The use of solar is increasing now more than ever. The transition from fossil fuels is increasing now that people see the benefit of using energy sources that don’t pollute the environment. The United States, in particular, is seeing a lot of that growth. Solar represents 54% of energy projects in 2023 in the country. The question is, will the investment be right for you?
Knowing the solar energy benefits you’ll see when investing in solar can significantly influence your buying decision. Keep reading to learn why investing in solar panels for your home makes sense.
Reduce Your Power Usage
The first benefit to learn about when investing in solar is the power you’ll save. Unlike traditional homes, where you draw power from the grid, you get your home’s energy from the sun when you install solar.
The amount you’ll save will depend on your installation. If you want to power your home fully, you’ll need to get an installation big enough to meet your maximum power usage and be able to store energy for usage during the evening.
However, you don’t have to power your home at all times if you don’t want to. You can still purchase a minimal installation and partially power your home. You’ll still see power savings when doing this.
Of course, you’ll need to understand your power requirements to do this. Answer the following questions to learn what you need:
- What’s the average and maximum power usage during the day?
- Is there space to install solar panels to point towards the south?
- Are any trees blocking the sun that will degrade a solar panel’s effectiveness?
- How many solar panels will fit on the roof?
Once you can answer these questions, you should be able to learn how many solar panels you need, the power you can generate, and how much money you’ll save on your power bill.
Save With Tax Credits
Although solar panels have drastically decreased in price over the years, they still cost a lot to set up. In some cases, you can still spend over $10,000 to get the installation you need.
This cost turns many people off from buying a solar panel installation. After all, they may not see a return for a long time — which makes the purchase not worth it. But things change when you account for the tax credits available. The government wants to encourage green energy use. To do this, it offers tax credits to homeowners who invest in solar.
Local and national credits are available, depending on where you live. These credits are available on your tax returns over a few years. It’s possible to save thousands after you claim everything possible.
Make sure you examine all the tax credits available to you to determine your true cost of solar. If you can bring down the price enough and have the money to pay cash upfront, it can make purchasing solar more appealing.
Avoid Electricity Price Increases
You don’t only have to worry about the cost of electricity today. Price increases happen often. The price you pay today won’t be the same that you pay in a few years.
You don’t have those increases when you invest in solar. You have your price of installing solar panels, and once you finish that process, you don’t pay the power company for energy anymore.
This means you won’t need to deal with inflation or price gouging from power companies. Look at the average cost of power over time to see the expected future price. Doing this will help you better understand your future savings instead of only considering energy costs today.
Receive Energy Credits
In most cases, you won’t be able to power your home at all times. The sun won’t shine bright enough during the day during heavy cloud cover, and you’ll have zero production at night.
However, that doesn’t mean you don’t have options. Many energy companies allow you to sell excess power to the grid and get energy credits for excess output.
You’ll do this by tieing your solar system to the power grid. Your installer will make the connection for you, with your required power going to your home and the excess hitting the grid.
The power company will then calculate how much you give them and provide credits. At that point, you can use those credits to draw grid power when your solar installation doesn’t produce enough energy. The amount you earn will depend on where you live.
Additionally, some locations don’t offer this option. You’ll need to explore the options in your area to determine if this is possible.
Boost Your Home’s Value
If you installed solar panels a few decades ago, there’s no telling what impact they would have on your home. People weren’t that aware of solar panels and the value they provided.
That’s not the case today. The value of solar is well-known and is something people will look for. Even better — people will pay more for homes with solar. Because of that, you can expect an increase in your home’s value when you install solar. The energy savings offered make it enough to make homes more valuable.
This number will depend on the installation size you get and how much energy it produces. Check the average amount you save each year to get an idea of the increase you’ll see.
Get an estimate from a professional if you want to learn more about solar’s impact on your home.
Get Performance Guarantees
The performance of solar panels can put off some people from investing in solar. It will take many years before someone sees a return on investment, and solar panels are expected to last 30 years. What happens if that doesn’t happen and you waste your money?
The good news is that solar panels today are reliable. Yes, there is an expected degradation in performance over time. But solar manufacturers understand those numbers and will tell you what to expect.
