[aprssig] Solar House Symbol & Solar ecstasy!

[Robert Bruninga]

Now that all my energy comes from solar, I finally remembered to change my
APRS symbol to Home Solar (House with S overlay). ALthough I dont think any
APRS clients have adopted all the new potential symbols, at least APRS is
ready when they do.
http://aprs.org/symbols/symbols-new.txt

Solar is Amazing!  Its cheaper than the Utility, its clean and it returns
from 10 to 20% return on investment for life. And that return only goes up
as the cost of energy rises. You cannot find a better risk free investment
anywhere.

I was just out watching my electric meter spin backwards on this nice sunny
holiday and wanted to remind people to think about tomorrow.

Remember, if  you have sun on your roof, are going to live there for a long
time, and are not going solar, what are you thinking?  Sooner or later you
are going to go solar, it just makes no economic sense not to.  So why keep
paying thousands of dollars a year to a utility when you could be paying
near zero for the rest of your life starting now.

And the one deadline that is looming is the end of the 30% federal
incentives next year (2016).  Why wait till then and then maybe mis-out
because all the proctrastinators wait too and then the installers are so
over loaded you miss it?

The things that are certain in life are death... taxes.... and utilities.
But finally you can do something about the last two.   Get 30% refund on
our taxes AND eliminate your utilities and energy costs for life.

see my page: http://aprs.org/solar-now.html

If you don't have sun, you can at least sign up with most utilities for
wind power and soon you can buy into commuinty solarfarms in many states.

My point. Solar costs about half of what you will pay for utilities for the
next 20 years (at today's rate), more like a third if utility rates
continue to go up.  So why keep paying every month for the rest of your
life, or even one more year, when you could go solar and have free energy
for life?

I'm just glad I have lived long enough to see solar not only equal the
utility in cost (2010) but to now be cheaper than coal!

ANother way to look at utilities is that its like being permanently in
debt, but even worse, because you never pay it off!  You just keep paying
for ever.  Makes no sense (if you have a sunny roof) .

I used to spend $2400 a year for electricity, $3000 a year for heating oil
(old leaky house) and $1500 a year for gasoline. Now I switched to a
heatpump (had to double my solar) and drive an Electric car and my utility
electric bill is about $4 a month (the minimum account charge),  And the
only fossil fuel we burn anymore is about $500 a year for the gas for the
prius when we go out of town.to visit gramma.

That's $6400 a year savings for the rest of my life.  And my contrubution
to fossil fuel burning is down 10-to-1.  ANd... it is cheaper than doing
nothing!

Don't wait.  Even my first array I bought in 2010 at 4 times today's price
has already paid for iself, so "waiting" for costs to go down gains
nothing, but just more money lost every month going down the utility
rat-hole.  And wait too long and miss the 30% federal tax credit (going
down to 10% in 2016) and  you just threw away another 20% of your potential
savings for life.

Its a whole new world.  Glad to be part of it!

YOUR state and your mileage may vary.  But get some quotes, and do the math!

Bob, WB4APR
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.tapr.org/pipermail/aprssig_lists.tapr.org/attachments/20150907/b3e031fa/attachment.html>