When Kimry Corrette invited ReVision Energy to her home for a site evaluation in August of 2012, she hardly thought it would lead to not just a solar energy installation in her home, but a new career in the solar industry.

Kimry and her husband, Corey, have lived in their passive solar house on the outskirts of Durham for six years. Over that time, they worked on reducing their home’s energy use to the lowest reasonable level, while building an expanding menagerie along the way (3 dogs, 2 cats, 2 goats, and a motley bunch of chickens). However, the time had come to push their home to the next level. An article of Mother Earth News informed them that solar had become a lot more affordable, and so the young couple looked into what solar energy could do for their New England home.

“When [Exeter branch manager] Dan Clapp came to my house, I was moved by how far the solar industry has come and I wanted to be part of it,” Kimry says, “Sometime after our visit, Corey was looking at ReVision’s website and noticed they were hiring – it just seemed like a perfect fit.”

Kimry joined us as an office assistant to help manage the vast amount of paperwork needed to keep jobs moving efficiently in New Hampshire and Massachusett’s regulatory environment. Meanwhile, ReVision Energy got to work planning the installation on Kimry’s home.

Solar in the Snow

“We were swamped with a huge snow storm right before the installation,” Kimry says, “The day after, the crew was out there, shoveling a trench to where they needed to install the wire and cleaning snow off the roof. Once they got the snow out of the way, I was amazed at how efficiently the crew got to work.”

Coming from previous employment for a more conventional contractor, Kimry was impressed at our crew’s professionalism and team spirit. “I had heard all sorts of great things about our crew from customers I talked to, but seeing it is another thing entirely. I came from a world where the installers were a bit rough around the edges, and ReVision’s crew was a stark contrast. The guys always had a smile on their face, were extra courteous when working in our home, and were very articulate when I asked them all sorts of questions about the particulars of the system installation.”

The Joy of Solar

The Correttes had us install 16 American-made all black Suniva solar modules with Enphase inverters, for a production capacity of 4.2kw, plenty enough to provide for their home’s electricity needs.

Now that it’s installed, Kimry finds all sorts of intangible benefits besides a negated electric bill. “It’s just great to look out and see the sun shine and be happy about it,” Kimry says. “I find myself looking at the production each day, eager to see how one day compares to the next, and getting excited as the days get longer. It’s surprising how much sunshine there is, even in February!”

Of course, living with solar is also the best way to understand the systems, and Kimry’s been able to apply her own experience as she helps out customers. “While there’s a lot to learn at first, when you get down to it, it’s a simple system. When the sun is out, our home is making power, we’re saving fossil fuel and saving money. I love what it does!”

Kimry is not alone among ReVision Energy staffers – in fact, just about every ReVision Energy employee who owns their home has a renewable energy system installed on top. Get some ideas on how to make your home more sustainable by reading through our employee bios.

Anita Brosius-Scott stands next to her PV array to help Connect the Dots on Climate Change. Her home is now a net-producer of electricity each year.

The road to a more sustainable future happens one home at a time, and for Anita Brosius-Scott and Geoff Scott, that meant installing a solar photovoltaic system that would allow them to eliminate their electric bill.

“We originally thought that this kind of system was out of our price range, but we kept bumping into [ReVision] at events and eventually decided we’d at least get a quote for our home,” says Anita, “After meeting with [System Designer] Hans Albee, we found that a solar array was within our reach, especially due to a generous suite of state and federal incentives.”

Those incentives include a 30% uncapped federal tax credit and $2,000 Maine state rebate. The cash rebate remains available for now but funding is a bit uncertain in the second half of 2013; we are hopeful the new legislature will enact new rebate funding to keep the program going in the years ahead. Solar electric arrays also benefit from record low prices – the cost of solar panels has dropped by more than 50% since 2009 and, while costs are no longer dropping precipitously, they are on track to remain at record low prices through 2013.

When Economics Help the Environment

The solar array is quite low-profile on the Brosius-Scott home, located just outside the heart of Camden.

The Brosius-Scott’s array turned on the spring of 2011, and since its installation they have done several energy efficiency upgrades in their home, resulting in an overall 25% drop in electric consumption. The effect of this conservation is that a system which was designed to produce 95% of their electric bill has actually led to them becoming a net producer of electricity – meaning that their solar array produces more electricity each year than they consume.

