Accelerating the Residential Solar Adoption Curve

Since our founding in 1999, Community Energy’s mission has been to ignite the market and supply the demand for fuel-free electricity, with a keen focus on the Northeastern U.S. We feel a particular urgency these days around climate change and are committed to accelerating the pace of the transition to a fuel-free economy.

Recently we’ve taken to promoting solar power for homes in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and other markets that have solar incentives strong enough to make the economics work for consumers.

In this role, we are learning a lot about the barriers to the sales of solar power systems in the Northeast. We think that there needs to be a lot more solar power on the grid–and soon. We accordingly feel a great sense of urgency around these efforts. Prospective solar buyers don’t always share that sense of urgency so I thought it would be good to put out a series of posts that answer some of the most common objections that we hear from homeowners regarding solar power.

Most homeowners these days are interested in the solar lease structure (which is similar to a Solar Power Purchase Agreement). With the solar lease, a homeowner can have solar installed for zero money down and pay for the electricity produced over time at a fixed rate. That fixed-rate is usually less than their current utility rate.

So if you can get clean electricity that saves you money today and protects you against rising electric rates in the future without putting a single dollar down, why would you not take this step? Why would you wait?

Here are some of the reasons we are hearing from homeowners.

1.    What if electricity prices decline in the future?
2.    Doesn’t the technology get better every day? Shouldn’t I wait for the technology to improve?
3.    I keep hearing that the cost of solar keeps coming down? Shouldn’t I wait for it to get less expensive?
4.    What if I want to sell my home and the buyer doesn’t want the solar panels?

These are a few of the major topics we’ll be covering over the next few posts. Stay tuned.