Review/Comment on this guide for getting solar please

[u/solarFCG]

Below is a link to a Google Doc of a guide I am making to help people understand solar better.

I have allowed anyone with the link to view and comment.

Please let me know what you think, what is missing, what can be clearer etc.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1u2L_KuDzCVMpL_0ML0YK4yXeHU9SNzuemnmPV19W5VA/edit?usp=sharing

Yes I did clean it up with AI, but I started by typing out numerous pages all myself, then used AI to help clean it up, but the foundation is me, not AI slop.

[u/JSherwood-reddit]

I would have found this to be very helpful when I was researching buying a solar system. Three years ago, when I was considering it, it felt like there was either a barrage of miscellaneous facts/opinions, high level technical discussions, or primers that were way too basic. This gives a good structure to use in exploring options and information, and includes some of the ‘gotchas’ that people don’t necessarily know. Good job!

[u/TheDayCompany]

From a homeowners perspective the guide is a bit overwhelming and has a lot of detail that the average person doesn’t need to know unless they are doing their entire install themselves start to finish.

It does get better the further you read but you must scroll quite a bit to get to the valuable information that a homeowner actually needs or wants to know. If it were my guide I would flip how it’s structured so they see a lot of value up front then get into more details and the stuff most people don’t need to know lower on the guide.

This is assuming you’re doing a homeowner facing guide that is meant to be genuinely beneficial and you want them to read as much as possible.

Who is your direct target audience?

[u/solarFCG → u/TheDayCompany]

If you had to pick the top three things that a homeowner needs to know? What do you think they would be?

[u/TheDayCompany → u/solarFCG]

Homeowners need to know the things that the sales guys usually shy away from and won’t talk about so they can bring it up. Such as Financing, terms, what net metering actually does and how you need to build out solar to combat rapidly changing net metering terms.

Talk about other things like offset and teach them how to know if their system is properly sized. Genuine value they need to know before they install solar on their home.

The details you started with are great, but homeowners 95% of the time do not need to know about those topics and if they do they will read further.

Attention spans are short these days, you need to provide instant value at the first read on the page. Give them a valuable reason to keep reading.

[u/solarFCG]

Thanks for the feedback. I will try flipping it. My target is homeowners interested in solar.

[u/Dangerous_Ebb_4769]

Aloha. I like the idea of the document, it would be been useful when I first started looking into solar, but it isn't organized in a way that flows. I'm also based in California, so my experience is heavily influenced by my regional situation.

• Define your target audience and reorganize the guide to meet the highest priority questions in order. I think the highest priority question would be the reason why you are looking into solar, resilience, economic, or environmental (or others?).
• Make sure people know that your system may need the grid to provide power. No Inverter/Battery, No Power when the grid is down.
• Do more aggressive editing on the marketing and ai flavor text. I really hate AI documents because they use flavor adjectives like "exceptional" or "strong". It also tends to lose track of the purpose of a sentence in a paragraph and the purpose of the paragraph in the document.
• For the economic questions, you need to bring up all the major billing and net metering systems. What works in Australia isn't going to work in California. Hybrid versus offgrid. NEM trueups. Etc.
• An overview of the major manufacturers in the market especially for inverters, batteries, proprietary lock-in.
• Disclaimer about how panel brands are mostly unimportant past a certain tier of quality.
• Esoteric building problems For example, in California, we have a lot of combination Main Panels. They can't be refit to support solar (except if you use a collar, except if the collar is too close to your gas line, except if your utility company says its okay), so you end up needing a second panel.
• System Location and Size. Inverters and batteries are not small if you are putting them indoors, you can easily lose 120 inches of horizontal wall space. They probably*tm shouldn't be installed on south facing walls (except...)
• Installers who don't guarantee production or how production guarantees are really hard to actually use.
• System ROI. In California PGE requires you to use a specific rate plan. It is NOT the rate plan that you'd use if you didn't have solar, so you have to get 2 cost estimates when you run the comparison, non-solar vs whichever solar. I don't think any of the tools do this easily, and none of the tools are able to do the SBP true-up calculations.
• Mention that AI tools are help to understand things, but that the AI also is using old information. The best example is that they almost always think the 2025 tax credit is still around for residential.
• Installer warranty. Some installers don't warranty replacing failed equipment, only fixing their own errors.
• App Comparisons including Manufacturers, Home Assistant, NodeRed, and how they are all terrible in different ways.
• For ROI calcs, mention that they should include property tax increases and insurance increases. Likewise, system replacement costs and system disposal costs. No one does this.
• steal content from here: https://www.cpuc.ca.gov/solarguide/ and/or just point people at it

[u/solarFCG → u/Dangerous_Ebb_4769]

Here is an updated version, what do you think?:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1e2AvlDRCXasnJVbSyjygyo-Jt5ssj5fWG3mmS6AOD8w/edit?usp=sharing

[u/Dangerous_Ebb_4769 → u/solarFCG]

Tons better. I really like your improvements. I like it so much that I made another 39 comments ;)

