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Great to see this update on how it’s working out! 👍

After living with roof mounted solar panels (grid tied) for 4 years I can say with confidence that if you live where it snows, and you plan to go off grid, you need to mount the panels on a steep angle. Don't worry about it being too steep for the summertime, there's tons of sun in the summer. It's the panel's ability to shed snow, lower sun angle and shorter days in the winter that you need to plan for.

A seedling heating mat may be worth looking into for your 3 battery system. It seems you could run it off them and heat them all slightly when needed. Such mats only raise the temp up to 20 degrees so could be easily managed with a timer or sensor.

This man is living the dream of every 45+ year old man

I had 4 solar salesman come by this year promoting the net metering program. The installation cost always makes them seem not very cost effective. I might need to look into this DIY option.

Hey Zack. Awesome work.👍 The drop in power in year 2 can be attributable to PV degradation, which is abt 0.7% per year. Thats also how you get to the 80% power warranty at 25 yr. And ofcourse clean the panels, soiling loss is one of the biggest controllable losses. Please do not keep heavy items (like batteries) on the panels, there can be microcracks on the cells 😟

2 Years!? It feels just like yesterday we were watching you install it

Jerry you are an excellent trainer and I can really appreciate your thoroughness at explaining the items regarding solar that are on our minds. I’ve done lots of training in my career and you have a very effective, clear style. Way to go man! Now I have to decide if I take this on. Hmmm.

I'm loving the projects that you do and the EV content. I subbed for the phone destruction, but the channel content just keeps getting better and better!

I love this kinda stuff & Zach is so entertaining to watch! I know he built this channel by testing phones, but personally I enjoy the vlog style more! 🙌

I've been watching this channel for years and I'm only NOW realising Zack doesn't use graphs or charts or any fancy animations AND still keeps the videos interesting and entertaining. 🤯

Hey Zach I’ve been keeping up with you since high school and am planning an off grid self sufficient cabin build in the next 5 years. As you keep producing diy content it will drive down costs and make clean energy more realistic for the masses. I have friends who sell solar and they’re getting paid way more than what it’s worth to have and install units. Thanks for documenting your experiments it inspires a lot of people.

I love how Zack explains things on a great level. Not over the top, but just right!

I just got solar installed, I'm so amped! (Pun intended lol) So far we're 100% grid independent, with a 6KWp system and 7.2KWh of battery storage. We also had pretty heavy rain for a couple days and we still managed to not use the grid! About ¼ of our roof is covered so we very well could expand if we get an electric car (hopefully soon) or something. So far though we're completely fine with the setup we have, 6KWp is way more than enough for an European home. We use 250-400W constantly with some short peaks at 1.5-3.5KW, so we're good. The 7.2KWh battery does last the whole night Here in Italy we had a 110% tax credit (yep, 110%!) last year, we just missed it so we had to "settle" for a 50% credit, a friend used the 110% thing and made money before even having it installed lol Here in Italy electricity prices are absurd right now, at 0.35€/KWh, fluctuating a bit every month. In a week we already saved about 30€ in energy we would have consumed and didn't, and are selling excess energy pretty much during the whole day! Yes, here in Italy we don't have a "grid credit" but excess energy gets sold to the grid, for about 0.14€/KWh on average during the year. You get a check from the energy company once a year for it. The profit might be quite a bit higher this year, looking at energy prices. We'll see, as we've only had the system for about a week lol. So far, it's good!

Nice stuff as always Zack. We're 5yrs in on 3.4kwh system. Solaredge AP sez lowered co2 by 25,000 lbs. Added used model 3 used leaf in 2019. Also lowered co2 by around 20,000 lbs. Financial savings is icing on the cake for this grandpa and recently great grandpa

My system produces about 17.6 MWh/year. Got it in 2018 for about $30k net after rebates through Tesla solar. About half the costs came from installation and permitting. Pretty amazing you were able to get 12 MWh/year for $8k. It’s going to take me 10 years to break even in late 2028. Being able to break even in just 6 years is a really great deal.

