Eeek! My ISP closed its doors without warning last week, which means I am no longer getting mail at my old address. But keep those cards and letters coming at my new address:

brucewmays@gmail.com

Thanks.

There's an interesting story in today's Boston Globe about do-it-yourself installation of solar panels:

www.boston.com/business/articles/2009/12/10/selling_solar_panels_for_the_handy

A Home Solar Panels Success Story

Margaret C. was able to generate her own power in mid-central Vermont. This is her story:

About three years ago I noticed that the roof of one of my barns had an unencumbered southern exposure. After exploring some possibilities, I talked to GroSolar, a Vermont-based company that installs solar panels and had them come out to study my potential for producing solar power on a net-metering basis. As it turned out, my barn was a perfect location and had the potential to hold forty panels! That, of course, was way more than I could afford. I ended up contracting for 16, taking advantage of a State of Vermont subsidy and a federal tax credit to help with the cost. The panels were installed in May of 2007. The installation went smoothly and I have had no problems with the system since it was installed.

Since then I have only had to buy about 100 kwh of power (the first winter when I didn't have enough credits to get me through). Usually I generate quite a bit more power than I actually use. For example, I have enough accumulated credits to get me through this winter without generating another kwh until at least mid-March. You cannot imagine how much fun it is to watch your electric meter running backwards! My excess power goes to CVPS. At this point they don't pay me for it; but that is not really an issue for me as I feel I am harnessing the sun to help reduce reliance (even by only a tiny bit) on fossil fuels.

solar panel rebates

The Boston Globe ran an interesting article Dec. 1 on the Massachusetts program to help defray the cost of solar panels. You can read it at www.boston.com/lifestyle/green/articles/2009/12/01/68m_in_solar_rebates_goes_fast/

I'm starting this blog to create a community of people who are concerned about energy. I'm trying to generate a dialogue between people who have actually generated some form of alternate energy or have taken steps to conserve energy and people who want to do the same. Let me tell you a story:

Four years ago my wife and I bought a 150-year-old farmhouse with a few acres in east-central Vermont. Like a lot of old farms in east-central Vermont this one had a stream running through it, and since we moved there in April this one was running like Secretariat at Churchill Downs. And when we first walked down to look at the stream we found what seemed to be the crumbled-down remains of a stone foundation, maybe of an old mill that had used the stream for power. It made sense: you were living in east-central Vermont in the 1850s, you'd use whatever natural resources you had to generate power for a grist mill, or a sawmill, or to pump irrigation water. Why couldn't we, I wondered, harness this same hydraulic power for our own use--convert it to electricity, and light a few light bulbs for free?

I asked a friend who knew his way around the internet to research hydraulic power for me, and within a few days he came back with an inch-thick stack of printouts on things like flow rates, and kilowatt hours, and turbine speed written with so much terminology and jargon that they might as well have been written in Sanskrit. And what I realized was that I didn't want to pore through a pile of PhD-level technical specs. I wanted to talk to people who had actually done what I wanted to do. I wanted to know what worked, and what didn't; what they did, and what they would've done differently; what it cost, what the payback was, and whether they'd do it again.

I wanted people to tell me stories, because listening to stories and asking questions is the only way I've ever learned how to do anything.

So this is the way this blog is going to work: anyone who has ever generated their own power--wind, water, solar, geothermal, whatever--write in, and tell me your story. Anyone who has insulated or reinsulated a home or business write in, and tell me your story. I'll then post these stories on this site to give people who want to undertake similar projects a resource of experience to draw on. If it works, we'll have created a community of people who are looking for a way to get off the grid, and feel that they've moved maybe one step closer to energy independence.

Send your stories to me at brucewmays@gmail.com. Share your experiences, ask your questions, and start up a dialogue about energy in the future.