02/10/2016
Anonymous
Being in only the second month of the solar electric experience, it is way too early to be evaluating the success of this project. I would think it would require a full year. However, I will give some initial feedback. <br /><br />First, A1A Solar as a company is really fantastic. They were always professional, sensitive and actively communicated all throughout the process. There was some accidental damage to our home during the installation process and they called me immediately, laid out a plan to fully restore the damage and covered it all in a timely fashion and clearly and frequently communicated the status of the work. <br /><br />I am going to be interested in whether the system, as installed will be meeting the electric generation goals that were set. The first month failed to meet the goals, but there were extenuating circumstances such as Christmas parties, people staying in our home over the holidays and warm weather requiring running our air-conditioning for over two weeks, which should not be happening this time of the year. It appears that this second month is closer to the goal. However, I am not yet confident that, over the course of a year, we will reach the goal of a net zero electric production. <br /><br />This question has led me to a critique of one part of the otherwise great process with A1A Solar. The sizing of the system, from every evidence I had, was done by the salesman. I was unaware that there was any review of the system size by engineers or others who looked at it all scientifically. In retrospect, that may not be the best approach. There are some nuances to our system, like half the panels having to be on an east facing roof, that would seem to modify production estimates. It seemed to me the the salesman was just using optimized raw numbers. <br /><br />I hope that as the year unfolds it will be the case that the system covers our usage. We shall see.
A1A Solar Contracting, Inc reply
02/10/2016
Thank you for a thoughtful and thorough review. You're absolutely correct, one should always look at the annual production of the system rather than specific months, because there will be things that cause fluctuations in both the energy usage and the system's production from month to month. You referenced December as a month when you realized your usage was probably high, keep in mind, too, that December has the shortest days in the year (least number of daylight hours), so December will typically always be one of your system's lowest-producing months. We appreciate that you seem to understand these fundamentals. <br /> You are also wise to be concerned about the technical and engineering aspects of your system. Rest assured that A1A Solar does have an in-house engineering department that analyzes each proposed solar electric system before we move on to finalizing any financing or scheduling the installation. Our salespeople are trained on how to properly size a new system, but the engineering team approves final design and acts as a second pair of eyes to ensure that production will be as expected. <br /> Again, thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts, and we hope you'll keep us posted as the year progresses! Please feel free to reach out to our office directly if you should encounter any issues.<br />