If you have a roof, you can get solar panels!

It doesn’t matter what way your roof faces, modern solar panel installers can design a solar panel system for any roof. As long as you have sun, there are solar panels that can cover your power needs.

It used to be that only single-family homes with a southern facing rooftop could get solar panels, but thanks to improvements in the efficiency of the panels and an acceptance of solar in general, now people in condos, townhomes, and even whole communities can enjoy solar.

Solar panels no longer need to only be on roofs that face the south.

Solar is still quite useful if connected on roofs that face east, west, and north. Especially homes that have roofs facing towards the west. Not every home has a tree-free southern facing roof. Often where there is not a south-facing roof, a house will have both east and west facing roof spaces. In this instance, the preference is usually for the one that is orientated closest to the south, but with the introduction of time of use billing and late afternoon peak periods more people are now opting for the west to capture more power generation in the later afternoon.

This is particularly the case in California where all residential customers will be on time of use billing plans from their utility by the end of 2019. Time of use billing basically means that the more that people use power from the utilities, the more it will cost. Power in the middle of the day or middle of the night will be less expensive than power from 5 pm to 9 pm. If you use solar panels during the day and use the grid at night when it is less expensive, you will be using time of use billing to your advantage.

Shade does have an effect on your solar panels.

Shade will affect the number of kWh (kilowatt hours) of electricity that home solar panel systems would produce, but modern solar installers can work around these issues and find the proper setup to keep your panels generating the energy you need.

Just having a small amount of shade on your solar panels can affect the output of the solar panel, and it can even cause damage in the future. The amperage that can come from each panel is only as much as the amps that flow through the panel with the lowest amount of current. It’s like the sports adage, you are only as good as your weakest link. If one panel is in the shade, it lowers the output of all the panels in the string.

So, how do you work around that? First, by working with your installer to design your system so it’s not covered by shade. If you still end up with trees creating shade on your panels, you can simply trim back its branches to get rid of the shady areas and it will be just like new!

Micro-inverters will optimize the power of your panels.

Since 2011, micro-inverters and panel level optimizers have become quite common and have taken a significant portion of the market share ways from string-inverters.

Micro-inverters optimize the power at each panel level by varying current (I) and voltage (V) to maximize power output and then converting it to AC power at the panel. What this means is that a reduction in Amps in one panel caused by shade no longer affects the other panels that are not in shade. This would completely eliminate the shade problem, though you’ll probably still want to trim back your trees.

Want to learn more about bringing solar into your lifestyle? Check out the HahaSmart blog!

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