How to Prepare Your Home for Solar Power

If solar power has been on your radar recently, you may be wondering what steps you need to take as a homeowner before implementing this sustainable force into your home permanently. The experts here at MSS have a plethora of information ready for you, to help answer any solar-related questions you may have! Keep reading for some of our top tips on how to prepare your home for solar power.

Monitor your current usage within your home.

First, it’s important for you to look inward at your power usage and figure out approximately how much energy you and your family use on a daily basis. Do you primarily work from home and need to have multiple appliances and lighting powered throughout the day? Are your evenings often filled with movie nights or gaming? Tracking your energy usage throughout the day helps us determine the type of solar power system you need.

There are also plenty of inexpensive and straightforward steps you can take to reduce your current energy usage before going solar. The less energy you use, the less solar you will need to offset your usage! 

Understand your bill and billing structure. 

It’s no coincidence that taking a look at your utility bills feels like trying to understand a language you’ve never spoken before. Billing structures are often vague and confusing for homeowners, but we can help! Contact Michigan Solar Solutions and send us a copy of your monthly electric bill. For DTE and Consumers Energy, we recommend including the entire first page that shows the graph that summarizes the past 13 months. For other energy providers, we need to know the exact average of the past 12 months of electrical usage, in kilowatt-hours (kWh.) 

During the process of looking at your current energy bills, we may also recommend changing your rate structure with the utility company to further lower your bill. Customers who use a high percentage during off-peak times, and not much during peak times, will likely benefit from a TOU (Time-of-Use) rate! This rate charges much less for power during the off-peak time while increasing rates during the time when solar produces (peak rates time).

Learn what solar options you have available to accomplish your goals!

The next step is to have a clear understanding of what you are trying to accomplish with solar power. Maybe you want to generate enough electricity to run a water pump on your farm, or have a battery backup in case the power goes out. Most people want to go solar to offset all of their electrical usage, so they don’t have to pay the electric company for it. The amazing thing about solar is that it’s modular in design, meaning you can start with just a few panels and add on in the future as you desire!

Ready to learn more about solar power for your home and get on the path to clean energy? Let’s chat!