Any comments on my quotes greatly appreciated

[wannabegreener]

I have 4 quotes that should cover my usage 100%. I continue to do energy improvement and my usag continues to go down, but feel it should be leveling off. My annual usage is 6500kwh but my roof is not ideal. Roofline is true north/south. Proposal are to put the panels on the back of the house facing west.

All 30 panels, but different size panels

1. 30 lg305, micro inverters 3.30/watt

2. 30 solar world plus 260, micro inverters 3.40/watt

3. 30 sun Edison 270, micro inverters 3.40/watt

4. 30 re escolar 255, cc optimizer solar edge inverter 3.47/watt

Still trying to research which one to decide on.

They all seem to have the linear warranty, all 20 years with the same max drop off. The lg quote uses the larger micro inverters.

Thanks for any suggestions and help.

[solar pete]

I have 4 quotes that should cover my usage 100%. I continue to do energy improvement and my usag continues to go down, but feel it should be leveling off. My annual usage is 6500kwh but my roof is not ideal. Roofline is true north/south. Proposal are to put the panels on the back of the house facing west.

All 30 panels, but different size panels

1. 30 lg305, micro inverters 3.30/watt

2. 30 sunpower 260, micro inverters 3.40/watt

3. 30 sun Edison 270, micro inverters 3.40/watt

4. 30 re escolar 255, cc optimizer solar edge inverter 3.47/watt

Still trying to research which one to decide on.

They all seem to have the linear warranty, all 20 years with the same max drop off. The lg quote uses the larger micro inverters.

Thanks for any suggestions and help.

Howdy, next step is to check out the installers on line, a good place to start doing that is at our site sponsors www.solarreviews.com, its not all about cheapest price you want the job done by an outfit that really know what they are doing, keep reading and asking questions, looks like optio 1 is a bit of a goer if its with a top installer, cheers

[solarix]

I'd suggest at least getting a quote using a string inverter with a good value panel like Canadian Solar / Trina / Hyundai. I know lots of dealers just push microinverters, but they are a big reliability risk - imho.

Are PV panels getting so inexpensive now that dealers figure that their markup is so nice that they might as well push the overpriced brands?

[LafLASolar]

I have 4 quotes that should cover my usage 100%. I continue to do energy improvement and my usag continues to go down, but feel it should be leveling off. My annual usage is 6500kwh but my roof is not ideal. Roofline is true north/south. Proposal are to put the panels on the back of the house facing west.

All 30 panels, but different size panels

1. 30 lg305, micro inverters 3.30/watt

2. 30 sunpower 260, micro inverters 3.40/watt

3. 30 sun Edison 270, micro inverters 3.40/watt

4. 30 re escolar 255, cc optimizer solar edge inverter 3.47/watt

Still trying to research which one to decide on.

They all seem to have the linear warranty, all 20 years with the same max drop off. The lg quote uses the larger micro inverters.

Thanks for any suggestions and help.

Where are you located? Are those Enphase M250?

[wannabegreener]

Southern nh

I thought I included my location. Sorry. Southern NH.

The lg305 would be enphase 250, the other two would be enphase 215. I have some shading from trees so the optimizer with the converter or the micro inverters seem to be my best bet. A string converter was ruled out by all three installers.

I did check the reviews. The company with the lg and the sun Edison is the same company (company A) and they only have 5 reviews with an average of 5.0. The other 2 installers (company B And C) don't have any reviews. Company C installed my hot water solar and I was very pleased with them. NH has a program called solar up, company A bad B have been chosen for different towns in NH. So, I would feel comfortable with all 3 companies.

Would anyone recommend larger panels from the same manufacturer? I see lots of posts for panels in the 300+ ranges.

Thanks

[LafLASolar]

I thought I included my location. Sorry. Southern NH.

The lg305 would be enphase 250, the other two would be enphase 215. I have some shading from trees so the optimizer with the converter or the micro inverters seem to be my best bet. A string converter was ruled out by all three installers.

I did check the reviews. The company with the lg and the sun Edison is the same company (company A) and they only have 5 reviews with an average of 5.0. The other 2 installers (company B And C) don't have any reviews. Company C installed my hot water solar and I was very pleased with them. NH has a program called solar up, company A bad B have been chosen for different towns in NH. So, I would feel comfortable with all 3 companies.

Would anyone recommend larger panels from the same manufacturer? I see lots of posts for panels in the 300+ ranges.

