Should you get Solar Panels in Seattle?

What is Seattle known for? Rain. And what is covered up when rain falls…the sun. But I’ll defending my decision of installing solar panels by mentioning that Germany has the highest adoption rate for solar-harnessing technology use per capita of any nation. And it just so happens, that despite all of our rain here in the great Northwest, we get more sun than Germany. Why did we invest in solar technology? Well, beyond the environmental responsibility aspect, it also makes sense financially.

We first considered our purchase when we heard about a non-profit called Solarize Seattle. Their aim is to gather lots of homeowners in Seattle neighborhoods to educate them on the benefits and cost breakdown of residential solar energy installations. Solarize Seattle then works with solar contractors, who agree to extend a discount to all the homeowners who have completed the educational seminar. These homeowners become a pre-lubricated business opportunity, which allows the contractors to convert them to customers much easier than cold calling, or canvassing a region with marketing efforts.

In addition to the group-buying discount, there are a number of state and federal credits and incentives to take advantage of. First is the federal tax credit of 30% of the installed system cost. So, if you pay 30,000 for a solar photovoltaic system, you will get a $9,000.00 tax credit come April 15^th (I bet you wouldn’t procrastinate that filing season). The State of Washington has also agreed to not collect state sales tax from solar installations. Once your system is generating its own electricity, those kWhs are recorded in a production meter before the electricity feeds into the panel of your house. Depending on where your photovoltaic panels and inverters (convert DC from the panels to AC for your home) were manufactured, there are three different tiers of what the state pays you for each kWh your system produces (not to exceed $5,000 per year)

$0.54 per kWh for Washington panels & Washington inverter

$0.36 per kWh for Washington panels & out-of-state inverter

$0.18 per kWh for out-of-state panels & Washington inverter

$0.15 per kWh for out-of-state panels & out of state panels

The state pays out these production incentives on an annual basis. It’s really the production incentive that is paramount in paying the homeowner back for the up-front costs of the system. But, here in Washington, the incentive payments are scheduled to end in 2020, so don’t delay.

With solar, when you produce more electricity than you use during the day, your meter (that your utility uses to measure your consumption) moves in the other direction, pushing your electricity backward into the grid. At night, you use up those “banked” kWhs when the meter moves forward again. But don’t install a system that produces more electricity than you use from the city, because if you “bank” more than you consume, this bank doesn’t pay you back.

By far, the biggest money savings we’ve seen is through conserving the electricity we use. Once we saw how much electricity we produced and consumed on two separate meters, we were shocked at how much electricity we used…even when we weren’t home. So we took measures like unscrewing some light bulbs on our 6-light vanity fixture, and installing a timer to power our hot water circulating pump on demand, instead of having it run during all daylight hours. Next up is to retire the beer fridge in the man-cave, but I’m really dragging my feet on that one. I’ve also figured out how to take a 90-second shower (more about that here).