Generating electricity using your own small renewable energy system fits the circumstances and values of some home and small-business owners. Many people enjoy the independence they gain and the knowledge that their actions are helping the environment.
A renewable energy system can be used to supply some or all of your electricity needs. Most people connect their systems to the grid and use them to reduce the amount of conventional power supplied to them through the grid. A grid-connected system allows you to sell any excess power you produce back to your power provider.
A small solar electric or photovoltaic (PV) system can be a reliable and pollution-free producer of electricity for your home or office. And they're becoming more affordable all the time. Small PV systems also provide a cost-effective power supply in locations where it is expensive or impossible to send electricity through conventional power lines.
Because PV technologies use both direct and scattered sunlight to create electricity, the solar resource across the United States is ample for small solar electric systems. However, the amount of power generated by a solar system at a particular site depends on how much of the sun's energy reaches it.
A grid-connected system allows you to power your home or small business with renewable energy during those periods when the sun is shining. Any excess electricity you produce is fed back into the grid. When renewable resources are unavailable, electricity from the grid supplies your needs, thus eliminating the expense of electricity storage devices like batteries.
In addition, power providers in Virginia allow net metering, an arrangement where the excess electricity generated by grid-connected renewable energy systems "turns back" your electricity meter as it is fed back into the grid. Thus, if you use more electricity than your system feeds into the grid during a given month, you pay your power provider only for the difference between what you used and what you produced. |
