My Solar Retrofit by Nan Fischer

(This is the first installment of a multi-part series.)

When I bought my house in 1999, this remodel was immediately part of my dream. I saw the potential to grow food and heat the house at the same time. It took me eight years to pull it together, but in June 2007, I got serious.

It started with a call to Valverde Energy to see about putting in solar hot water. Larry Mapes, the owner, and I crunched some numbers after talking about my current and future hot water use. Since my teenage daughters would soon be going away to college, we decided to size the system according to my needs after they left. That meant one solar panel with the option to add on for future residents.

Larry and I also talked about a photovoltaic system (solar PV). It would not have been cost effective for me, since my electric bill was about $25 a month. At 2007 prices, I wouldn’t have been able to pay off a PV system during my entire lifetime anyway. If I was insanely passionate about generating my own electricity and sending some back to the grid, I would have installed it. I was more interested in generating hot water, since that bill had gotten high with two teenage daughters.

I decided to upgrade my infrastructure at the same time I installed solar hot water by ditching my propane tank and bringing in natural gas from the new adjacent subdivision. I also replaced my aging water supply line. I am on a shared well, and, for years, we have been talking about replacing the water lines to each house. The money has never been available to do the entire job, so I went ahead and replaced my own. I was going to replace the septic tank to have all new infrastructure, but it was deemed to be in good shape via an inspection, and I did not need a new one.

I needed a contractor to do some work in conjunction with Valverde. Lots of things needed to be shuffled around as the new plumbing went in – walls, sinks, water heaters, and so on. I asked a contractor friend if he wanted to do that. I got a few bids for the bigger construction job of building a solar greenhouse and reworking a few rooms and traffic flow inside. We started work in mid-July, and the results will be documented over the next several weeks.

This corner faces due southwest where a solar greenhouse was to be added. It is not an optimal orientation, but it was ‘adequate’ according to solar building guidelines.

This area was a concrete slab that we had to remove to run the new water line from the well. The concrete is piled up on the right side, and the new water line connection is sticking up in the corner by the door. The demolished slab is piled up on the right.