Great vid Zach! Only had one question as those YC600s only put out 600w so should be coupled to every 2 ~300w photovoltaic panel. I'm sure you've probably done this but if not it may be worth looking into as you could double your power output! :)

As someone with a big solar installation, another thing I really like is that they are very good at keeping the heat out of your house. It's litteraly an extra roof over your roof. My roof was very will insulated to begin with, but adding a layer of solar over it has made a noticeable difference Other than that, very nice and clear video. The 90% credit back is steep and does completely invalidate setting up your own battery (unless you could/need one for emergency back up).

I installed my solar wholesale setup just over a year ago with help from your videos. Same experience as you, working really well maintenance free. Thanks for posting the update!

Glad to see you went with a micro-inverter setup. I've been installing solar on houses in Aruba for about a year now (my own house included) using mostly the AP-Systems micro-inverters and they turn out to be more efficient than a string-inverter setup, plus the benefits of being able to monitor each panel individually. Also, if by any bad luck a panel breaks down, this doesn't influence the performance of all the other panels, so production loss is minimal. Both string- and micro inverter setups have their benefits and drawbacks, but still I prefer the micro-inverter systems. What's also interesting is the development of hybrid micro-inverters, allowing you to tie into the grid, but also have a battery backup system. No need to split your solarpanel-array between on- and off grid. We're about to install one of those systems in the near future and I'm excited to get my hands on it. As always a great video. Thank you and keep up the good work!

Those electricity prices are crazy. In the UK I'm currently paying 31.247p/kWh daytime and 20.3742p/kWh night (about 38 cents/25 cents). Using a small solar panel setup with a separate battery inverter and pretty big battery setup (16kWh lead acid, picked the batteries up for free) which does a good job of shifting most of my usage onto solar or night rate.

Great content Zack, you absolutely proved the efficiency of solar panels. I hope you will add some wind turbines to the same system or on a next project and later on compare the outcomes with the existing solar panels. Wind energy is also a great source of free energy!

I worked at an ISP that provides internet to rural areas, and the only solution to power the repeater antennas is solar energy. So it's great to see technology evolving over time.

There's a lot of variables that determine if it's worth it. Cost of panels, cost of install, property sun exposure, weather conditions, how far north you live, etc. If you don't have a place with good sun exposure throughout the day, you may only run at 25% or less. Same goes for geographical location, if you live way up north and in a coastal location, you may have cloudy summers and dark winters.

As someone who lived through that Texas Freeze, that wasn't the half of it. We were freezing to death in our homes. We couldn't drive anywhere because there is no deicing of roadways. I didn't have drinkable water for almost 2 weeks, we were just lucky to have some bottled water. At least our food didn't go bad because it was refrigerator temp inside the house Yeah that really blew. Get some solar power and batteries.

Kinda wondering if you've looked ahead and considered what additional cost there may be (if any) in removing/replacing the panels when you need to replace your roof?

You already have about 100kw of batteries that you can use for house backup when needed! Yes, I'm talking about the electrified Hummer... I'm sure you can figure out a V2G (vehicle to grid) upgrade for it... 😋 It would definitely be an interesting project to see!

Pretty great to see it all run well, though for many households pretty sad how they waited until gas skyrocketed, was pretty obvious that solar panels were at the most effective price like the last 3 years and oil was under big pressure and we all know what happened

I love how you were able to do this job yourself and still take advantage of a significant tax credit. In Belgium they always tend to couple subsidies and tax credits to having things done by registered installers. Which is a shame because a) there are simply not enough tradesmen around causing long waiting times (right now its almost impossible to still get panels in time for the 2022 grant) and high prices b) tradesmen tend to stick with specific brands, limiting your choice of pv/inverter/battery systems c) there is always a minimal cost/startup cost when you let someone install something for you, it is financially less attractive to start small and gradually expand a system. I hope there will be more support for DIY'ers here in the future, because with our ageing population and too limited number of people who went into technical/construction related professions I feel like DIY is very necessary. In any case, thanks for the very clear and interesting report on your solar installation/returns. :)

The installation costs are indeed a nightmare. But the hardware also costs a whole lot to be honest. Unfortunately grid-tie systems often go offline when the grid is down, unless there is a master inverter that separates the microinverter array from the grid and provides a baseline for the separated system untill the grid kicks back in. I have found a pretty good niche myself - broken hardware. Received a damaged 6KVA UPS for effectively scrap value and I'm making a 12V buffer system for it, powered with random solar panels i find for little to nothing. For now the main battery is a string of 15 lead acids in series, but in the future ill go for lithium ions. The 12V buffer is a 200Ah Liion battery from a wrecked vehicle, turned out only one cell out of 6 was shorted. Using broken hardware is really the highest cost/efficiency ratio you can get, of course at the price of knowing what you are doing, but many things could be handled by literally anyone! :)

We went with solar last year. Insane on the savings from having to pay the full amounts. The last 6 months have cost me $14 a month just to keep on my electric companies grid. So, the last six months have cost me zero for actual electricity, minus the cost of the panels and grid dependence.

