connection fees that they pay now, plus the customer will pay the utility company for any extra electricity the customer uses that exceeds the agreement. Q. What does that mean; exceeds the agreement? A. At the end of the year, the customer used more energy than what was contracted for and the residential solar energy system produced for them, then the customer would need to pay the electricity company for the excess power that was used and not created by the solar system. Q. And what rate would the customer pay for that power? A. The customer would pay the electricity company’s current rates. Sorry, this solar rental company cannot do anything about the utility company’s rates. But look at it this way, the customer will be using a lot less of that environmentally damaging power and the solar system the customer rents will always self-produce the homeowner’s power at the same guaranteed low rate. No surprises. If a customer reads about rising power costs, they can smile knowing that their solar generated electricity costs are guaranteed for the length of your agreement. Q. In the first year, the homeowner is just paying the same rate that they were paying previously, right? A. Often rate is actually less. The company bases the equipment costs on the yearly average for the rate charged by their utility provider. So, the company bases their equipment costs on the prior year averaged charged by the utility. Since power rates tend to go up each year, many customer will save money on their first bill. This will only increase as the years go by. The company provides a tool on their website that will tell specifically what they will save with their particular utility and their monthly usage. Many customers save over $10,000 just by switching to solar. Q. What would a customer’s monthly rental fee look like? A. Let's say the customer agreed to the company installing a system to self-produce 12,000 kilowatt hours of electricity for the year. The customer’s contract rate is 10 cents a kilowatt hour. The total bill for the year would be $1,200 for the use of the solar equipment. With most power companies, the homeowner has some months that are higher and some lower. It is hard to understand your expenses. This solar rental company has a system called "Flat Rate" where the customer simply pays a given dollar amount each a month every month. Q. What happens if the customer contracts for a certain amount of kilowatt hours and then their kids go off to school? A. The residential solar energy system is remotely monitored automatically every day. If the solar engineer notices a usage drop, they will contact the customer to see if this is a permanent situation or just a short-term fluctuation. If this will be a permanent decrease in energy usage, the solar installer will come out and remove the proper number of panels and readjust the contract. Q. And how much will system support cost me? A. Nothing. This solar rental company makes solar simple. Q. What happens if something need to be fixed? A. The company has a complete maintenance guarantee. If the residential solar energy unit ever stops working, it will be fixed for free. The customer has no additional costs until the solar power system is working again. This makes the company motivated to get it fixed fast. Q. What if my neighbor drops a tree on one of the solar panels? A. It is just like renting an appliance. The customer is responsible for returning the residential solar power system in working order. The company recommends that customers contact their homeowners insurance to ensure that the solar equipment is covered under their policy. Q. Would the customer save money in the long run if they just bought a residential solar energy unit? A. It’s doubtful. Renting solar equipment can save a significant amount of money, and it protects the homeowner from the large investment risk. If the customer buys solar panels and invest $40,000, they are tied into that technology for a long time. If something is invented, the homeowner can't switch because their $40,000 would be wasted. If the customer breaks their agreement with the solar rental company, they will lose their security deposit, usually $500. The customer can simply contact the company and tell then that they want to cancel the agreement. The customer would lose the security deposit. But that is a lot better than losing a huge investment. Q. Is the residential solar energy manufacturing plant completed yet? A. No. The first solar units will be ready to install in the middle of 2008. Q. So why would a customer reserve a solar unit now? A. First – the customer lock in the even pay rate as soon as they sign up. With the way power rates are increasing, this could save the homeowner a lot of money. Second – the customer reserves their installation position. This means they can get their residential solar energy system sooner once the manufacturing plant is producing. Third - it also helps the company show the government how many homeowners will upgrade to solar if an offer that makes sense on every level is presented. Q. What happens if the customers accepts the agreement and the manufacturing plant is never completed? A. The contract would be void and canceled. This solar rental company understands that this is a new concept. The big power and oil companies have been saying for a long time that solar generated electricity has no market. They have a vested interest in making that statement. This company is presenting an alternative. They have a solar vision. The consequences are too big if we don't. The only way that change is going to happen is if we create a better vision. For that vision to be sustainable, it needs to make economic sense for all consumers involved. Energy production is the biggest source of pollution in the United States. This solar rental company is not asking anyone to give up anything. In fact, homeowners can save a significant amounts of money by switching their homes to solar generated electricity. When was the last time a person could save money and do the right thing? Daniel Stouffer is small business owner and advocate of renewable energy. At Solargies (Solar Energies), Daniel’s objective is to spread the use of clean solar power as simply and as rapidly as possible.
Article Source: http://www.solarpanelarticles.com
He is an Ecopreneur investing time and energies educating people about renewable energy, most specifically, solar generated (PV) electricity. Learn more about Daniel at www.Solargies.com. ***** TO LEARN MORE ABOUT RESIDENTIAL SOLAR ENERGY **** You can visit www.Solargies.com/Residential_Solar_Energy.htm.
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