As we contemplate the things we are thankful for this year, many things come to mind. Here at North Church, we remember many, many blessings, including those solar panels up on our roof. Here’s the latest news.

Our first full calendar year of solar power at North Church was 2013. We used 46.974 Kilowatt hours of which our solar panels generated 26.734 Kilowatt hours, 57 per cent of the electricity that we used. You may recall that our system was sized to meet only part of our power needs—another way of looking at it is that we planned to produce all we need in the long sunny days of summer and rely more on the grid in the long nights of winter.

National Grid bills the church for demand electricity beyond that generated by our solar panels. In 2013 we paid $2961.90. (This includes a $30.00 basic service charge every month.) This figures to a cost of 12.855 cents/kwh for the electricity we purchased. Based on this cost, we could say that producing the solar electricity earned NPC $3,436.65 minus the system lease charge of $100.00 per month, for a saving of $2436.65, that is, about $200.00 a month.

Aren’t you grateful we’re a solar church?!

We wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving!