Portland’s famed Becky’s Diner now sports 8 flat plate solar hot water collectors to help wash all those dishes.

The Forecaster reports:

When Becky Rand renovated her iconic diner on Commercial Street four years ago, she wanted to add solar heating panels but couldn’t afford to do it.

She made sure the necessary plumbing was installed, though, so if the funds became available, she would be able to add a solar hot-water system in the future.

So when ReVision Energy called Rand and told her about a grant available through Efficiency Maine and federal stimulus funds, plus a tax incentive, she jumped on the opportunity.

“That made it affordable for me,” Rand said.

Rand worked closely with ReVision over the next year and a half, filling out the many necessary forms and documents to make her solar-heated hot-water system a reality.

Finally, last week, the eight panels and a 160-gallon water tank were installed. Rand said that in the height of the summer, when the diner is the busiest and is using the most hot water, the panels should provide all the heat she needs for hot water.

… “For people like me, with grandchildren, you want to think you’re leaving something nice for your grandchildren,” Rand said. “Maine is special – we don’t appreciate what we have here, how beautiful it is. I want that maintained.”

The system, which is tied in to an existing natural gas heating system, will offset roughly 1,131 therms of natural gas each year and produce 248,000 Btus a day in the summertime. Inside the restaurant is a display panel that tracks system production and tank temperature for real-time analysis of system production.

Next time you’re looking for a nice bowl of chowdah, you can rest easy knowing the water washing your dishes at Becky’s is heated by the sun!

Solar hot water systems work by capturing the thermal energy present in sunlight and turning it into usable energy in your home.

When solar hot water collectors (either flat plate or evacuated tube style) on your roof are warmer than your water tank, a differential temperature controller activates a pump. This pump then circulates a nontoxic antifreeze mix up to the solar collectors on your roof, where the fluid heats up.

This solar-heated fluid is then pumped to a super-insulated storage tank, where it gives off its heat as it passes through a heat exchanger. It is then pumped back to the roof, continuing the cycle as long as the sun is out.

Should there be unexpectedly high solar thermal gain (or should you be away), the system is designed to automatically go into an overheat protection mode called “Steamback.” Once a certain temperature threshold is hit, the solar circulating pump stops circulating fluid and the fluid present in the collectors turns to steam and fills an expansion tank. The copper elements of the solar hot water collectors are not harmed by high heat and will reach high temperatures until the end of the day. After the system has cooled overnight, the differential temperature controller will reset and allow the system to start running normally the following day.

From May to September, all of the hot water a household uses for washing dishes, clothes or taking showers will be provided by the sun, even on cloudy days. In the darker months of winter, the sun will still help out, but a backup unit – such as a boiler or electric element – will run to ensure a steady supply of hot water. Instead of running all summer, a home’s boiler will only fire up as a backup unit to heat the second coil in the upper part of your tank.

Overall a typical system will produce about 80% of a home’s water heating needs.

The solar hot water system for Bow-based homeowners Gail and Leon Kenison allows them to use their oil boiler for backup only, with a wood stove for primary heating.

We had a chance to speak with Gail Kenison, a homeowner in Bow, New Hampshire who recently had us install a cost-effective solar hot water system that will essentially keep the boiler off from May to October.

Gail and her husband, Leon, had already cut down oil use in their home dramatically by choosing to heat primarily with wood. In the winter, their oil boiler still served as a source for hot water and backup space heat. But with their boiler running throughout the summer for the sole purpose of heating water, they decided to take the next step and invest in solar hot water.

“We’ve tried to stay in tune with all the renewable energy options, and had wanted to do something for a while,” Gail says, “We learned about solar at a continuing education class, and discovered that solar thermal presented a great solution for our home.”

Solar Hot Water Works

The Kenisons had ReVision Energy install two American-made Chromagen 4×8 flat plate solar hot water collectors and an 80G super insulated dual-coil solar storage tank. Whenever the rooftop collector temperature is hotter than the water at the bottom of the 80-gallon storage tank, a differential temperature controller automatically activates the solar circulating pump, which pumps solar-heated propylene glycol (a sugar water antifreeze solution) down from the collectors and through the bottom heat exchange coil in the tank, thereby transferring the heat from the sun to the water in the tank. The system includes automatic hot water backup from the oil boiler for those times of year when the solar resource is not strong enough to meet 100% of domestic hot water demand.

“The experience has been great so far,” Gail says, “The install team was knowledgeable, very professional, and clearly took the time to do the job right. They made us feel very comfortable with their work and took the extra time to help us understand the system. We couldn’t be more pleased.”

Even as the Kenison’s solar thermal system enters the heating season, it should produce up to half of their household’s hot water. Since they’ll be heating primarily with wood, that means their boiler will only need to run as a backup for both heat and hot water – creating some substantial fuel savings and CO2 reductions!

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!”

We’ve noticed an interesting phenomenon when customers start generating their own solar electricity – they start looking at electricity in a whole new way! As soon as you have a means of understanding how much electricity you produce, you naturally want to understand how much you consume, and if possible adjust your behavior so that you consume less without losing too many creature comforts so your PV system foots a larger part of your bill.

