The solar basics

Watts (W): Watts are units of measurement for power, which is the rate at which energy is used or generated. Solar panels are rated by wattage, typically in the 360-420 watt range for residential panels.

Kilowatts (kW): Kilowatts are a larger unit of power. 1 kilowatt is equal to 1,000 watts. It's often used to describe the power output of household appliances or smaller machines.

Megawatts (MW): Megawatts are even larger units of power. 1 megawatt is equal to 1 million watts. This is commonly used to describe the power output of larger systems like power plants or industrial facilities.

Kilowatt Hours (kWh): Kilowatt hours are units of energy. They represent the amount of energy used or produced over time. It's like measuring how much electricity is consumed by a device running at a certain power for an hour. A 1500 Watt Hair dryer used for 1 hour, consumes 1.5kWh (1,500Wh).

In a nutshell, watts gauge the momentary power of a solar panel, kilowatts assess the system's overall strength, megawatts measure power on a grand scale, and kilowatt hours track the total energy produced by your solar panels over a period.

There’s a lot of steps that involve a lot of people in the process of going solar. But don't worry, we'll make sure it's as smooth as possible.

Site Survey: We typically don’t need to do a site survey, which saves you and us a lot of time and money and is part of why our costs are so low. But in the instances we need to perform one, we’ll come to your home to take some photos, notes and measurements of the property. Then our Design and Engineering team uses that information in creating the plan set for permitting and installation.

Permitting: This is where we work with your local building department to let them know what work we’ll be performing, provide our contractor and license information, and get permission to install the system on your home. The timelines and cost vary by building department, solar contractor and project complexity, but we’ve developed a very efficient process to get your system permitted and installed as fast as possible.

Installation: This is the big day, we show up at your home, install the solar panels on your roof, and connect all the components to your home’s electrical panel. This is typically completed all in a single day, and most of the work is done without having to turn off your power. But when we do the final wiring there’s a short window of time we need to shut off power to the home for the safety of our installers and electricians.

Inspection: After the installation, we coordinate with the local building department to let them know the work has been completed. This is where they verify that the system was installed according to the plans and permit, and give their final safety approval.

Interconnection: The system is installed, but we can’t turn it on until the utility gives their Permission to Operate (commonly called PTO). We submit the details of the system, such as the power it’s expected to generate, equipment used, permit and inspection approval, then they review everything and give us approval to turn on your system.

Once we have this approval we’ll let you know, and it’s as easy as flipping a switch. This can easily and safely be done by you, or we’ll be happy to come by and do it for you.

The simplest and most common way to compare pricing between companies is with the cost per watt model. Which is the total system cost on your contract divided by the total watts of the system. If a system is $25,000 and 8kW (8000 Watts) then the $/Watt would be $3.125.

This is a best first step, then you should look into everything that is included in that price. If your home needs electrical or roof work to install the solar panels, that may or may not be included in initial quotes.

Also the equipment being used varies a lot, equipment is not created equal and it’s important to factor in those details when comparing.