Personal Pursuits of a Canadian man
Below is actual production data over the past few years that I pulled from my inverters. It shows clear patterns, but always some variations. You can really see the years we had a lot of smoke or lots of snow. Note this is in kWh.
Below is a slightly different view from Spot Power which shows the imports vs. exports to the grid to decide when to switch from winter to summer solar rates.
Like my 2022 results post and my 2023 results I wanted to provide an update on how our solar did in 2024.
Overall we had a net contribution of $2720 and the results were a little worse than 2023 but slightly better than 2023. We had production of 12,000 kwh in 2024; of which we sold 7600 kwh back to the grid. This was about 1500 kwh less than 2023, I assume due to the Tesla being set to charge during the day so we don’t have to pay distribution and transmission charges.
For all our financial calculations we use the real solar club rate for what we produce in the summer, but only price our internally used power at the “grid” rate which we use 8.3 cents per kwh. Like in 2023 we use 6 cents for our variable Distribution and Transmission cost, so internally consumed kwh are always 14.3 cents. This is important as our results are not inflated using a higher export solar club rate, although that is our opportunity cost.
Our payback period remains at 9 years with an additional 5 years to go. This is the most common financial metric I get asked. I thought this was optimistic, but we have remained at 9 years payback throughout which is great.
Starting May 1st 2023 I wanted to see if I could generate enough credits to make an entire year without a power bill. I was super excited when I reached the end and Spot Power gave me my credit balance.
Here is my 12 month bill showing the credit.
During the year I never paid for my monthly fixed charges, the charges for grid electricity, the distribution or transmission or anything else. It is like having my own little energy reactor on my room making money.
Something to be aware of if you want to try this is you have to specifically ask the power company to not credit back your micro-generation credits. Generally they are required to this if you have a >$200 credit or so. That probably would have been smarter, but this seemed like more fun. My peak credit was $1350 which is how I managed to get through the winter with a bill.
Regardless it was another way to look at return on investment other than pure financial like in my 2023 performance post.
Like my 2022 results post I wanted to provide an update on how our solar did in 2023.
Overall we had a net contribution of $3107 and the results were a little better than 2022. We had higher production of 12,900 kwh in 2023; of which we sold 9100 kwh back to the grid. We used a little less in the house than last year, but bought a Tesla late in the year so that will change in 2024.
For all our financial calculations we use the real solar club rate for what we produce in the summer, but only price our internally used power at the “grid” rate which we use 8.3 cents per kwh. Like in 2022 we use 6 cents for our variable Distribution and Transmission cost, so internally consumed kwh are always 14.3 cents. This is important as our results are not inflated using a higher export solar club rate, although that is our opportunity cost.
Our payback period is about an additional 6 years, which is the most common financial metric I get asked. This is probably optimistic but would be great if true.
Was chatting with a buddy that just installed his system. Not surprisingly his experience was the same as mine, no production after snow. He was also told of the NAIT study and how snow wouldn’t be a problem…
Thought I would past another picture, this time with a bit of cold snap after a brief warming period.
I have been keeping track of my solar production every month since installation to see how I am doing. Overall the system has performed quite well. The economics are actually doing better than I expected.
For 2022 we consumed 8616 kWh, and we put back 8594 kWh, so we were able to produce 100% of our consumption which was great! On top of that we utilized 4007 kWh in our house, which we could calculate by taking the kWh produced by the system minus the amount we received micro-gen credits for.
One of things we noticed is when we have changed some of our behaviours in when we use electricity. Now that we know we can use our own, we have put a lot more of our heavy loads in during daylight hours like using the dryer or putting on the dishwasher. The 4007 kWh that we used in the house is particularly valuable as we not only save the power cost, but also the 6 cents per kWh or so of variable distribution and transmission costs. These are the most valuable kWh’s we produce.
On the economics side the value of our production in 2022 was $2570, which is a real amount. It consists of the microgen $ we get from Spot Power on the 8594 we put back into the grid, and the 4007 internally used kWh that is calculated at the power rate plus distribution and transmission. At this rate the system should payback in 7 – 8 more years, which is better than I expected.
I can’t wait for another year of production to see how we do in 2023!
With the solar panels clearly working I was then able to get my very cool solar production app installed and working. It told me lots of things I wanted to know and was very exciting to see.
I was able to get the web version to share so here is my current results.
After install we were allowed to turn on our solar panels, and low and behold my meter started going backwards!
Something I didn’t know at the time, and wish someone had told me, was that these old style meters are way more lucrative with solar power. This is because you get credit for all the power you are putting back – including distribution charges. This is a material impact as per my financial post.
Clearly the panels were working, which was very exciting!
Unfortunately i was in a rush to get my net-meter installed, which in hindsight I should have just let the very slow wheels of Enmax do on their own sweet time…
Like many things during COVID Solar YYC was having various supply problems. The original panels (Longi 360) weren’t available, so we ended up getting Longi 375 watt panels. They were slightly larger so the system would be a little bigger which was nice. Total system size moved to 12 kilowatt.
We were able to keep our micro-inverters which were AP System QS1 & YC600.
Once the panels were available we then ran into various other shortages including the shake flashing. But finally the big day came in the early fall. About 3 months behind plan, and production would be lost for the peak summer months, but I figured it wasn’t going to be any better next year so might as well go ahead.
The crew arrived, was nice to talk to and began getting things organized. The only significant hitch was with the new panels my roof vents were in the way for some panels and four had to be put on the North side of the roof. Not ideal but I figured it was better than not having them.
The first day was getting most of the rails and flashing in place and levelled.
Next day was getting the rest of the rails and the micro-inverters starting to get laid out.
The next day was the big day – the panels went on!
