Category Archives: Solar Power Rocks
In Focus: Los Angeles Solar Rebates and Tax Credits
Solar power in Los Angeles makes perfect sense: on average, the city is blessed with over 3,000 hours of sunshine every year. LA also offers solar rebates and other incentives to help encourage homeowners and businesses to invest in solar panels. The program is a little complicated, and LA rolled out revised solar rebates last [...]
In Focus: ‘Pay As You Go’ Solar
Think solar panels are too expensive? It’s a common misconception—homeowners often think solar power is something only the rich can afford. But it just isn’t true. In fact, in many locations now, you can actually get solar panels for free. No, that isn’t some kind of trick: you can get free solar up on your [...]
Doubling U.S. Solar for No Extra Money
The Solyndra debacle grabs so much attention because it’s such a sensational example of the government picking winners and losers, and because it’s loudly wielded as a weapon against the Obama administration. The latter fact is silly considering that the Department of Energy Loan program, what funded Solyndra’s loan guarantee, was actually started by President [...]
Calculating Solar Panel Output
The amount of electricity a solar panel produces depends on three main things: the amount of sunlight hitting the panel, the size of the panel, and the efficiency of the solar cells inside. We’ll break down what you can expect from a typical solar panel, and how that power output compares to the power you [...]
Delaware the Solar King?
We’ve been giving out kudos lately here at SPR (check out our recent blog singing Boston’s praises) and while we’re at it, we can’t miss Delaware. The last time we check in with the state solar policy was lukewarm at best, and we gave it a mediocre “C” grade. Boy have things changed! If you [...]
Boston: Setting The Solar Bar
Here at SPR we see go over a lot of solar policy. It’s kind of our job, after all. We’ve gone through a lot of states (all of them, in fact), and a whole bunch of cities, summarizing and reviewing how bright an outlook each offers for your residential solar power system and the money [...]
How Clouds Affect Solar
While solar panels generate the most electricity on clear days with abundant sunshine (not surprisingly), they continue to work when the weather turns cloudy. On a cloudy day, typical solar panels can produce 10-25% of their rated capacity. The exact amount will vary depending on the density of the clouds, and may also vary by [...]
The ROI for Home Solar Panels in Hawaii
Hello indeed! I don’t know if anyone else has been checking out the recent Hawaii updates, but there is some really exciting stuff going on for solar power in the Aloha State. You may have confused all that noise for Hawaiians up in arms about their sky-high electric bills, but don’t be fooled – that [...]
Which U.S States Install the Most Solar?
Where is the US solar market growing fastest? One way to get at that question is to dig deeper in to some obvious data about how much solar has been installed in the country: Take a look at per capita solar installations to date and last year. How many watts of solar have been installed [...]