Have you considered a thermal heat accumulator for the barn? You could go super simple, like tanks of water heated by vacuum-insulated solar-thermal arrays, or something really amazing like a giant insulated tank of rocks and sand, heated by excess solar power, and able to store heat over a season.

I have always enjoyed watching your videos! I've been watching them for a long time now and I really like how you push innovation and forward thinking.

I'm keeping my eye on the Wallbox Quasar 2 coming out at the end of the year which will provide V2H capabilities and I'm crossing my fingers the Rivian will be compatible! I think I heard that Wallbox makes the Rivan home charger so I hope that means V2H will be coming s00n as well!

This is really cool, I guess I am just intimidated to try something like this since you're like the ultimate DIY guy and I don't think I'd have 1/3 of the needed knowledge to correctly install something like this.

Phenom is the word Jerry! I just found you by accident today and watched your reviews of your Rivian and F-150 Lightning and now your home solar systems. Excellent! Thank you! I'm a full subscriber for sure!

I don't understand how it's already been 2 years since you installed these. Now that I've got my own house, this is definitely something I want to look into and save and invest for. So thank you for these super informative and helpful videos!

I have a feeling that this guys is going to be Owning a lot of blocks of solar panels on earth, he’s going to build electric cars like it’s easier than breathing, thank you Zack!!

Thanks for the info. Our solar and battery has been running the house completely since turning it on, and 2 x EVs. We never have a power bill ! And no fuel costs either. It’s awesome, I just wish I had done it sooner tbh. If anyone is thinking about getting solar installed, do it yesterday 👍

well done, you covered all the solar and storage topics so clearly. Yes the F150 makes a great storage solution, tough to drive a Tesla power wall (seems Tesla needs to add vehicle to home soon to stay up with times)

you should add heated floors to your house with solar that will be a nice combo in the winter, and much better than a heater or hot air heating source

Hoping to try getting ahold of some used panels or ones that have been in a warehouse forever and putting a 9kw array on the roof. Panels aren’t too bad price wise it’s just getting proper equipment that can properly convert DC to AC

We all just appreciate the content this man and his crew makes its just a masterpiece imagine what's he's gonna doing the future 💛

Would love to see an update video adding more panels to your off grid system!

I got one question. would you rather turn your windows into transparent solar panels, add to roof, or make a solar fence?

Ive looked at doing ATS and hybrid 240v inverter/chargrer and battery bank. That way it works as both ups for backup , and to offset electric use. And less electronics on the panels makes it easier to centralize the equipment for maintenance, modifications and upgrades. And until I get batteries could still function similar to how you do.

You should make a small underground battery compartment that would probably maintain a temperature above 32 degrees. You could probably find the underground temperature info from a heating and air conditioning tech. Insulation would help, and have temperatures controlled by a thermostat and an electric heater that would only come on, as needed.

Imma have to look into the Anker battery. I use their cables exclusively and continue to be impressed. If you have any pull with them tell em we need 240v battery backups, the market is seriously lacking in that regard.

Hey! Thanks, some questions... How much of your vehicles' electricity are you providing from your own panels? How is that savings accounted? Thoughts on using the vehicles as part of the system? And what of the arbritige? My thought is that an app oversees the charge/discharge rate and time for any connected battery, powerwall, local neighborhood megapack-ministation, or vehicles. The overall strategy would be to charge mostly at low cost times, late at night, while discharging into the grid during the day, during peak. Personal calendar, weather apps all tied in. How about a solar water-heater for that off-grid section? Run some water down to it. Sunny winter days would generate enough to warm up the battery compartment. A super out there follow up would be to run heated water into those raised beds. Warming up the soil earlier, extending the warm season, and at times even cooling off the soil's temp can all be done to great advantage. Could dial in a crop of corn to mature earlier than others locally, can also extend vine ripe picking of tomatoes until first hard frost. The hummer could be tied into the system, no? Charge up at night/discharge during the day? Set reasonable limits in an app.

