Solar Power

A few years ago (about five) we put solar panels on our roof, I think we have seven and the first bill after was  only sixty dollars. We thought wow this is good coming from bills for electricity of around $300 for a quarter. the bills gradually increased until we are paying back up around the $300 mark.

Almost two years ago the box in the garage rad something stupid, its supposed to show how much sunlight/solar the meter was taking in at that particular time. We rang the people and they would send some one out, which they did about three weeks later. Meanwhile we are off the grid with no solar power coming in.

March last year was when we got the meter box back on, nearly four months out of action. The company gave us a rebate of what we would have been generating in that time, thank goodness.

Three or four weeks ago, the box gave the same funny reading as before, we turned it off and then on again but nothing we did would get it going again. Warren rang them, some-one would come out. Friday he sent an email, they call within two hours and announced that the service man would be out on Tuesday 9am.

Ten past nine, a white van drove past our house (as our house is on the bend in the road, many people miss it and then find that they are at the next house which is four numbers past ours). Two guys and they replace the box with a completely new one and had to go up on the roof to adjust the panels. I went shopping while they were here and arrived home in time to offer them a coffee or tea but they said they had to get on as they had 35 houses to do in the next two weeks so no time to stop for coffee.

The new meter box is very low key, actually there is two boxes and unlike the original one that had a very bright red read out which could be seen as soon as we drove into the garage, this one one needs to be quite close to it to see what we are generating.

I really dont care as long as our power bill either goes down or stays stable. By the way at least it was under warranty so no cost to us, yay.