Thanks

"reviews" on a company do not mean much, to me, anyway. When in the solar industry, you should be impressed with how long they have been in business. I think if you can get that LG305/enphase M250 guys down a little, you have a great system for that price. LG has been in business and will be for a long time. Enphase is a strong company that offers a 25yr warranty, out of the box warranty that is. No other inverter company does that. Maint. and monitoring is simplified. Sure, some will say, enphase has some issues but thats the beauty of a 25yr warranty. Don't get caught with your pants down, holding a string inverter with a 10 year warranty, in year 12...... personal opinion

[wannabegreener]

I am now second guessing the size. I forgot about pv watts. All three installers thought I would lose at most 19% based on shading. If I enter everything in pv watts, it show about a 1:1 ratio od dc watts to kWh. So a 7.8K system would produce 7800'kwh. They are claiming much lower. I just played with pv watts to see what effenciey they were projecting and it is around 26% loss.

lafLASolar, you like the LG over the sun Edison and Solar World? I know LG makes just about everything and has been I business a long time. That is comforting. Sun Edison being a Canadian company and solar world being a U.S. Company is comforting to me as well.

How low do you think is a good price on the LG? I got that price without any negotiation.

Thanks!

[thejq]

Without looking at price, just in terms of financial stability, I'd rate LG > SunEdison > Sunpower > Canadian solar > ... > Solar World (which almost went BK twice). BTW. SunEdison (which used to be called MEMC semi) is a US company not Canadian. Canadian Solar is head quartered in Toronto Canada. LG makes good stuff at reasonable price which is slightly more expensive than average, but way less than Sunpower. In terms of performance, LG is just as good as Sunpower initially if not better, but Sunpower claims to degrade slower (hard to prove though). Looking at your list, both the LG and Sunpower's prices are pretty good. The Sunpower 260W is not current model but they should carry the same 25-yr panel+labor warranty. I'd swap out the M215 for M250 for slightly more (vaguely remembered as $10/inverter), or solaredge.

[LafLASolar]

Without looking at price, just in terms of financial stability, I'd rate LG > SunEdison > Sunpower > Canadian solar > ... > Solar World (which almost went BK twice). BTW. SunEdison (which used to be called MEMC semi) is a US company not Canadian. Canadian Solar is head quartered in Toronto Canada. LG makes good stuff at reasonable price which is slightly more expensive than average, but way less than Sunpower. In terms of performance, LG is just as good as Sunpower initially if not better, but Sunpower claims to degrade slower (hard to prove though). Looking at your list, both the LG and Sunpower's prices are pretty good. The Sunpower 260W is not current model but they should carry the same 25-yr panel+labor warranty. I'd swap out the M215 for M250 for slightly more (vaguely remembered as $10/inverter), or solaredge.

I 100% agree with @thejq

[LafLASolar]

I am now second guessing the size. I forgot about pv watts. All three installers thought I would lose at most 19% based on shading. If I enter everything in pv watts, it show about a 1:1 ratio od dc watts to kWh. So a 7.8K system would produce 7800'kwh. They are claiming much lower. I just played with pv watts to see what effenciey they were projecting and it is around 26% loss.

lafLASolar, you like the LG over the sun Edison and Solar World? I know LG makes just about everything and has been I business a long time. That is comforting. Sun Edison being a Canadian company and solar world being a U.S. Company is comforting to me as well.

How low do you think is a good price on the LG? I got that price without any negotiation.

Thanks!

I dont know your market obviously but in Louisiana, with LG & Enphase $3.00 - $3.25/watt. Either way, LG/Enphase is the best option you have been given. IMO

[J.P.M.]

I am now second guessing the size. I forgot about pv watts. All three installers thought I would lose at most 19% based on shading. If I enter everything in pv watts, it show about a 1:1 ratio od dc watts to kWh. So a 7.8K system would produce 7800'kwh. They are claiming much lower. I just played with pv watts to see what effenciey they were projecting and it is around 26% loss.

lafLASolar, you like the LG over the sun Edison and Solar World? I know LG makes just about everything and has been I business a long time. That is comforting. Sun Edison being a Canadian company and solar world being a U.S. Company is comforting to me as well.

How low do you think is a good price on the LG? I got that price without any negotiation.

Thanks!

Keep in mind PVWatts takes NO account of shading. While I'm usually very skeptical of vendors' claims of output, if you have shading, an annual output estimate from an estimating tool that does consider shading will estimate a lower #.

[Ian S]

Without looking at price, just in terms of financial stability, I'd rate LG > SunEdison > Sunpower > Canadian solar > ... > Solar World (which almost went BK twice). BTW. SunEdison (which used to be called MEMC semi) is a US company not Canadian. Canadian Solar is head quartered in Toronto Canada. LG makes good stuff at reasonable price which is slightly more expensive than average, but way less than Sunpower. In terms of performance, LG is just as good as Sunpower initially if not better, but Sunpower claims to degrade slower (hard to prove though). Looking at your list, both the LG and Sunpower's prices are pretty good. The Sunpower 260W is not current model but they should carry the same 25-yr panel+labor warranty. I'd swap out the M215 for M250 for slightly more (vaguely remembered as $10/inverter), or solaredge.

