Thoughts on Solar

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you know that there is a total eclipse of the sun set to cross the United States from Oregon to South Carolina on August 21st. This is a Really Big Deal as the next total eclipse to come to the U.S. won’t be until 2045!

Baily’s Beads effect taken Dec. 4, 2002. Credit: Arne Danielson.

So there is a great deal of excitement around this event, but might there also be a “dark side"?  (Sorry, couldn’t resist the pun.)  Here’s our take…

The eclipse in California will not be total (unlike for our friend and former colleague, Laurel Hamilton, who is now up in Bend), with coverage ranging from roughly 76% in Northern California to 62% here in SoCal during the hours of roughly 9 to Noon.  But that will still have an impact on solar energy production in the state, and that could mean that the California Independent System Operator (CalISO) might have to rely on more fossil fuels during the two-plus hour eclipse window.

How big an impact will this have?  It is 10:30 as I write this and according to the CalISO website, at this moment, solar is producing 9,119 MW (at utility-scale plants - that total does not count rooftop solar) which amounts to 27% of the total load being served.  That means that on the 21st, solar production could be reduced by as much as 6,930 MW, leaving it up to gas-fired plants to fill that gap.  Unless…

Unless we find a way to cut our usage by a similar amount during that period.  Given that we are talking about an August day, that might be tough, but every bit helps.  That is why the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has set up a pledge page to encourage Californians to take steps both before and during the eclipse to lower their demand.  (We just made our pledge - we are shutting off unneeded lights and the A/C during, and swapping out to more LEDs before.)

As of now, we are the 259th pledge to be made.  Let’s drive that number up, shall we? It’s easy, just click on the button below!

Ten years ago this month we founded Run on Sun—which, to paraphrase Vice President Biden, “was a pretty big [freaking] deal."  Think about it: when we started in 2006, the California Solar Initiative didn’t exist, the federal tax credit was capped at $2,000,  and looming in the near future was the Great Recession. 

Despite that inauspicious start, we have gone on to install solar at major schools like Westridge and Chandler, ditto at countless homes around SoCal, and we have been honored to make Solar Power World’s list of the Top Solar Contractors four years in a row! It has been quite a ride and we are ready to celebrate!

We are planning a party to share our achievement with our wonderful clients in the coming weeks (watch your email for an invite soon!), but today we want to invite our neighbors to join us in greening their energy.  For all new clients who sign contracts with us during the month of September we will be offering a Birthday discount of $500 off the proposal price!  This applies both to folks who already have proposals in their hands as well as those who get a proposal during the month.

But September is a short and busy month so you need to act now! 

Click on this link to request a free solar site evaluation, or just give us a call at 626-793-6025 or 310-584-7755.

Let’s party!

Its been a week since we returned from the most epic solar event of the year - Intersolar North America in San Francisco. Now that we are caught up on the backlog of emails and calls we can take a moment to reflect on key highlights from the event. 

Top 2 New Innovative Products to Watch

1. Beamreach - Where do I start with this truly innovative new company?? Beamreach Solar unveiled a product called Sprint that includes the attachments, racking, and panel all in one. The panel frame and “racking” is entirely made of a composite plastic (material tested in automotive and other outdoor conditions for 20+ years). They demonstrated the installation of 6 panels in about 5 minutes! Designed for flat roof commercial projects, the tilt up back end pops out to click into a base which also pops out and sticks with a roofing adhesive to the roof. The front of the next panel then clicks into the base of the first panel and so on. The whole system is obviously much lighter (including a handle in the middle of the panel) and way faster to install than conventional ballasted systems. Best of all, no grounding required since there’s no metal to ground!
   While this is an awesome new product we have to wonder about a few things… 1) Do we have to powerwash the roof first for the adhesive to work? 2) What if a footing is incorrectly placed?! According to the great sales rep we spoke with… while the panels can be removed and replaced easily for maintenance, the footing is solid once it adheres to the roof so you’d have to essentially re-roof if you want to get rid of them. And 3) most roofs are nowhere near as flat as the surface Beamreach demonstrated on. How does the system deal with irregularities on the roof given the sticky feet are basically a flat square? We look forward to following this company as they work out the kinks in their exciting product. Keep your eyes peeled for a blog post where we dig in a little deeper on this.