Something I learned about in my journey is the significant advantage of Solar Clubs in getting a solar generation rate for power produced. This was legislated in Alberta a few years ago under the NDP government. Essentially any site can be made a small micro-generator which enables you to get credit for power produced. As per my financial analysis this is a game changer for economics of solar systems.
Since this Solar Clubs have been created or added. These clubs enable a small producer like me to access these higher rates once I am an approved micro-generator. Solar YYC took care of my micro-gen application and approval so everything was done as part of my installation.
Below are a few of the solar Clubs I am aware of. They all seem to be the same and I will have to decide in the spring when I switch to a production plan. I won’t switch until then as I have a pretty good rate from ATCO right now.
A local Cooperative that serves the foothills of Alberta. They have normal energy plans and a Solar Club plan you can see below.
Like most of these programs you have to call in to switch between the low rate and high rate in the spring and fall. Getting the high rate will add up quick in the summer.
Like most of the solar club plans they have the 2% cash back on power you consume. They also include 50% renewable energy on what you consume which is great.
Foothills donates their profits to local energy projects which is nice.
Another company I heard of was Park Power. They have the same rates as Foothills, and everyone else I saw in Alberta, but have a better explanation of how the billing works.
Spot Power is a local Calgary company and has the standard solar club rates. The nice part of Spot is they provide Air Miles which seems like a small, but nice addition. Will have to decide what to do once the sun is out a bit more.
Living in Calgary, Alberta there were no municipal or provincial government programs available when I was looking into installing solar. Luckily for me the Government of Canada decided to launch a Greener Homes Grant through NRCAN. It is always nice of the government to bribe me with my own tax dollars!
Wit this grant you can get up to $5000 of home retrofits and the cost of a home energy assessment up to $600. You have to get an initial home assessment done (before work begins) and then after the work is completed.
For interest there a provincial program for municipalities here.
Nothing dealing with the government is easy. I had a hard time finding a solar energy assessor, and while I received a tracking number after applying that was it.
Eventually I did get an assessment which I will provide in another post, however, never heard boo from NRCAN. I did call the 1-800 number which was especially useless. I said I applied about 5 months ago and haven’t heard anything. The answer was they couldn’t see the status of my application. I asked why the site says most people hear in weeks not months; the response was we can’t see anything. I mean why have a 1-800 number if the agents have no visibility to anything?
After nearly 6 months my application was finally approved, after the solar already installed. Now I just have to get a final energy audit.
I love Excel. It can do all sorts of great things, like estimate how long a solar system will take to pay off.
I had a couple of payback estimates from the folks that originally gave me quotes. Both seemed to say payback was about 9 – 13 years. This was primarily due to Solar Clubs and bi-directional metering. Essentially you can get a higher rate while you are producing more solar than you are consuming. The rate was about 26 cents a kWh so material. The bigger the system the quicker the payback if you are over 100%.
While the solar rate is great, I made a fundamental error in my model. When calculating the value of my power I included the variable distribution costs. So in my system I assumed a total power cost of 13 cents, of which 7 was variable energy costs and 6 was distribution. This is true for power I consume, HOWEVER, it is not true for power I push to the system. I only get credit for the production (7 cents in this example). This was materially less than I had modelled, so my payback will be longer than expected.
I should note that both of the companies that provided financial models made this same assumption so were certainly showing an accelerated payback.
Given how much the monthly fixed and variable distribution costs are (generally significantly more than the actual energy costs) I wanted to avoid them as much as possible. The way we have been doing that after discovering the model issue above is to use our high energy devices in the daytime. For example we used to run our dishwasher at night, but it would make far more sense to run it during the day when we had solar production. The difference is about 6 cents a kWh of variable distribution charges – nearly as valuable as the actual power!
My wife and I have been looking at Solar for years, but I could never make it make financial sense. I had looked into both solar water heating with vacuum tubes and solar photoelectric. This past spring we decided to take another look.
As you may know Calgary is very sunny generally, and a large portion of our power generation is coal, so it certainly would have positive environmental impact. You can see an approximate solar energy production estimate at several sites like PVWatts from the US Government.
Through some research it seemed like it might now make at least some financial sense (i.e. an eventual payback).
With some hope I reached out to about 4 solar installation companies in Calgary. A couple replied with a very high level quote using a satellite image of my house. Their quotes probably were good enough for my initial needs.
Two companies did come and visit my house to take a look and give me a more detailed quote with some explanations. Prices were fairly similar within about 15% or so.
The big difference I found between the companies was their ability to answer questions and explain why they recommended what they did. The one company was clearly a salesperson with no solar background and really couldn’t tell me why they were commending what they were.
We ended up selecting SolarYYC. They were very helpful in explaining things to us, and came back and did an electrical assessment to provide a firm quote.
One of the biggest reasons I chose SolarYYC was they use micro-inverters. The other providers seemed to a single larger inverter.
Solar Micro-inverters as per Wikipedia “is a plug-and-play device used in photovoltaics, that converts direct current (DC) generated by a single solar module to alternating current (AC). Microinverters contrast with conventional string and central solar inverters, in which a single inverter is connected to multiple solar panels. The output from several microinverters can be combined and often fed to the electrical grid.
Microinverters have several advantages over conventional inverters. The main advantage is that they electrically isolate the panels from one another, so small amounts of shading, debris or snow lines on any one solar module, or even a complete module failure, do not disproportionately reduce the output of the entire array. Each microinverter harvests optimum power by performing maximum power point tracking (MPPT) for its connected module.[1] Simplicity in system design, lower amperage wires, simplified stock management, and added safety are other factors introduced with the microinverter solution.”
The primary disadvantage is micro-inverters cost more initially. My south roof has a large tree on the north east side, and a chimney in the middle I knew I would get a fair amount of shading. Given this micro-inverters became quite important to me, so this was a great benefit of the SolarYYC proposal.