Have you considered having a frost heater for the batteries linked to a thermostat in the battery enclosure so when the temperature dips the frost heater kicks in just to keep the batteries safely in their operating window

Great video. I have had Solar hot water and Solar panels on my home since 2007. One thing everyone should be careful of. Do not lease a solar system from any company. If you can not purchase it yourself don’t do it. Thanks again for all the videos you put out.

Awesome job explaining solar for people out there my man! FYI maybe try looking at supercapacitors for your batteries (especially the barn, they operate -30C degrees under 0.

Video is fantastic, @Jerry you explained it so clean on your savings. Great inspiration for environment lovers.

Has it really been 2 years already? Wow time fly’s by when you are jerry rigging everything.

FYI, Lithium Titanate batteries have a chemistry that allows you to charge below freezing - also, they cycle tens of thousands of times. They are, however, a bit more expensive.

I’m really glad that people can make their energy themselves. I want to get some panels and have a battery system.

Thanks Zack. Now we can DIY our own panel array :)

Not only are your videos informative, and presented very clearly and concisely, you have an incredibly easy to listen to voice. Amazing presenter.

Love you being fan of green energy, this inspires lotta people. Great job!

Nice setup. I wish I had the know-how and skill to install everything myself. But we just bought our system from Tesla with Powerwalls. The goal was more to always have power than save cost, since we have been working from home for many years. And when you develop software, if you don't have power, you can't generate revenue. So far everything has worked out well. We no longer have an electric bill and when the rest of the block's power is out, we can still work, surf the web, cook, run the heater, or watch TV.

My PhD research is in solar panels and maintaining efficiency throughout its entire service life. Soiling is a major issue in solar panels, and will accumulate over the years. Always make sure to clean the panels annually, or biannually, and think about applying an optically clear hydrophobic coating!

you could install a heat fan or a pump which will heat the batteries zone after it turns on when the temp drops down a certain temperature during the colder months . keep up the grt work

I agree that Ford (being the first with a production model) is doing the right thing by having the vehicle battery be able to power your home n the event of a power outage. The 100Kwh battery can run an entire home for probably days (most avg homes anyway) if it's fully charged to begin with. I put in a solar system with small battery backup linked to an NG generator for power outages. Will definitely be looking at vehicle to home systems in the future as they mature since I will be using my solar system to charge my future EV as well. :-)

Thank you for your information I am looking to install solar this fall myself after someone else replaces my roof this July. I have rewatched your video on the installation a few times to get familiar with it and it looks like a doable project again thank you

Great vid mate, thanks for the update 👍 Question: How common are rooftop systems where you are? I'm in Australia and they're super common here, 1 in 3 roofs where I am

Thanks for making it clear to your viewers. Solar panel systems pay for themselves and then pay you in cash and benefit the environment.

Roof leaks & shingle replacement could be a problem. Great idea using your electric vehicle batteries for emergency backup.

Hey! I’ve BEEN WAITING for this update and it is really persuasive and extremely tempting/motivating. I would like to clarify the 8,000 dollars. Is that per panel or for the entire set up?

You can use water header pads to heat the batteries, so basically temperature less than 32, solar power goes to heating, above goes to charging.

i love watching these kind of projects zack!

Hey Zack! Noticed your barn gets too cold and water freezes up in pipes, might have a solution for that. Maybe we can brainstorm together, but crypto miners might be a solution for heating your barn, water, pool, house... Make some crypto as well and maybe we can make them run on solar and battery systems you are building out. Let me know if this sounds interesting. Love your videos and all the work you do! It would be amazing to work on a project with you one day.

I wonder if ceramic coating the panels would help with efficiency in regards to dirt.

Zack something that I've been wondering about with roof solar systems is - what if you need to do roof work; like shingling or other maintenance? Does that add any extra cost when the time for those things come around?

Good morning. I have recently installed a Sungrow battery backup system and seems to be working exceptionally well might be worth a look for you , keep up the good work chat soon David

Solar is great when cost effective, doing it yourself definitely saves a lot. Here in Canada we sadly don't have anywhere near the government credits, Solar system for me would be $25k! Those ecoflow deltas aren't cheap either over $2k each.

