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Solar Energy Alerts! | Issue 6 | September 2011 |

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In This Issue...

1. NEW! How To Go Solar For Less Than $1000!
2. Recommended Reading
3. Upcoming Solar Energy Events

NEW! How To Go Solar For Less Than $1000!

If you've stopped yourself from going solar due to the large up front costs of purchasing a solar power system, you need to take a look at solar leases. For less than $1000, and in many cases for $0, you can have a full solar power system installed at your home.

Solar leasing programs are designed to remove the largest obstacle that a homeowner interested in going solar will face - the large upfront cost of purchasing and installing a residential solar power system.

Traditionally, when a homeowner wanted to install a home solar power system, it meant they would need to purchase all of the equipment and hire a solar company to install it for them. The price for doing this varied depending on your local market, the solar equipment purchased, and the solar company performing the installation, but on average it cost about $9 per Watt.

For a 3 kW system, you would be looking at investing close to $30,000. This is the amount of money that the homeowner would need to come up with through financing and incentives in order to go solar. As you can imagine, since this is a major expense it becomes a significant factor in a homeowners decision on whether or not to go solar.

An alternative to purchasing your solar power system is solar leasing. With this option, the company you lease solar equipment from will install the system in your home but will retain ownership of the equipment.

In return for your monthly lease payment, you get to use the solar electricity generated by the solar power panels. This will generally be at a lower rate than the electricity provided by your utility company.

What's really nice is that as the price of electricity provided by your utility company continues to increase every year, the rate you pay to lease solar energy from the solar power company will remain low, sometimes even flat, over the life of the lease.

When you lease solar panels for your home, three key benefits you can realize are...

• Little to no upfront investment required
• Lower monthly cost of electricity
• Stable rate even as utility prices increase

The most common reason homeowners choose to lease solar energy is the low upfront costs compared to traditional solar power financing options. The initial cost is usually in the range of $0 to $1000. With such a low price, leasing solar panels and equipment makes residential solar energy a real possibility for many homeowners that otherwise would not have even considered it.

If you are interested in a solar power system for your home, make sure you consider whether a solar lease is right for you.

Solar leases aren't the only options that can save you money when installing a residential solar energy system. For more options that you should consider, take a look at our page on Solar Power Financing

Recommended Reading

If you want to have a better understanding of the environmental challenges facing the world, I recommend you get a copy of Hot, Flat, and Crowded by Thomas Friedman.

This book provides a thorough analysis of global warming and its consequences. However, even more importantly, Friedman also explains how this challenge can be beaten and the opportunities it will provide to those that solve the challenge.

Learn more: Hot, Flat, and Crowded

Upcoming Solar Energy Events

Featured Solar Energy Events

These are the upcoming events that Solar-Energy-At-Home.com readers have submitted to our database...

• Sep 7 : Residential Basics of Going Solar Workshop
• Sep 24 : Easy Solar Projects Workshop
• Oct 1 : 3rd Annual Southwest Florida Green Futures Expo
• Jan 26-27 : MiaGreen Expo & Conference (4th Edition)

Other Solar Energy Events

Here are some other solar and renewable energy events that you may be interested in attending...

Date	Location	Event
Sep 5-7	Brisbane, Australia	EcoGen 2011
Sep 5-9	Hamburg, Germany	26th European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference and Exhibition
Sep 9-10	East Peoria, IL, USA	Central Illinois Green Expo
Sep 10	Albuquerque, NM, USA	Free Solar Basics Seminar
Sep 10	New Haven, CT, USA	CT Green Expo
Sep 14	Honolulu, HI, USA	Solar Seminar
Sep 14-16	Singapore, Singapore	Build Eco Xpo (BEX) Asia 2011
Sep 17	Richmond, CA, USA	Green Drive Expo
Sep 17	Huntington Beach, CA, USA	4th Annual Huntington Beach Green Expo
Sep 17	Galax, VA, USA	Save Green Expo
Sep 19	Istanbul, Turkey	Solar, Wind & Geothermal: A TIREC Technology Briefing
Sep 20-21	Istanbul, Turkey	Solar Turkey
Sep 21	Raleigh, NC, USA	Solar Exchage East - 2011
Sep 21-22	Santa Clara, CA, USA	Northern California Facilities Expo
Sep 23-Oct 2	Washington, D.C., USA	U.S. DOE Solar Decathlon
Sep 26	Berlin, Germany	PV Technology Briefing
Sep 26-29	Mexico City, Mexico	Green Expo 2011
Sep 27	Columbus, OH, USA	Green Building Expo
Sep 27	Los Angeles, CA, USA	Germany California Solar Day
Sep 27-30	Chengdu, China	IEEE International Conference on Smart Grid and Clean Energy Technologies
Sep 29	Berlin, Germany	An Introduction to Solar PV Business Planning
Oct 4-6	Austin, TX, USA	SXSW Eco
Oct 11	Maui, HI, USA	Solar Integration Workshop
Oct 11	Charlotte, NC, USA	Sustainable Business Awards and Green Expo
Oct 11-12	London, UK	Energy Solutions 2011
Oct 14-15	Seattle, WA, USA	Green Industrial Business and Career Expo
Oct 15	Roswell, GA, USA	Roswell Green Expo
Oct 17-18	London, UK	Certificate in Solar Power
Oct 17-20	Dallas, TX, USA	Solar Power International '11
Oct 18-20	Bahrain	Bahrain Green Technology Expo 2011
Oct 19	London, UK	Renewable Power Technologies
Oct 20	London, UK	Renewable Power Economics
Oct 22-23	Sioux Falls, SD, USA	Green Living Health Expo
Oct 27	Santa Clara, CA, USA	International Solar Energy Technology Conference
Nov 8-9	New York, NY, USA	Renewable Energy Insurance & Risk Management USA
Nov 9	Seaside, CA, USA	Green Building Expo
Nov 9-11	Hyderabad, India	SOLARCON India 2011
Nov 10	Bucharest, Romania	3rd International Conference - Solar Energy in Romania
Nov 10	New York, NY, USA	An Introduction to Solar PV Business Planning
Nov 14-15	Freiburg, Germany	Solar Summit 2011
Nov 14-18	London, UK	The Green Power Academy Mini-MBA
Nov 16-17	San Francisco, CA, USA	U.S. Solar Market Insight Conference
Nov 29-30	Amman, Jordan	Arab Renewable Energy Congress and Exhibition
Dec 1-2	Milwaukee, WI, USA	Solar Thermal '11
Dec 3-5	Shenzhen, China	Asia Solar Expo 2011
Dec 5-6	Toronto, Ontario, Canada	Solar Canada 2011 Conference & Exposition
Dec 6-7	London, UK	Renewable Energy HR
Dec 6-9	Beijing, China	InterSolar China
Dec 13-14	Overland Park, KS, USA	2011 Heartland Green Expo
Dec 13-16	Mumbai, India	InterSolar India
Jan 11-12, 2012	Indianapolis, IN, USA	Indiana Green Expo
Jan 31 - Feb 2, 2012	Las Vegas, NV, USA	Solar Power Generation USA
Feb 14-16, 2012	Long Beach, CA, USA	Solar POWER-GEN Conference & Exhibition
May 15-17, 2012	Denver, CO, USA	World Renewable Energy Forum

Do you know of any solar energy or green-living events happening in your area? Add them to the database using my online Submit Form. It's quick and easy.

In Closing...

Is there a residential solar energy topic you'd like more information about? If so, let me know through my Contact page (make sure to note that you subscribe to Solar Energy Alerts! so I can put your request to the top of the list). I'm always looking for topics of interest to Solar-Energy-At-Home.com readers.