We’ve all heard that going solar can save you money by reducing, or eliminating your electric bill. Homeowners can sometimes get a rebate for installing a grid-tied solar system. However, how much do you know about the different types of home solar systems?

Grid-tied Solar Systems

A grid-tied solar system is tied to the electrical grid maintained by your local utility company. As your solar panels produce energy, it’s sent back to the grid. Your home may not necessarily use the electricity your solar panels produce. Instead, you would get credits for the amount of energy your home produces. A grid-tied solar system is what you’ll generally receive a rebate for installing. That’s because it directly benefits the utility company. It can reduce your electric bill to zero, as long as your panels keep putting out enough energy.

The Shortcoming of Grid-tied Solar Systems

You may have heard that during natural disasters, although people had solar panels, they still suffered from a power outage. Often, that’s because all of the electricity their solar panels produced was sent to the grid. When the grid went down, their power went out too, despite the panels on their roof.

Solar-Plus-Storage System

If you want your home to be energy-independent, you need a storage system. That means, you need solar batteries to store the energy your solar panels produce. You can still send power to the grid, and also, store electricity in your batteries in case of a grid-down disaster.

A typical car battery won’t do, you’ll need what is called a deep-cycle battery. Deep cycle batteries are designed to be charged and recharged, over and over again. Deep cycle batteries can be lead-acid, like your car battery, or lithium-ion, like in your rechargeable electronics. Most home systems use lithium-ion batteries. They hold a charge longer than lead-acid, as well as a longer life span. However, they’re more expensive.

Making Solar-Plus-Storage Work in Your Homeowner

The first thing you’ll need to decide is how many solar batteries you will need. You’ll need to calculate the energy use of your home, and then purchase enough batteries to store that amount of energy. Next, you’ll need to decide where to put the batteries; solar batteries can take up quite a bit of room. The garage is a good place to place them.

Please do your research, to calculate how much battery you will need, as well as the different types and brands available.