https://texassolarguys.com/solar-reroof/
At least $140/panel to put a new roof under installed roof top panels. Excluding the cost of the roof.
Cost of DIY ground mount can be less than $100/panel. "Professional" installs of roof top PV is at least $600/panel.
12/23/2020
Here is a thought that has come to me recently. My first PV expenditures were for three professionally installed roof top projects.; one is now about ten years old. Based on initial projections by the installers, I should be near recovering the cost; payback periods were 10-14 years. BUT those projections were made based on full retail electric values of about $.12/kwh and those values increasing annually. The fact is that electric rates have been declining and are expected to continue to decline as wind and PV push the more expensive coal and natural gas out of the market. ALSO, I am now selling all the production from those early projects for $.06/kwh. About half the initial projections. So, my payback for those projects is probably about 30 years. That is about 10 years longer than the life expectancy of the components. I guess I could argue that the projects were about half paid before I started accepting the reduced rates; payback period might be about 5 years for the early period plus about 15 years for the lower rate period. At any rate, by getting into the compensated power production business, I have reduced the value of my early projects.
The first thing the professional installers want to see is your electric bills for the last year. The 30 year payback period would only apply if you had never used (or aren't consuming now) the power that cost $0.12/kWh. So each month, each one of your professional installed projects has some consumption at retail rates, which then drops the excess power to the six cent rate.
ReplyDeleteMy consumption CAN be considered to be worth $.10/kwh. However, my production FAR overshadows my consumption so that essentially all my production is worth only $.06/kwh. It is true that I benefited by $.10-$.12/kwh for a few years before I achieved significant DIY production so I did get my expensive roof top partially paid for during that period. In retrospect, it would have been far better to have skipped the roof top and jumped into the far more cost effective DIY ground mount. I have a neighbor, smarter than I am, who did that. OTOH, it is the experiential learning that makes it fun.
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