We had a tech talk at work about people who had done whole house real deal commercially installed solar. After listening to their stories, it solidified that it's still not a viable thing yet if you believe in a positive ROI. The rebates are scams; there are a limited number of them and you have to sit on a web site and mash the "submit" button like a monkey to try to get in at the exact time Duke releases the rebates or you don't get it... it's like concert tickets or something but only 10 seats and 1000 people trying for them. Tax credits aren't all that good, and really the subsidies are just driving the prices up, just like any time the .gov tries to fiddle with the markets.
Duke at el want to sell you whole house... but all it does is feed power to the grid. All the power comes off the grid and if the grid is down your solar is doing nothing. The 'spin the meter backwards' thing isn't quite correct anymore either. You sell power to duke at whatever the rate is, and they sell it back to you at rate + tax. So even if you generate 100% of your own power needs, you're going to pay the tithe to the .gov every month. No electricity bill indeed, but you still gotta pay unless you generate way more than you use, and then your system is HUGE (or you don't run a dryer).
I've done my own system as a trial, and I've learned that:
- separate lighting is the way to go, doing 48v DC to 110v AC conversion and trying to be "normal" is expensive at scale
- don't run 12v systems. I did, and the voltage drop moving the power anywhere is severe, unless you want to spend $$$$ on crazy large gauge wire. If I did it again, 48v all the way. 48v to 12v step down to run 12v stuff (like LEDs, HAM radios, etc) are reasonably cheap.
- actual 'solar' batteries are a thing, I'm using them. they're not 'car batteries', they can't do lots of CCAs but they do tolerate discharge and are cheaper for their capacity because they don't have to be vibration/heat/etc resistant like a car/golf cart battery. I want to think mine are 4 years old at this point.
- fuses, fuses everywhere!
- there are multiple angles for the panels depending on the time of year. you can use fixed mounts and use a 'compromise' angle that's good enough half the time. I did this because I built my own panel mounts. I'll pay $150 for a panel but I'm not paying $150 for some bent angle iron to hold it in place, I'm cheap like that. Movible mounts are a thing, but who wants to get on the roof a few times a year and reset panels? auto-moving panels are also a thing, but how complicated do you want this and how often do you want to pay to replace crappy motors? you know that stuff is chinese junk that won't last, or it's going to cost WAY more than it should (see ROI rearing it's head again).
It doesn't cost that much to setup and expernment. I've got enough panel and juice stored up to run the cable modem, router and wifi for 3-4 days 24/7. when the grid is down we're running off the generator but when i shut it down at night we can still do internet stuff on the laptops because the infrastructure is up. it's kinda cool.
Also, my PSA AR is "just as good" as your BCM.
(ok, maybe that last part isn't true).