Another Milestones Reached for Solarize Hopkinton

 I'm pleased to announce that early last week we crossed into tier 3 of the Solarize Hopkinton discount schedule.  The purchase price has now dropped from $3.79/Watt to $3.55 and the PPA has gone from a $0.065/kWh to $0.059.  Keep in mind that these prices don't include cost adders for optional upgrades or ones sometimes required by building code.  The PPA pricing assumes an optimal site and the price will vary depending on shading, roof orientation and other factors that can degrade the system output.

At last count, we're at 74kW of signed contracts with another 14kW more verbals in the works.  Things are starting to really accelerate as the discount kicks in and people are back from summer vacations with time to make informed decisions and talk to their banks.  We now have 310+ residents and businesses expressing interest in the program.  The conversion rate (people signing contracts averaging 5kW) in the pilot program last year was 25% so we're in great shape to reaching tier 5.  The first building permits have been submitted and I'm hoping we'll be posting pictures of the first installs to the Solar Hopkinton Facebook page shortly.

Before the sales tax holiday weekend, I sent out a note on the importance of energy efficiency in either reducing your system cost or increasing the percent offset with solar.  I had written to HomePower magazine asking for permission to send out an older article on just that.  Little did I know they would use it in the October/November "Ask The Experts" column.  They did the math and created some charts showing the dramatic PV savings by simply changing 8 light bulbs.  They used 20 Watt CFL (75W equivalent) bulbs as one example - imagine using a 9 Watt LED instead.  They also said we were getting "a very good deal" at $3.50. Coincidentally, there was an advertisement for Solectria inverters two pages away that caught my eye. HomePower is available at the library and I highly recommend subscribing if you're interested in renewable energy and conservation.  It's an addiction - you'll find yourself looking out the window at work and then logging into you're web browser to check PV production at home. 

On a closing note, the September 30th deadline is coming soon.