Determining If Solar Is A Good Option For Your Home Energy Needs
Installing residential solar panels on your home to help reduce your energy consumption or completely power the house can be an excellent idea. If you have enough sun and a good location for the panels, you can generate significant power. Working with a residential solar panel service is the best place to start and can help you determine the solar potential for your home.
Site Survey
The first step in determining if solar will work for you is to hire a residential solar panel service to come and survey your property to determine if you have enough sun and when the best place is for solar panel placement. Solar panels need direct sunlight to work efficiently, so if you have a heavily shaded lot, you may not be able to collect a large amount of the sun throughout the day.
The solar service can measure the amount of sunlight on your lot and make some recommendations for improving your solar potential after they spend a little time looking things over. Not all solar panels need to go on your home's roof, so sometimes just moving the panels away from the house can be enough to get more sunlight, but access to the southern sky is a must, no matter where the panels are on the property.
If you are dealing with obstructions on the property, mounting the panels higher can help, so a large barn, shed, or outbuilding might be a better place to put the solar panels than on your home's roof.
Tree Solutions
If you are having a problem locating a good spot that has a lot of sun throughout the day, the residential solar panel service may recommend trimming some trees or potentially removing several to open access to the southern sky. Often a tree service can cut the tops of the trees back if you are mounting the solar panels on the roof of the home, but in extreme cases, you may need to take a larger tree out completely and sacrifice the shade it provides.
If you have an area that you can trim back and use a ground mounting system for your solar panels, you may be able to leave the shade on the house and run the electrical underground from the collection grid to the house. You may also want to consider having the residential solar panel service install the panels on a solar tracking mount that moves the panels with the sun's track during the day.
Adding the tracker to the system allows you to point the panels at the sun instead of depending on the right conditions and the sun to hit the panels. The potential to collect more solar energy this way could be the option you need for your home.
For more information on residential solar panel services, contact a company near you.
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