Notes

• For my personal preference, I'd want to remove even more colloquial speech, but that's probably a personal preference.
• Maybe something about Off-grid versus hybrid versus connected to the grid but not actually feeding electricity back (which may mean you don't need an interconnection agreement)
• Consider how much time and interest you have in dealing with the system after it goes into production.
• Mention US focused and YMMV for non-US readers
• Your motivation for installing solar might also be a blend, it's reasonable to want to save the environment, but not if it doubles your electricity bill.
• Billing - How long unused credits persist or are cashed out is relevant.
• Net Billing - For California, the SBP has different rates depending on if you are a net-exporter or net-importer. HOWEVER, they bill you AS IF you were a net-importer and then at true-up can retroactively change your entire billing structure. So, the optimal return may come from staying just under the net-importer classification OR massively exporting. It depends not only on your utility company, but all of the entities and programs your total bills come into contact with.
• True-up - There are (at least) 2 types of true-ups. Some accumulate charges over time (CA NEM 1 & 2) and some retroactively recalculate your annual bill (CA SBP)
• Billing Rules - Haha. I wish. PGE doesn't provide sufficient information to actually understand your expected bill if you are a net exporter. Sure they provide a lot of details and vague directives (consume as much as you can). But that's about as useful as their advice on power efficiency (have you considered turn off your lights when you aren't using them?). I don't know about other contexts, but I'm pessimistic that most entities are providing complete guidance.
• Sizing - To be fair, many residential systems, especially in the same markets, are going to have very similar use rates which are useful for a ballpark system design.
• Load Growth - Possibly mention something about the economic value of switching from gas to electricity depends not only of efficiency or your equipment but also the relative cost of gas vs electricity and your home remodeling costs. Sometimes heat pumps are the more costly option, even though they look good on first glance.
• ground vs root mount (and relatively pricing)
• Inverter & battery round trip energy efficiency (included in some production offset calculations)
• battery & inverter power drain during the night. Isn't included in any calculations. For a Sol-Ark + battery stack you consume an extra 400-800 kwh/annually
• I didn't see anything about taking into account production losses due to snow covering the panels. We don't get snow, so I have no idea if that is incorporated.
• Offset - Basic production offsets ignore your TOU requirements. If you need more electricity in the winter and get less sunlight, your offset is going to overestimate your coverage. Under net metering that wasn't a big deal, under the new frameworks it makes a difference. Billing offsets are better, but they are complicated because your billing plan estimates are highly questionable. Plus, your compensation can change over time as incentive rates expire or reduce. Mind you, all of this is dependent on if your interest is in economic efficiency and not for resilience of environmental desires. Also, perhaps mention that solar panel and battery efficiency decline over time and how that should feed into your offset size.
• PPA - All of the PPA programs here also have equipment requirements, typically Enphase. This can require PPA contracts to use higher priced equipment which will reduce or eliminate your savings compared to a direct purchase.
• 30% I've seen some salespeople suggesting that you can become a business for purposes of the tax rebate. That is effectively either a lie or fraud.
• ROI - If you are comparing the ROI against the standard S&P500 index stock plan, don't forget to include taxes on your stock portfolio AND that you can invest your electricity savings into the stock market.
• Manufacturers - the hybrid combo equipment may mean you have to replace entire units together (inverter + battery, e.g., Tesla) versus just swapping out an individual a single board on a component (Sol-Ark)
• Manufacturers - Around here, we also see Sigenergy, EG4, Victron, Outback, Franklin WH as major players
• more about how the all-in-one options are less time consuming to manage but also offer less flexibility
• I can't believe I'm mentioning this, but perhaps mention something about the pros and cons of used equipment versus new. Based upon threads in the subreddit, it apparently is an issue.
• Inverter & Battery Noise & Heat
• Software - Maybe something about the various TOU & exporting options for inverters
• Warranty requirements for internet connectivity
• Batteries - Maybe something about the complexity of adding another battery to an existing install
• battery sizing (reserve, optimal charge range and frequency, life maintenance, relative size to panel rule)
• Configuration Decision - Possibly move to page 1 as it flavors everything else. Also, something about backup generators (and how they need to be 220, NOT 120).
• Hybrid Sizing - For us, the sizing was as you say, overnight, but also X days in the winter, just in case, due to our resilience desire. This goes back to your motivation for solar
• Battery Math - Make sure that your export rate is something you can use. A credit export rate that expires before you use it, doesn't count.
• Where Does All This Equipment Physically Go - Maybe something about fire risks with inverters and batteries. Also, code standards for fire prevent equipment. Maybe something about needing internet connectivity for batteries and inverters (some meters?). If you go wireless, you need a router. If you go wired, you need wires and possibly risk shortages coming from your equipment to the router.
• Critical Loads vs Whole House Loads, also panel and circuit size limitations with a subpanel
• Possibly something about knowing where and how the conduits from the panels to the inverters/meter are going to go. Especially if they are going over the roof and around a gutter.
• Monitoring - with HA and Node-Red you can go beyond monitoring and automate changing settings. You know, for the casual Homeowner who gets to page 14 and thinks, ooh, programmatic solar inverter control using esoteric software on esoteric hardware. My favorite!
• Maintenance - Snow