2. Photon - While we didn’t get to actually talk to the masterminds behind this new start-up the idea is spot on. Photon is a subscription based app whereby your smartphone (with the addition of a cheap lens from Amazon) can take a shade analysis on a roof. I don’t think many installers would shed a single tear giving up their SunEye or Pathfinders. We may just have to try this innovative new app out. 

Top 3 Developments from Existing Partners

1. Energy Toolbase - These guys are the kings of data. We have been working with them since last year’s Intersolar to help us show our clients how solar will offset their electric bills with the greatest confidence possible. They are constantly adding more of the dozens of complex rate models around the country to their system. And now they’ve built in net metering 2.0 in anticipation of this huge change to California rates coming next year as well as storage into their models. Staying ahead of all the rate changes nation-wide is a huge undertaking but these guys are on top of it! 



2. Life’s Good (LG) - While LG didn’t have a booth this year, Run on Sun’s CEO Jim Jenal enjoyed a breakfast where LG showed off their mammoth 375 watt, 72 cell panel. This is no surprise as LG continues to churn out higher wattage panels every year with their successful R&D department. Currently 320 watt, 60 cell panels (standard for residential solar) are available to us but it sounds like we can expect even higher efficiency coming within the year.  


3. Enphase Energy - Storage beta installations are taking place in Australia where they recently mounted 4 units in just 45 minutes! Can’t wait to get our hands on them as many of our clients have expressed interest in storage. Looks like we may be able to get beta Enphase batteries in the coming year! Interested clients (especially those in SCE territory) please let us know if you want to be one of the first!

Top 2 Companies Trying too Hard

1. Smartflower POP - There was a lot of hubbub around this giant solar flower thingy. While I like that it has integrated storage and the dual axis tracker is great for increasing output in a big way…we couldn’t help but feel like this was way over engineered. There are actually several other solar flowers out there and I think solar-integrated art is a fantastic way to showcase to the public and get the social benefit when a solar system may be hidden on a rooftop. But take a look at this Smartflower. There’s some serious mechanics going on to make the thing open in the morning, track the sun, then close at night. Why it needs to open and close is beyond me and just seems overly complicated, heavy, and probably costly. (To be fair, we didn’t get the full spiel from the sales guys.)


2. Ten K Solar - Sometimes its a fine line between being innovative and being overly complicated. When you decide to roll three “innovative” products into one maybe that’s a sign that you’ve crossed the line. I’m not sure if I’m more excited about the concept of wiring in series and parallel - making each “half” cell operate independently, or more confused as to why they orient the system north/south and eliminated MC4’s. To be sure there are some exciting things about this product and the people at Ten K definitely have thought outside the box. Will be keeping an eye on them for sure.

Top 4 Most Amazing Moments

Kendra Hubbard, Jim Jenal, Jeff Spies, and me at BotB

1. BayWa r.e. Customer Appreciation - As many of you know, Baywa r.e. is our fabulous distributor for many reasons. Namely they share a similar ethos and dedication to quality solar and an accountable honest industry that we do. But beyond sharing similar missions they also treat us really well!
   This year BayWa hosted a customer appreciation “chill out” area throughout Intersolar. Anytime the crowds and meetings were too much we could go sit outside in the shade, get a chair massage, and enjoy a cold beverage or lunch! Yeah, you heard me…Chair Massage. Best distribution partners EVER!


2. Solar Summerfest - It wouldn’t be Intersolar without an epic party or two! This year’s Solar Summerfest did not disappoint. From the variety of food spreads (loved the veg options!) and bars (wine, margaritas AND whiskey?!) to the awesome entertainment provided by professional break dancers… this was such a fun time to relax and get to know our solar friends and partners. As the night went on the real highlights were seeing BayWa’s Scott Snyder rock the karaoke stage and CalSEIA’s Bernadette del Chiaro cut a serious rug on the dance floor. And according to Jim’s pedometer Jim and I danced an impressive 7216 steps with our friends at Everest Solar! 


3. Battle of the Bands - And then there was the Battle of the Bands where solar companies show off their employees’ musical talents (and the Solar Tribe hangs out, like the four of us in the picture above). Solar folks really know how to party!  Special thanks to Jeff Spies for hooking us up with invite only tix!


4. Delorean! - Did I forget to mention the Back to the Future Delorean was on display…and I got to sit in it? That was a pretty cool moment for an 80’s kid like myself. 