My grandmother's house has Telsa Solar. According to the app 2021 they produced 16.4MWh, lifetime is currently sitting at 22MWh

Battery manufactures should make "backup" batteries be "full charge" at 50% that way its technically a storage charge and last A LOT longer. They could also have a feature to "super" charge it past 50% for when you know a storm is coming or other power outage. This way you can use full potential without the possibility of damaging the battery. I also think they should implement this into electric hand tools. I'd love for my drill batteries to charge to full, but after say 4 hours it auto discharges to 50% in order to keep me from leaving my batteries fully charged. This also saves on waste.

Would love to see a DIY Powerwall!! like the Hummer Conversion. You could also use the same Tesla battery modules as a powerwall!!

I'm in the middle of getting a 9kWh system installed on my 'new' house. I gotta say, the worst part is still just dealing with all the local regulations, permits, and installers. I started the process in February and it is now May and the permit still hasn't been approved. It's no wonder I hardly see any solar setups in my area of north west Indiana.

9:15 There should be a version with heaters that use the incoming energy to heat, and then charge the batteries

As a renewable energy engineer, I support you and I think you should try more that, as biogas too

Be interesting to see what happens next year when you clean them after every season. Could prove interesting 🤔

So the only thing I'm going to add to Zack is that if you're going to go with a local solar installer do your research some of those installers will go through and actually put a lien on your house. Make sure you read the fine print because if you ever want to sell your house you will either have to pay off the lien or the solar company will come and take the solar and they won't take it very nicely or you will have to pass the lien on to the new owners which a lot of loans will not cover solar leins. Just make sure you do plenty of research!

Right off the bat, that Anker backup is pretty neat and pretty impressive. Thanks for that.

you explain it so good, that even a non tech person can understand it, but when i saw the panels of you, i do recomment cleaning them(more light can touch the panels) EDIT: this whas written before seing the full video

Insulate your batteries. Much cheaper, greener, etc. Because they have a built in inverter, that’ll provide the heat source you need and foam insulation panels or spray foam in a double walled plywood box would be enough. Just be sure to open the box in the summer months when it’s warmer.

I envy your performance and that awesome grid return. In Germany we pay 40 cents per Kwh and receive 7 cent for production.

01:43 Looking forward for a studio tour. That super wide curved display is nuts!

How much of your total usage does the solar cover?

With the batteries in the barn not being able to charge in freezing temps, but being able to discharge, would it be possible to put a low power heater in that chamber? So it keeps them just above freezing, so they can recharge over a longer period? There might be too little power for it to be viable (if it ends up using more to heat it then they'd be recharging) but it might be something to look at.

Insulating the cabinet to retain the heat generated by the inverters might be sufficient but how about building a passive solar collector to keep the barn batteries warm? It could be something as simple as an insulated glass faced box like a gardener's coldframe ducted to and from your battery cabinet, perhaps with a little solar fan to aid circulation.

I watched these videos when they first came out. Shortly after I bought a diy kit for my parents house. 2 years after install they have not paid for electricity. Which was averaging $400 a month. Thank you!

Really informative videos you have here regarding the solar panels. Do you have an indication of how much of the 12 639 Kwh was fed to the grid and therefore only 90% of it came back to you?

Hi Jerry. Just curious if you could give some additional information on the app you use to track your power generation. Is that something that comes with the kit//micro inverters or is this something you installed in addition?

a couple questions. what are the dimensions of each panel and what is the entire dimensions of the system you have?

I wish I had the skills and health to install, as well as being an age where I would benefit from the 25+ years of energy :). One of the things that surprised me when moving from the UK to Arizona 20+ years ago was that every roof didnt have panels on them in the valley of the sun.

Zack, Would you gain some efficiency if you bypass the DC to AC inverter of your solar panels while charging your 3 EVs? like the fast charging station!

Thing about energy storage is, your own home is already a massive energy storage device. We're just talking thermal, not electric. When talking about being worried about pipes freezing, etc, even if all you have is power in the day, if you use all of that which you can to heat the home, (even beyond the point of comfort) in the day, you won't have to worry about anything freezing indoors at night.

2 years since I watched your video on solar panel installation?? Damn!! Time really flies..