Re pricing, did you look at his Sunpower quote? Same price as Sun Edison and and only 3% higher than lg. As for LG's financial stability, that's certainly true but they are also a huge company with lots of other businesses apart from solar. Indeed, I'd say that solar is peripheral not central to their organization. As such, it would be easier for them to jettison the business at some point if things got tough compared to others whose main or only business is solar. Plus, I think the Sunpower degradation claim is true based on the testing they've shown so this appears to be a case where Sunpower is actually cost effective compared with others. I'd go with Sunpower.

As for Enphase, I don't think their warranty covers labor to remove and replace a defective unit. That said, a cooler climate like southern NH would be less likely to cause any failures I suspect and with shading issues, micros or optimizers would be the way to go.

[J.P.M.]

Plus, I think the Sunpower degradation claim is true based on the testing they've shown so this appears to be a case where Sunpower is actually cost effective compared with others.

I'd agree that their degradation claim is based on testing they have done and controlled if you're referring to the same stuff they've published, but I'd not call that independent, and so I'd not place a terribly high degree of confidence in it's veracity.

I've got a suspicion that claimed panel degradation for most all reputable mfgs. is less than what is likely to actually occur if for no other reason than to aid in system oversizing, but also to possibly avoid potential warranty problems down the road, as well as other reasons.

Since most/all the degradation testing is accelerated, it's all speculation for the most part anyway. If any mfg. has 10 yrs.+ or so of actual data, I bet they're keeping it to themselves for a time when it may be to their best marketing/sales advantage.

Also, and somewhat speculatively, if most residential PV across the board does, for any number or combination of reasons have a lower degradation rate than we all think, I don't think it will change the numbers a great deal in terms of relative cost effectiveness except maybe to allow consideration of slightly smaller arrays as having slightly greater long term output. That does not sound like something the selling side of the solar industry would like to see.

As for price, that S.P. price does seem more competitive that most I've seen. With that in mind, I'd be careful to make sure they are not sloppy seconds or other less than 100% real deal. If a deal seems too good to be true ????

[thejq]

Re pricing, did you look at his Sunpower quote? Same price as Sun Edison and and only 3% higher than lg. As for LG's financial stability, that's certainly true but they are also a huge company with lots of other businesses apart from solar. Indeed, I'd say that solar is peripheral not central to their organization. As such, it would be easier for them to jettison the business at some point if things got tough compared to others whose main or only business is solar.

Yes, the quote of SP is very temping. Normally I'd dismiss SP based on prices I've seen. But in this case, the choice is tougher. If you're limited by roof space and wants more wattage, LG is the way to go, otherwise SP could be a better choice if you value their long warranty. If I remembered correctly, LG offers 10-yr performance and 20-yr panel warranty without labor, whereas SP is 25-yr and 25-yr with labor which many people value highly. PS when compare prices, you have to realize the SP 260 is a few generations old, so some discount is expected. If it was for SP 345, it would be a no brainer.

BTW, even if LG exit the solar panel business, they will survive long enough to provide warranty service to your panels, that's unless WWIII breaks out and the N Koreans marches into Soul.

[Ian S]

Yes, the quote of SP is very temping. Normally I'd dismiss SP based on prices I've seen. But in this case, the choice is tougher. If you're limited by roof space and wants more wattage, LG is the way to go, otherwise SP could be a better choice if you value their long warranty. If I remembered correctly, LG offers 10-yr performance and 20-yr panel warranty without labor, whereas SP is 25-yr and 25-yr with labor which many people value highly. PS when compare prices, you have to realize the SP 260 is a few generations old, so some discount is expected. If it was for SP 345, it would be a no brainer.

BTW, even if LG exit the solar panel business, they will survive long enough to provide warranty service to your panels, that's unless WWIII breaks out and the N Koreans marches into Soul.

IIRC, the Sunpower 260 watt panel would have 20% efficiency so wouldn't it be a better choice for a limited roof space installation? For my money, if the Sunpower installer has a decent track record, then that deal would be hard to beat. I believe that the lower rate of degradation claimed for Sunpower is real - actual field tests over four years or so have shown that to be the case. Is it worth a 20% premium, no I don't think so but is it worth a 3% premium, I say yes especially when you also get the piece of mind of the 25 year warranty.

LG could exit the solar business by selling it to another outfit and that sale could include assets and liabilities such as warranty claims: there is no guarantee that LG would retain liability for warranty work on their old solar panels.