Conducting Your Own Site Survey

SITE SURVEY:

The amount of electricity generated by a PV system depends on a number of different factors, and the first step is to look at your own home. The reason for this is quite simple:the amount of electricity you produce is determined by how much sun reaches your system. You’ll want to look at a few basic areas to make sure your house is well suited for a PV system and that you maximize the energy your system produces by placing it in the most advantageous location.

1) The first question to ask yourself is whether your property has good access to the sun. On the east cost, the sun is in the southern half of the sky and is higher in summer and lower in winter. This means the best location for a PV system is typically a south-facing roof, but east and west may be fine as well.

2) You’ll also want to look for objects such as trees, vent pipes on your roofs, chimneys, or buildings that could block or obstruct the sun from reaching your system. You’ll want to determine how large the obstruction is and how long it casts a shadow onto your roof or other proposed PV system site. Your PV installer will have special tools to help measure shading.

A GOOD RULE OF THUMB:

If all obstructions to the east and west of your PV array are more than two times the distance from the system as they are high, and obstructions south of the PV system are more than three times the distance from the system as they are high, then your PV system should have no more than 10% loss due to shading.