Death, taxes, and your electric bill. Turns out, paying the utility month after month isn’t as inevitable as you think. This solar customer found out how going solar helped him win his energy independence.
There’s only so much you can do to lower your electricity bill, right? Wrong. When you go solar, you’re really in the driver’s seat. Just ask Gordon Eglintine, who put in his ground-mounted system of 40 LG panels at his home in Bow, New Hampshire in 2018. Solar is enhancing his resilience in terms of energy and finances. And he likes the way the system looks too.
How Do You Become Energy Independent? With Solar, of course.
What was Gordon’s main reason to go solar? In one word: “Independence,” he says. “I didn’t like being reliant on the electric company and I wanted to have my own source of energy that was renewable and would pay for itself over time.”
As a homeowner, Gordon didn’t want to be at the mercy of the grid any longer. Why pay for electricity to be generated far away—and then pay for the transmission to your home? Gordon was ready to cut out the middleman. “I was spending close to $200 a month,” Gordon explained.
His system was sized to make this not-so-fun bill vanish. 14.4kW Fixed Ground Mount 40 LG 360W panels with 40 Enphase IQ7+ micro inverters. “The installation went great—better than expected. The team was communicative throughout the whole process.”
How Solar Makes Electric Bills Disappear
That’s because solar uses an electric meter that runs forward and backward, depending upon whether the house uses more or less energy than the panels generate. You can offset your electricity use by generating your own electricity beyond the needs of your household. “It goes back to the grid,” Gordon said, expressing his happiness about producing more energy than he utilizes. He then gets credited for this excess power—that’s right, the utility pays Gordon, not the other way around—and practically pays for the electricity his home does pull from the grid when his panels aren’t producing (like at night).
Must Read: How Does Net Metering Work in New Hampshire?
“Not having an electric bill and getting paid by the utility every month is nice,” Gordon said with a chuckle. Solar requires essentially no maintenance and industry warranties extend out 25 years, which means that you can bank those savings month after month. “The system is paying for itself over time. It was a good investment.”
Now, two years after installing his system, Gordon is just as happy with his panels as the day they were installed. “I love looking at my solar panels, as silly as it sounds,” he says. “I look at them and I’m like, ‘Yeah that’s cool!’ I feel like I’m doing my part, using a renewable resource.”
By Jane Stromberg
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