The Advantages of Solar Energy

Reducing your electric bill 

One of the biggest benefits of solar panels is that they can provide you with substantial savings on your electric bill. Many states require utilities to offer net metering, which allows homeowners to offset their electric costs with the energy their solar panels produce.

Insurance against rising power prices 

One thing most homeowners know is that electricity keeps getting more expensive. The price of electricity has increased steadily over the past 10 years, with an average increase of about $0.02 per year. The cost of electricity will continue to rise in the future, meaning your electric bill will continue to go up.

Solar panels protect you from these rising electricity costs. Because you are producing your energy, you don’t have to buy that expensive power from your utility company.

Seeing a return on your investment 

Solar panels not only reduce or even eliminate your electric bill, but they can also be a source of extra income. As we mentioned before, net metering allows you to earn money by selling excess power your solar panels generate to your utility company.

Some states have other performance-based incentives, like Solar Renewable Energy Credits, that have the potential to earn you hundreds of dollars a year depending on where you live.

The money you earn from net metering, combined with your electric bill savings and other incentives, goes towards paying back the cost of your system. In areas that have all of these incentives, the payback time for a solar panel system can be as little as four years.

Once your system is paid off, your solar panels will continue to generate free power for your home for the lifetime of the system!

Environmentally friendly 

Another big selling point for solar power is that it is a renewable energy source. This means that as you use the resource, it doesn’t permanently deplete the source. In other words, when using the sunlight that hits the earth and turning it into electricity, we don't use up the sun’s energy.

Additionally, electricity created with solar panels does not produce any greenhouse gas emissions. Nothing is being released into the atmosphere when we produce electricity with solar panels; the only thing that's created is clean energy!

Energy independence 

Having solar panels allows homeowners to create their own energy, thereby giving them energy independence. Essentially, this means that a solar home isn’t as dependent as other homes on the traditional electric grid. This allows you to take power into your own hands and control where your home is getting its energy from.

On a larger scale, the United States making the switch to solar and other renewable energies would allow the country to achieve energy independence, as the US would not have to rely heavily on other countries to get oil and gas as we do now.

Using energy created right here in the US and not relying on foreign sources is beneficial for national security and the country’s economy.