Looking Into Solar

While waiting out the weather, ever hopeful tomorrow is the day that the well gets dug, I’ve begun my search into solar, as it is my intention to think green on any and all new construction.

            For starters, the well will require a pump (which runs on electricity). This summer I will start a barn (wood for which has been reclaimed; building for which will commence in July; this too, requires electricity). Meanwhile, between heating and cooling my own home, my water, my goat shed, the additional tug on the power bill is ever top of mind, what’s more, for the sake of the future (and whoever winds up living here when I’m dead and gone) I’d like to be thinking ahead as to how to do it naturally, while still an optional proposition, (for some day, at the rate we're going, I sincerely believe it may not be.)

            With that I began making calls on solar as well as other renewable resources that yes, appear to be costlier right now, but down the road, would surely save both money and energy. (Right?)

            My first stop was my local electric company, to see just how “thinking green” might work. Turns out, if I wanted to play ball today, just to “feel” like I am contributing, I could opt into the “Green Power Switch” and buy blocks of green power that they say comes from solar, wind or some such. (This I want to see with my own eyes, as I gotta tell you, it’s counter intuitive to make such a switch unless you’re just sitting on money and wanting to be poster child for green living.)  As I understand the brochures, you can opt to pay additional $4, $8, $12, $20 on your bill to have part of your energy come from solar, but how that works (and who monitors it) leaves a few questions unanswered in my book. We’ll dig into that one later.

However, as it pertains to my current (new) projects, I did receive a call from a most helpful dude working within what appears to be a relatively new division of Middle TN Electric that focuses solely on questions like mine involving solar for new construction. It’s a bit confusing at first…All the more reason to dig a little deeper for answers…But bottom line, installing a solar panel does not mean that solar goes to the building it’s on, but instead, my power (brought in from my panel on my barn) will be routed back into the bigger (TVA) grid, which in turn, gets credited back to me on my electric bill. I’m told I can’t bring in more power than I use. (In other words, if I churned up a whole bunch of energy, they aren’t going to pay me for the difference, which is fine. I’m not out to make a profit off the sun, but I am concerned that if I brought in more than I used, why others have to PAY $4 to be green, when I could be gifting them my overage to help lower their bills.)

Again, this part is entirely new to me, as it seems to be to a lot of folks. The results as to how this works seems too early to tell. As to whether one can slap a panel or two outside the TVA power grid is another line of questioning for me. In short, for a company that has made its fortune on coal, (TVA is one of the 5 largest coal burners in the country) I’d love to help ‘em out by cranking in a little sun from my hot tin roofs. But again, there are questions to be asked…and if they’ll let me, tours to be taken. If they seriously want us thinking green, they gotta figure a way to make it simpler for us, not costlier, though at this stage, I’m well aware that change alone will cost someone (and I think we all know who the someone will and will not be).

For now, my brain is full of well digging questions. We shall save our Green Power tutorials for another day. But soon after the well gets dug, next up on the agenda is how to keep it pumping.

Stay tuned. (I'll let you know what I find out.)