Huzzah! Way to go green, man!

Whoa, sweet! So tell me about the economics of this -- we've thought about doing this at DNA for a long time, since we have a big roof and we use all our power off-peak, but the last time we looked it was like, "it might pay for itself in 20 years".

Don't forget to factor in the environmental costs of building the panels themselves, that's usually what tips the scale to the negative as far as the overall impact.

I think jwz's considering economic cost, not environmental cost. At least, he posts more about how broke DNA is more than he posts about the environment.

Do you mind sharing with us how much this install costs, end-to-end? And, what your average monthly electric utility costed you?

Sounds exciting! And San Francisco would be a good place to do it, too!

Looking forward to hearing how it all works out. :)

luckily it's a nice day... imagine how you'd feel if they finished and it was all cloudy? ;)

Neat!

Awesome.

How much is a installation like that? Is it hail storm proof?

Considering you're never home, this actually might pay itself off in a decent amount of time. :)

I think a bigger reason to do this than the economics is the "mmm, I have power during the rolling blackouts" feature. I'm trying to get us to put solar on our office rooftops, and might put some at my house, for this reason. The hardest part is finding space (except at SF office) for a large enough battery bank to be worth it.

Aw man, you should have gone with SolarCity, they're friends of mine, awesome, and could have gotten you a discount :P

I wish I could do like you though. Yay solar power ! Now get an electric bike or car and stick it to the oil man, man !

What was the total cost to you?

Electricity in hawaii is insanely expensive. For about 2kw average draw we pay $500 a month. We could maybe get our usage down to 1.5kw but that's still a lot of money for power and I'd prefer to be able to run more computers and an ac unit for the office.

Homemade my butt. That power was imported. From 150Gm away.

Friggin' awesome.

I want to play with rainwater collection and reuse.

start small...
pee in the shower.