Lane House
1526 Willowwood Street
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Even though we are too old to likely see a profit in our energy costs we believe this was the right thing to do.It should also increase the eventual value of the house when sold because energy bills are much lower. |
Renewable energy features
Solar PV
kW: 7.95 kW DC
Installation date: May 2016
Installer: Alternatex Solutions LLC
Equipment
30 Upsolar UP-M265P PV Modules, w/ 30 Enphase M250 microinverters
Retail Electric Provider
Denton Municipal Electric
Energy Monitoring
Enphase Enlighten
Green features
- Low water use landscape
- Attic Tent
- Solar Attic Fan
- Thermal barrier (radiant, copper)
- 10” spray in fiberglass insulation
Other
Learn about the “Citizen Science” particulate air quality monitor recently installed at this home. This is the first monitor to go online of those distributed at the City of Denton Sustainability workshops led by Constant Marks, a Ph.D. student in UNT’s Mechanical and Energy Engineering department. This small, inexpensive (‹$35) device is designed to assess fine particulate matter in the air and is linked to a website in Stuttgart, Germany (https://luftdaten.info/en/home-en/). The Stuttgart website generates continuously updated particulate matter maps, including this one centered on Denton (http://deutschland.maps.luftdaten.info/#12/33.2338/-97.1460). Particles smaller than 10 micrometers in diameter (PM10) and particles smaller than 2.5 micrometers in diameter (PM2.5) are both recorded. Sources of PM10 include pollen, road dust and construction activities while PM2.5 is associated with all types of combustion including motor vehicles, power plants, forest fires, and some industrial processes. PM2.5 is a more serious health concern than PM10, since smaller particles can travel more deeply into our lungs and even enter the bloodstream. The EPA’s standard for PM2.5 levels is a maximum of 12 micrograms / cubic meter annual mean, averaged over 3 years. The World Health Organization estimated that 7 million premature deaths were linked to all forms of air pollution in 2012.
Host Comments
Even though we are too close to retirement to likely see a profit in our energy costs we believe this was the right thing to do. It should also increase the eventual value of the house when sold because energy bills are much lower. We paid only 20K because of Denton’s rebate program and the federal tax rebates. The total cost was 33K. We paid out of pocket in order to avoid having to take loans and pay interest. This latter was important to us because of the unlikeliness of living here long enough to see a profit. Now that it has been over year, we can see that our electricity bills, especially in summer, are much much lower. We had one year here without the panels and are thrilled with the difference they have made. Sometime this year, we will look into purchasing a battery from Tesla which will cover all our electricity needs for up to 9 hours and part of them for up to 31 hours. We also hope to be able to buy an electric car and charge it at home. The newer electric cars are almost to the point of being able to handle Texas distances.