First, let’s talk about the financials. GoGreen Solar, which provides you with a DIY Solar Kit, provides a great return on investment. I have invested a total of $16K for my 7.28 kW system. My system included 28 260W panels (made in the US), 28 optimizers, rails, roof mounts, inverter, the accompanying screws and bolts, and step-by-step install guides. $15K of the cost was taken up with GoGreen Solar Kit. GoGreen Solar works with a lending partner to finance the loan over 12 years and my monthly payments are actually comparable to my monthly electrical bill. Out of my pocket came the cost of wiring, AC Disconnect, permits, tools, inspections, etc which I had to get on my own. They provided a shopping list I was responsible for. I was able to get most of the items at Home Depot, Amazon, or a wiring online store. Like I said, all in all, I spent about $16K.

My solar system should offset close to 99% of my electricity needs. The Federal Tax Credit should offset about $4K which would bring my total investment down to about 12K. By doing it myself, I have saved the very large expense of having it professionally installed. Based on my current usage, I use about 10,020 kWh per year. At almost $0.15 per kWh, that equates to about $1500 per year. If PECO doesn’t raise their rates (and they already have one planned for Jan 2019), my system will pay itself off within 9-10 years. After that, everything is gravy. This doesn’t even take into account the extra money I can make with SREC’s (Solar Renewable Energy Credits).

Now, let’s talk about GoGreen Solar. GoGreen Solar provides DIY Solar Kits. In addition to the solar kit itself, they provide the system design, providing all the plans needed for municipal permits, utility interconnection agreements, and support to help the DIY homeowner install the system themselves. I was given the phone number of their on call certified solar engineer, Dave, to help me with any questions. I would rate myself a 5 on a scale from 1 – 10 as a DIY and I was able to install 95% of the system myself (I hired an electrician to help me with the final connection to my main service panel). In total, it took me about 35 hours of my time doing the install. I had a friend help me with one of the final pieces of the project, lifting the solar panels to the roof and attaching them to the rails (6 hours of time).

Overall, I am very happy with GoGreen Solar. They were not perfect, however. Although most of the major components of my system were included in my kit, I found I was short with some of the nuts/bolts and rail extensions. They assigned a project manager to me and she was my point person for any issues that came up. She was usually very good about sending the missing items, though it took up to a week to receive the missing items. Seems minor, but when you have your weekend planned to work on the installation and you come up short of materials, you have to stop and postpone the entire project. This happened on three occasions, prolonging my install by at least 2 weeks. Their electrical engineer, Dave, was great. He was very personable, very knowledgeable, and most importantly, very patient. He helped me through all my questions relating to my customized project through phone calls and email. Weekend support though was almost non-existent. Which happened to be when I did most of the work so that sometimes forced me to figure out any roadblocks myself. Which, for the most part, I was able to using the stepby-step install guides. Speaking of which, the guides were pretty good with a couple of exceptions. First, they often included instructions for things that were not necessary for my particular project. That was sometimes confusing. They should have tailored the guides to my specific project to eliminate that confusion. Second, it would have been nice if they offered youtube instructional videos to supplement the guides. I did find some online, but from other sources and they didn’t always match up apples to apples.

I paid for my system on August 10th. I needed to get a building permit and an electrical permit from my township municipality. After I got the permits approved from my township, GoGreen sent the kit. It arrived by trailer truck on October 12th on a pallet. I completed my solar panel install on November 8th. It was inspected by an Electrical Inspection Agency on November 14th (the inspector said the installation looked like it was done by professionals ). PECO finally approved the interconnection and gave me permission to operate on December 5th. That’s just about 4 months from signing to flipping the switch. Keep that in mind if you plan to get a solar system for yourself.

For me, it was personally very rewarding to install the system with my own two hands. But I know DIY solar is not viable for many homeowners. I found there are companies that provide reasonable costs for comparable systems. Some, not so reasonable. I received quotes for my house ranging from $20K for a full system including install and as high as $36K for a full system and install. If anyone is looking for information in the Philadelphia area and has any questions I can help with, please feel free to reach out to me at diem0013@yahoo.com. I even have some tools and parts that can help you save money if you DIY. Do your homework! But keep in mind the Federal Tax Rebate for solar winds down at the end of 2019.
Finally, let me say that as a homeowner, parent, spouse, neighbor, citizen, and human being on this earth, it feels great to power my home with clean, renewable energy. I’m not perfect, and like most Americans, can be very wasteful with energy, food, etc. But I try to do better and better as I get older. I believe we need to do more to reverse climate change and this is another step towards that goal.