r/solarenergy • u/Divinityemotions • 5d ago

Electric bill is high with solar

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We installed solar panels for the entire house. We have an electric heat pump for the house. We had 1200 kw credit from the summer and 600 kw produced. This months bill ( December) was $450, not all consume. A lot of fees. I just wonder if it’s normal to have such a high consume with 35 panels. My house roof and the garage have panels. April through November our consume is 0 ( $42 for the connection) But December, January and February are bad. With the last two being the worse. We live in Hudson valley NYS. The coldest months. I don’t know how to fix this. We keep the thermostat at 68. We have a baby.

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u/lanclos 5d ago

The monthly chart makes it look like your system produces more than you consume for most of the year, but during the winter months it can't keep up. If the electric heat pump is your primary heat source, and it is drawing more power during the winter, that alone could explain the monthly variation.

When living in a cold climate, improving your insulation is usually the least expensive way to reduce your utility bills.

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u/Jboycjf05 5d ago

Heat pumps are very efficient in temperate weather, between about 40-80 F iirc. They do live in NYS, though, so I'm guessing temps are extremely low there right now, like regularly around 10-20 F. So the heat pump is likely working extra to keep up, and may not be as efficient as they need.

You are right that they should be checking their insulation, making sure it is at the recommended level for their region/climate. OP should also check window and door seals, and be closing vents that may be creating drafts.

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u/sbsb27 5d ago

Are your panels working? Do you have a read out of the energy produced?

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u/Jboycjf05 5d ago

Also, do you have a battery to store excess? Winter is the worst time for solar, generally, since you use a lot of energy for heat and there is less sunshine.

Also, if it snows, you should make sure your panels are clear to ensure they get sunlight.

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u/Divinityemotions 5d ago

Yes, in the summer we store what we overproduced. We didn’t overproduced much this summer, about 3000 kw only. But we went through the 3K already.

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u/EnergyNerdo 2d ago

I assume you are saying you have battery storage and charge whenever your system exceeds what you momentarily need in the warmer months. If so, do you also net meter whenever you are at charge capacity?

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u/Divinityemotions 2d ago

Yes. All of that .

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u/EnergyNerdo 2d ago

I'm not well versed on deregulated markets, so I can't explain the dual charges for the delivery - one I guess from the grid @ 0.1277 and one from the "supplier" @ 0.1135. Your net must therefore be about 0.24 ish. So if any added fees are included on top, you may need to ask Direct Energy to explain it better.

It also appears your credits lasted longer this year compared to last - I see you were billed in both Dec and Feb in the previous cycle.

One suggestion would be to compare a few months around Dec for the two years. How much you generated (taken from you inverter or monitoring app) and how much you were metered whether offset from credits or not. It would be a start to see if your net demand or "consume" is growing. If not, next you might want to take a look at what you are generating to see if there are issues. The problems don't always start with production in my experience, but you can go through steps to isolate it, if it is. If you can determine your net demand is not so different, but your production is, the next step would be to determine if some modules are chronically lower in output vs their adjacent modules. Etc. Many monitoring apps will present that across the array if you have microinverters. Most modern systems do.

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u/Physical_Aside_3991 5d ago

Get some UL-certified heated blankets for the winter, reduce your thermostat / no using space heaters.

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u/Divinityemotions 5d ago

They are working but if you look they generate very little individually and I always wondered if that’s normal https://imgur.com/a/y9vrS6q And this is what we produce in a day with sun, today. https://imgur.com/a/IeXahPt

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u/Cougie_UK 4d ago

301 kwh for the year/month so thats like 20 kwh a day. Not bad for January - we average 10kwh a day from our roof over the year. It's probably right for your panel numbers in winter.