Warming to solar panels with Sungevity

Are you put off getting solar panels on your roof because of the troublesome examination, preparation and installation involved? Help might be on the way, if you live in the US. A company in California is pioneering a web-based system that should make it easier -- and cheaper -- for people to use solar energy in their houses.

Using the web, the Sungevity solar company has devised a system for evaluating the solar potential for a given home through satellite data. Interested customers simply log on to Sungevity's site and provide a California address and some information about their monthly electrical bills.

Within 24 hours, the company sends the prospective customer a quote for installing a solar system. The quote also includes an estimate of how much the system will save home owners over 25 years and the prospective increase in the value of their home, plus simulated imagery of what their home might look like after solar panels are installed. Traditionally, the process that provides all that information takes days and a physical examination of the roof.

Company owner Danny Kennedy explains: "We do all that (the calculations for preparing the estimate) in about 10 to 15 minutes."

In a few more clicks, customers can schedule an appointment and put a deposit down on a solar system.

We did an estimate on an eldery relative's home in California, and the quote came back in a speedy two hours. There were plenty of payment options and with the addition of the panels, it quoted a vast improvement in the electrical bills over time.

Reducing a complex sale into a quick online exchange -- the same trick that propelled Dell to the front of the PC world -- helps reduce one of the nagging costs of the solar world: the install expenses. Installation costs come to around roughly half of the cost of a solar system. Sharp, Akeena and other companies have tried to reduce installation costs through prefabricated frames for solar panels. Others have developed roof tiles with solar cells built in. SolarCity, meanwhile, has aggressively used software to coordinate solar panel deliveries and installations to cut down on the number of trips electricians and contractors have to make. SolarCity also leases solar panels.

Sungevity's software essentially eliminates the money and time it takes for an installer to drive out to someone's house, climb on top of it and take a bunch of measurements to prepare an estimate. Only 10 per cent of those visits lead to a sale, Kennedy added.

In all, Sungevity can cut the cost of a solar system by around 10 per cent, he said, and cut out 80 per cent of the on-site estimates. Like SolarCity, Sungevity also uses software to coordinate installations.

The company's secret sauce is a trigonometry-heavy application that can take satellite imagery and create a 3D model of a house. From the model, Sungevity calculates the pitch of the roof, the azimuth (for instance, where the house faces in relation to compass points) and the available area.

"You introduce errors when you put a guy on the roof," Kennedy said.

Sungevity uses data from Microsoft Virtual Earth rather than Google Earth for its satellite imagery. While Google Earth only provides a top-down view of a roof, Virtual Earth gives data from different angles, which lets Sungevity calculate pitch.

The data provides enough information for a fairly strong estimate even without customer input, Kennedy said. To prove its point, Sungevity is going to mail fliers to all of the homes in Albany, California. Each flier will come with a picture of the addressed home, a picture of the home with simulated solar panels, and the cost savings. To fine-tune the estimate, customers need to submit their power bills.

Rather than install custom solar panel systems, Sungevity offers five different systems, ranging in size from 1.4-5.6 kilowatts. Prices range from $7,500-38,500 (£3,800-19,300) for everything after rebates are subtracted.

While operating only in California right now, the company will try to expand to other states. It may employ solar installers as subcontractors, or it may sell estimating services for installers in other states. As for us in the UK, we can just hope that some solar energy companies here will soon follow Sungevity's good example.

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