This means you will know your exact performance over time. If you don’t see the expected performance, you can get help from solar companies.
Most manufacturers offer performance guarantees. If you see your panels not producing results, let the manufacturer know about the problem, and they will do what they can to help. And if they can’t, they will help you with a replacement to get back to the expected performance.
These guarantees mean you don’t need to worry nearly as much about your solar panels going bad over time.
Power Off-Grid Homes
Although you can use solar to power homes with a connection to the grid, it isn’t a requirement. You can set up solar independently and not rely on the power grid to get power.
This is useful if you have a home away from the city. Not every piece of land has power lines run to the property to provide power. Hiring a utility company for the job can cost thousands if you want to run power lines.
But that isn’t necessary with solar panels. You can spend your money on solar hardware and a crew to handle the installation. Depending on how far your property is from utility work, the costs can come out around even.
Doing this will allow you to live off the grid without any reliance on traditional utilities.
Use Battery Storage
The good thing about solar is that you can send its output wherever possible. In most situations, you’ll send it to your home and the power grid. But that isn’t your only choice.
If you don’t want to use net metering to get power during low-production periods or you don’t have the ability, you can still store your excess solar production. You do this by purchasing a battery installation.
In this situation, you send your excess power to a battery system instead of the power grid. This process will charge a battery bank designed to power homes.
Once you have enough power saved, you can use it to power everything in your home. A power bank big enough can help a home stay powered at night until the sun comes back up.
A large battery system will add a lot to your installation cost, but it is worth the money, depending on your power needs.
Little Maintenance
Maintenance is a major concern for people investing in solar energy. Since you’re installing complicated hardware on your roof, it’s common to think you’ll need to spend a lot of time each year maintaining your system.
The good news is that this isn’t the case. Solar panels typically work well for extended periods without any work on your part.
And even if you need to perform some maintenance, it’s usually just cleaning your panels to remove debris and clear obstructions — something necessary to improve efficiency.
Your solar panels may need some maintenance as they age, but a solar contractor can handle that. Even then, you’ll only need to do this once or twice a year as your solar panels age.
This amount of maintenance is something that most homeowners can handle and won’t add much extra work to home maintenance.
Avoid Outages
As good as the power grid is today, it still faces problems. Depending on where you live, there are many infrastructure problems that make the grid less reliable during harsh weather.
It’s not uncommon for the power to go out in times like those. If you don’t have a backup plan, you’ll lose power with everyone else.
You won’t face the same power struggles when you remove reliance on the power grid. Solar can keep the lights on in your home while everyone around you suffers from a power outage.
It may not help you during the entire day — you’ll still need power during the night if you don’t have batteries. But it can hold you over while the energy company works to restore power to everyone.
Constant Improvements
The great thing about solar panel technology is that it’s constantly improving. Researchers are developing new ways to increase the efficiency and lifespan of solar panels.
Although you probably won’t see those benefits today when you buy, you can in the future when you need to upgrade. You can build solar installations to be modular — which means you can swap failing equipment in and out with new hardware.
You can take advantage of those improvements when you need to upgrade. That will lead to even better performance in the future when you’re ready to upgrade your system.
Help the Environment
One of the most important things to remember when switching to solar is the impact you’ll have on the environment. More research is coming out that confirms the existence of climate change. You see this today with the average temperature rising and more extreme weather.
Investing in solar can play a small part in helping the world. You’re producing green energy that reduces the need for fossil fuels. Yes, it does require energy to produce panels. But once a great solar installation is up and running, it will produce green energy for 30 years.
The Solar Energy Benefits Are Worth It
There’s a reason why solar energy has taken off as one of the most popular home energy systems. It offers many cost savings, allows you to stay energy independent, and sets you up to contribute to a green future.
Now that you’ve read the solar energy benefits above, you should understand more about how solar contributes to those things and makes sense as an investment. Start talking to the solar panel installation companies near you to learn more about installing solar power in your home.
Did you find this guide helpful and want to learn more about making sustainable life choices? Find more tips that will help on the blog.