Geoff and Anita loved that they could make a solar investment that allowed them to “walk the walk” of their values. “We’re concerned about climate change and feel that local energy production is part of the solution,” Geoff says, “Now that it’s installed, we have a system that requires no maintenance, has lowered our electric bills, and makes me feel good every time I drive home and see sun hitting the roof.”

Chevy Volt parked outside a home in Londonderry, NH, which sports 5kw of solar panels. The solar array produces enough electricity to ‘refuel’ the Volt in 2-3 hours of full sun

Since we first started talking about electric vehicles, several ReVision Energy customers have gone on to purchase electric cars. So, we eagerly asked the question: How well does your solar array complement your electric vehicle charging?

According to Evan Sohm of Londonderry, NH – solar works GREAT with his electric car (a Chevy Volt). Here’s Evan’s experience in his own words:

I drive from Londonderry, NH to Methuen, MA for work, Monday thru Friday. It’s approximately a 37 mile round trip; the Volt will go approximately 40 miles on 10kWHr of charge. As a result, I’ve been driving the Volt to and from work without using any gas.

The PV Solar Panels on my roof produce 4kW of power in full sun. So if the sun shines on my roof for 2.5hours, that produces 10kWHr of energy which is enough to drive the car for 40 miles! On average our PV system produces 18.9kWhr/day. If you use all that energy to charge the Volt you could drive 75 miles per day with zero fuel expenses.

If we drove a regular car that gets 25mpg for 75 miles, that would require 3 gallons of gas. So for us, it’s like our solar panels produce 3 gallons of gas per day, every day.

I couldn’t be happier, because in all honesty, I hate giving my money to the oil companies. Not only do I get to save money and help the environment, but I get to drive a really cool car! Everybody who takes a ride in it says it’s like a space ship. But the Chevy Volt is not rocket science. It’s like any other regular car, only much more efficient. So far, I’ve driven 7,000 miles and the lifetime fuel economy is 107mpg.

Evan has made his solar data publicly accessible and you can view it online at: https://enlighten.enphaseenergy.com/public/systems/7HPp61895.

We’ll have more about solar and electric car driving soon with new videos in our Solar Road Tour series and an appearance by our fully decked our Chevy Volt at the Common Ground Fair this year. Also be sure to swing by our offices at 142 Presumpscot St, Portland to see our charging station whenever you’re in the area.

ReVision’s crew stands outside the completed solar electric array for Hilary Clark

Since the 70s, Hilary Clark has dreamed of producing her own power and being both lighter on the planet and independent from the utilities. So when she had a chance to build her own home in the early 90s, she jumped at a chance to implement several sustainable technologies – super insulation, a masonry heater, and solar hot water. But when looking at solar electricity at the time, she balked; the cost of batteries was just too high.

Flash forward 20 years, and Hilary Clark is the proud owner of a 7.2kw grid-tied photovoltaic array that will provide the bulk of her home’s electricity. A system that today is eligible for a 30% federal tax credit and state rebates – $2,000 in Maine and $3,000 in New Hampshire.

Herb Perry of The Green Alliance writes:

[after] attending a lecture by Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org … Hilary asked herself, “What can I do to reduce our impact on our earth and our atmosphere?” leading to a second question, “How can I produce electricity that’s not carbon-based?” A friend had put photovoltaic modules onto her roof in Portsmouth, using the company ReVision Energy, so Hilary learned more about the technology and the company.

That search led her to a free solar evaluation with one of our solar design specialists, who was able to design a system that would both provide nearly all of her electricity and pay for itself in just over 10 years. The home uses premium Sunpower panels, which are the most power-dense solar electric panels in the world, offering more power per square foot than other modules.

According to all reports, the photovoltaic system is working great so far! Again, Perry:

“I go out and check the meters constantly,” Hilary says. One meter shows how much carbon she is not putting into the air, another shows how much electricity the new system is generating and a third shows how much electricity she is selling back to CMP.

And the stakes are high as Hilary learned during a week she spent this winter on the Mt. Washington summit.