Top 2 Most Annoying Moments

1. When that guy I met at SolarFred’s Solar Tweetup (which was a great event by the way) asked me how Run on Sun was different than SunRun and couldn’t wrap his head around how installation companies can be so different. Even when given the most perfect metaphor… “We are like a microbrewery making delicious quality beer for the benefit of the people in the most sustainable thought-driven way, and SunRun is like Coors. NOT THE SAME.” He still didn’t get it, sigh. 


2. When I casually walked the exhibition floor looking for current and future partners working for the betterment of the solar industry and the world at large…and was confronted with a booth filled with girls dressed in what looked like playboy bunny costumes. Jim already described his take on Talesun’s display choices and their obvious lack of understanding for why they received such a negative reaction in another blog. But as a woman working in this industry with a rare position including answering phones, designing layouts, pulling permits, AND torquing bolts on the roof… I felt personally offended by Talesun’s decision to use misogynistic objectification to try to sell their product. Due to my many roles I feel I represent, or have an understanding of, a lot of different people in this industry.
   And I’m not alone, according to the 2015 Solar Foundation National Census women represented 24% of solar jobs, surely even more today! When a quarter of your clientèle are women why in the world would you use booth babes to market your products? Solar is supposed to be different than other male dominated construction industries.
   This is supposed to be an industry that makes the world a better place and values everyone equally for their contributions. That booth did not speak to me positively on any level in any of my roles as installer, administrator, customer service representative, saleslady, health and safety officer, or general solar ninja. On the bright side I was pleased to hear that the majority of Intersolar participants made it very widely known how unacceptable Talesun’s display was. This only solidifies my feeling that this is a great industry for women, despite a few bad apples who may never “get it".  

It is official! One million solar systems have been installed across the United States providing more than 27 gigagwatts (GW) of clean energy over the past 40 years! This incredible milestone becomes even more impressive when you consider that projections have us reaching 2 million installations in just 2 years. 

Every day at Run on Sun we are proud to be part of the solar movement helping our communities access clean renewable energy. Solar is no longer a fringe technology, nor is it a solution for the future. It is powering homes and businesses nationwide today, and the more solar we install, the more jobs and economic growth we support.

On Tuesday, May 3rd at 10AM EDT solar supporters across the nation are participating in a social media “thunderclap". Join us in celebrating and sharing this historic achievement and what it means for our energy future by spreading the word across your networks. Working together to raise our voice in unity shows our business leaders and lawmakers that solar is here to stay. We are #MillionSolarStrong! Join the SEIA organized movement and thunderclap here.

Longtime readers of this blog will know that we have been following the progress of the Solar Impulse team for many years.  Headed by adventurers/pilots Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg, the Solar Impulse project was about building an airplane that could fly around the world powered only by solar power!

The original craft, Solar Impulse 1, flew across the United States back in 2013 as a proof-of-concept design that could set the stage for the around-the-world attempt.  That audacious enterprise begin in March of 2015 as Solar Impulse 2 launched from Abu Dhabi on its way around the world.  Last summer, SI2 made it to Hawaii, but the effort needed for that extended non-stop flight from Japan damaged the batteries and required some redesign and retrofitting before the mission could proceed.  But this Thursday, April 21, was finally the day, and SI2 departed from Hawaii, headed for a landing at Moffet Airfield outside of San Francisco - a 62 hour flight!

For those who haven’t been following the mission, since there is only one pilot on-board, he can never really sleep during the flight.  Instead he takes power naps of 20 minutes at a time, assisted by self-hypnosis to quickly bring about a state of relaxation.  In addition, the pilot does yoga and the limited exercises afforded by his incredibly small and cramped cabin.

But how does the plane itself - which is only powered by sunlight - manage to fly at night?  By an ingenious combination of electric and potential energy storage.  During the day, SI2 follows a flight profile of climbing from 5,000 to approximately 28,000 feet.  Sunlight charges the batteries through a collection of more than 17,000 monocrystalline silicon solar cells.  Then at night, SI2 begins a gentle descent, mostly gliding from its lofty height, to begin the process all over again.

So how did it turn out? As these great images make clear, pilot Bertrand Piccard, made it safe and sound.  The revised systems performed with out a hitch, and SI2 cruised past the Golden Gate Bridge on its way to a successful landing.

Ah to have been in the San Francisco Bay area yesterday!  What a beautiful and inspiring sight!

The Solar Impulse team still has a great deal of work ahead of them including crossing the United States (they will be flying into New York City which should be something!) before crossing the Atlantic as they complete their mission of showing the world the true capability of clean energy.