As you know, I’m into saving energy and recycling. Heather is too.
We explored the possibility of getting solar panels for our home. Denver gets a massive amount of sun — it’s an ideal place for solar power.
There are incredible rebates and tax credits available now — knocking off nearly 2/3 of the costs! But it still would take more than ten years to pay for the investment. We just can’t guarantee that we’ll be in this house for that long.
Sigh.
I think that there are also some questions over the amount of energy that is used to create the solar panels that makes them less environmentally friendly than we may think. However, in the long run they could be beneficial and you may be able to recoup some of the cost of setting them up through the sale of your house if you do move in less than 10 years.
There’s also a system here (UK) where a coil is buried under the earth and water pumped through it. It’s supposed to heat in the winter and cool in the summer at a fairly constant temperature.
I seem to remember hearing the reason Denver doesn’t do much solar has to do with the materials required, due to the ferocity of the hailstorms when we have them... do I get that right? Is that what it is? Or is solar just as hard to make viable in other places?
Out by the airport there’s a huge, new-ish collection of what appear to be solar panels. Know anything about them?
Thanks, Marti & Phil.
Wycliffe’s Center in Dallas (SIL, actually) has a massive & expensive system for doing heating/cooling via the deep-earth method. (Not in our personal budget, though!)
I hadn’t thought about hailstorms — another reason not to spend huge money on that!
I have seen the panel array at the Denver airport — I am encouraged every time I see it.
Hey Paul! You could try an idea that I read about on the internet several years ago-you go on the highway, write down the phone number of the rental service for the warning lights (how you do that in traffic is beyond me), and call the company up. Seems they give away damaged solar panels-but even if half of the thing doesn’t work, the other cells will. If I could figure out a cheap way to haul a bunch to West Africa I sure would...
I’m dying to know if this actually works!