“A meteorologist told me: ‘It’s really, really hard to predict the weather now, because all of the weather models we have don’t work anymore.’ And that’s what’s happening. For those of us who know the natural world, we can adapt, but that adaptation takes place over the course of a 1,000 years, not over the course of ten years.”

While the global prospects are still scary, for her home’s part Hilary is keeping her share of C02 out of the atmosphere, and saving money while she does it.

The 7kw solar array on the Massachusetts home of the Whitleys will produce around 9,000 kWh of clean, solar electricity each year

When Ray and Joann Whitley installed a geothermal heating system in their Salisbury, Massachusetts home two years ago, they were thrilled to eliminate the cost of heating oil from their budget.

“While our electric bill did go up because the geothermal back up is an electric fan, it only went up about a third of what we had been paying for oil for the year,” according to Joann.

“We decided to go ahead and install some solar panels on our garage to offset the electrical cost of running the system,” Ray chimed in.

Going Solar in Massachusetts

The Whitley’s contracted ReVision Energy, a renewable energy company with branches in Maine and New Hampshire, to install their new solar photovoltaic system.  ReVision’s Exeter, NH branch is only 17 miles from the Whitley’s home in Massachusetts.

Massachusetts has one of the most generous solar state rebate programs in the country, making clean solar energy more accessible for homeowners such as the Whitleys.  In addition to a 30% federal tax credit, Massachusetts offers a Commonwealth Energy Credit (CEC) of up to $.85/watt for 5,000 watts DC of production, as well as a $1,000 State Income Tax Credit.  Massachusetts also has a Solar Renewable Energy Certificates (SREC) program, a market-based program which compensates a homeowner from .29c/kWh – .55c/kWh for each kWh of solar electricity generated.

“If they didn’t have the rebates we couldn’t have afforded to do it,” as Ray put it.

The Whitley’s decision to go green was rooted in part in their shared concern about global warming.

“I’m retired, but I was a science teacher for 24 years,” Ray said. “I taught Earth Science at Triton Middle School in Byfield, so I am very concerned about the carbon dioxide going into the atmosphere.”

Geothermal also proved to be practical replacement for the home’s aging heating system.

“We were using oil,” Ray recalled. “The situation was that the oil furnace and the tank were both getting old and we were concerned about leakage, so we took them out.”

“A friend of ours had installed geothermal, so we inquired and got interested,” he said. “We ended up going with it.”

Two years later, the couple has nothing but good things to say about the system.

“It does an excellent job,” Ray said. “The system is totally clean. We have one filter that we have to hose off twice a year. Nothing that’s going to create a mess like oil sometimes does.”

Results of Photovoltaic Solar Production

The Whitley’s are already pleased with the performance of their new solar photovoltaic system.

“We’ve had it about a month in operation, generated about 500 KW/hrs on the panels,” according to Ray, who has made a hobby of monitoring the solar array’s energy production.

“Even today we are generating about 25 KW/hrs, with just 9 hours of sunlight on a good clear winter day,” he noted.

Still a teacher at heart, Ray is more than happy to share his knowledge of renewable energy.

“Japan and Iceland use geothermal from the plate tectonics,” he said. “All you need is groundwater with a temperature around 60 degrees. We have two wells in the backyard, around 4 inches across and 300 feet down. That’s where all the action is. It’s buried 5 feet down so you don’t even see the wells at all.”

Of course, Ray’s appreciation for renewable energy isn’t strictly rooted in science.

“It’s nice to see the oil trucks drive by and not have to stop,” he said with smile.  With solar combined with the clean heat of geothermal, the Whitleys have a lot of smiles to give in the years ahead.

Meg Simone is known for creating timeless wedding films at New England’s most gorgeous destinations. Her home post-production studio is where precious moments come to be – thanks to a fair amount of electricity! Making her operation a little greener this year is a pole-mounted 3.7kw photovoltaic sstem installed be ReVision Energy just in time for the holidays.

Meg shares her enthusiasm for the system in this quick video:

Seasons Greenings From Meg Simone Wedding Films from meg simone on Vimeo.

We touched based with Meg to ask her about the process and what she likes about the new system:

When we built our house we put in a evacuated tube solar hot water system with ReVision. We know there are other options out there for solar installers but we love the personal attention, ease of install (thanks Jen for taking care of the paperwork) and customer service that stands behind the product. The vast experience from the team at ReVision is unmatched. You don’t have to take my word for it, you can read their bios!