It’s in this context that we were interviewed on a story of the promise of smart meters for Maine and New Hampshire. The Green Alliance reports, via Foster’s Daily Democrat:

Michael Gray lives in Hampstead, NH and uses both a solar electric array and solar water heating system. Gray installed a device called The Energy Detective (TED), to add more monitoring options to his solar energy systems, which were installed by Exeter-based ReVision Energy. While nearly all solar electric systems installed today come with monitoring on the solar side, they don’t show homeowners the other side of the coin: how much power their home consumes.

“TED has a little LCD display about the size of an alarm clock. We keep it on the counter,” says Gray. “It can display in watts or money per hour. It was really transformative to actually see in real time what you’re using.

“That had an effect on our family. It makes us think, ‘Is that something we want to spend our money on?’ You can actually turn lights off and see the price per hour go down. Being aware has helped us.”

Read more at Foster’s website. And if you want more info, we’d be happy to talk with you more about the TED!

A strong state rebate for solar hot water and high oil prices have lead to a huge demand for solar hot water systems in New Hampshire.

We’ve been all around the Granite State – from Seacoast to the Massachusetts border, up to Lakes Region and nearly to Vermont. Below are some examples of recent work we’ve completed.

Nashua, New Hampshire

Since his awning mount solar hot water array was installed in early June, Lou Juris reports that hasn’t needed to use his backup system at all. Going solar for his hot water gives him peace of mind that as costs for energy increase, he won’t face any shocking gas bills.

Wolfeboro, New Hampshire

These 6 flat plate collectors installed in Wolfeboro arrived just in time for 15 guests! Our happy customer says that the entire time the party was there – showering, washing dishes, doing laundry – solar provided 100% of all the hot water.

Deerfield, New Hampshire

Maureen Quinn, who had us install a solar electric system last year, re-invested the proceeds from PV federal tax credit into a solar hot water system. The rebates were just too attractive to pass up, says Quinn, who also is looking forward to decades of hot water and electricity provided by a free fuel source in the sky – the sun.

Roughly 2/3 of the electricity used in the new Black Dinah Chocolatiers commercial kitchen will come from the sun!

“When you live on an island, it shapes your thinking,” says Steve Shaffer, one of the proprietors of Isle au Haut based Black Dinah Chocolatiers, “You learn that everything you carry in you must carry out. You have the think things through. And this characteristic has shaped everything about our business.”

It was quite a journey for he and his wife Kate from a co-op in California to a rugged island off the coast of Maine, where they now specialize in delectable chocolates made from fair-trade, organic, and local ingredients. While their business started with a great idea operated out of their home kitchen, the popularity of their creative chocolates soon outgrew their home-based set-up and it was time for the business to expand.

“We were eager to grow though we were also concerned about the long-term costs of running the new facility,” says Steve, “Our business’ single biggest liability was energy costs. On the island, electricity costs roughly twice what it does on the mainland, so offsetting our use with solar electricity made a lot of sense. Likewise, solar hot water would help keep our propane use under control.”

ReVision Energy helped Steve and Kate navigate the various incentives and rebates available for businesses as they designed their new commercial kitchen, including work on an ARRA grant that helped make the project more feasible. The new facility featured all new appliances – commercial dishwater, chest freezers, and convection oven – which, while as efficient as they get, still require lots of energy to work. We designed a 3.29 kw grid-tied solar electric system to provide about 2/3 of their electricity, and a 60-tube solar hot water collector array to preheat an on-demand propane water heater.

A Little Bit of Independence

“Our goal was not to get to net-zero, but to keep our energy bills around the same as when we were running the business out of our home,” Steve says. “So far, we seem to be on track. The solar electric production has exceeded our expectations and we’ve hardly needed to run the propane water heater.”

The solar energy systems give Steve confidence that his business is protected from rising costs of energy. It also plays right into the mission of their organization.

“When you spend so much time with food you develop a relationship with it. We love knowing the Peruvian co-op where we get our chocolate. We also love using local cream, herbs, flowers, fruits, and spices in our chocolates. So it only makes sense that we’d use local energy, too.”

About 70% of Black Dinah’s business is web-based, and you can shop their delights at www.blackdinahchocolatiers.com. Also stay tuned to their Facebook page which features news from their summertime cafe, events, photos, and more.

And… we couldn’t help it – below is a photo of their delicious local Farm Market chocolate collection (all with ingredients grown on an Hancock or Knox County farm):

More Photos from Our Commercial Solar Photo Gallery:

For more installations, see our Solar Projects Map

Over the weekend over 20 people came out for our open house at Charles Forcey’s home in Durham, which sports a recently installed solar hot water and solar electric system

As we’ve previously reported, New Hampshire’s solar hot water rebate program has been running low on funds, and we’ve just received word that only 48 spots are left for the $2,000 federal portion of the rebate.

Once these funds are committed, the average $2,600-$2,900 rebate is reduced to $600-900.

With oil prices what they are, and the generous 30% federal tax credit, solar hot water is still an excellent investment, however if you’ve been holding out for a drop in prices — don’t! The rebates will unlikely ever be this good again.

If you’ve talked to us before, or are interested in moving forward on a proposal, please contact us to get moving, and soak up those rays of sun!