We had wanted to add solar electricity for a long time, and finally the incentives and rebates afforded us the opportunity. ReVision made my life easy and this process FUN. The guys are so friendly we told them to come in for lunch on the 2nd day of the install! In fact, the team is so friendly and personal it feels like a friend has helped install this not just a business.

We love seeing how much power the system makes each day. It’s a good feeling to know that the sun can power our at-home businesses and reduce our carbon footprint.

See some more photos of the installation on our Facebook page, courtesy of Meg:

When Bill Babb and his wife Barbara retired from their jobs as school teachers, controlling monthly costs was an important way to maintain the good life. Investing in financial markets looked shaky, and they wanted to see something positive result from their efforts. After seeing a presentation by a former student, Hans Albee, they started looking seriously at a solar energy investment – and they liked what they saw.

“For years, the upfront cost was an issue with solar,” Bill says, “But when we looked at it recently we were pleasantly surprised – the cost of solar panels had dropped considerably, and with state and federal incentives, we found we could purchase a system that would be a better investment for us than the stock market. Barbara and I both agreed that the cost of energy will only rise, and rise faster than it has in the past.”

As a pragmatic environmentalist (and climate change skeptic), Bill was attracted to solar’s minimal impact on the natural landscape. He likes that his clean power doesn’t add turbines to untouched landscape, block up or contaminate waterways, or contribute to air pollution. He also likes the impact solar has had on his monthly bill.

“We were expecting the system to produce around $50 a month of power, but so far it’s produced closer to $60-70,” Bill says. “We’re happy to be banking some power for the winter months, and seeing our electric bill dramatically reduced. The system has done everything I wanted it to do from day one.”

Solar Hot Takes it Farther

Bill and Barbara’s positive experience with solar electricity lead them to adding a solar hot water system, which further reduces their home’s fossil fuel needs by allowing their boiler to go dormant for 5-6 months of the year. We caught up with Bill just a few weeks after the system was installed, and he reports that so far, it had stayed well above the 110 degree mark that would trigger his boiler to turn on.

“The furnace has been turned off for weeks and we have had plenty of hot water, even without changing our lifestyle” Bill says, “On days that are a cloudy mix with little direct sun, we’re surprised at how much heat the system produces. We like it!”

For Cheryl Frederick, Assistant Professor of Captive Wildlife Care and Education at Unity College, the tipping point for energy came this past semester when she had a guest lecturer in her classroom talk about coal.

“There is nothing clean about coal,” she remembers, “And our environment is in crisis. I thought – I need to go beyond teaching this to living it.”

That decision brought her to ReVision Energy, who she learned about through colleagues at the university who were familiar with our work. She appreciated not only the lofty recommendation she received, but that she would be employing Unity alumni for her project.

PACE Financing Makes it Possible

Cheryl’s system took advantage of the new PACE program by Efficiency Maine, a low-interest loan tied to the value of your home specifically made for renewable energy and energy efficiency improvements. Maine is the first state in the country to offer PACE financing and Cheryl’s may be one of the first home to use it for solar electricity. But despite the newness of the program, she says the experience was great.

“The whole process took about a month,” she says. “Now our money now goes to the loan instead of the utility bill, and if we stay here long enough we’ll get most or all of our electricity for free. It’s an amazing program – we wanted to do solar and the PACE loan made it possible.”

Solar As a Form of Entertainment

Cheryl, like many solar electric system owners, finds herself having lots of fun watching the performance of her system through her web-based monitoring portal. She can now see how much power she generates in a given day and check in from anywhere with an internet connection.

“It’s like watching stocks go up – you have a nice sunny day and then get to see how much power you generated,” she says, adding “The website also tells you what your carbon offset is and how many trees you have saved.”

She finds that being aware of how much power she’s generating makes her more aware of how much power she’s using. “We have become more careful about our power use, and are hoping to bank more power this summer than we use.  That way, we can use more electric heaters this winter to offset our oil use.”

The best part? “I feel like I’m finally doing my part,” she says, “Instead of cutting down trees, I’m saving them.”