10 Best Solar Companies in Lancaster, NY (Aug 2022 Review)

The Cost and Benefits of Solar in Lancaster

Solar panels are powered by a free energy source — the sun — but before you can take advantage of this you first need to pay to set up your system. A few key factors that dictate how much it will cost to install a solar panel system on your home and how much money you could save over time are:

• Incentives: Along with the federal Solar Investment Tax Credit (ITC), which lets you receive a tax credit curretnly worth 26% of your total installation cost, your local government may offer additional tax exemptions, credits or rebates that can help you save even more. Not including incentives, you can save an average of $13,000 over the first 20 years with your solar panels, too.
• The kind of solar panel system you can afford: This depends on what your budget is.
• How much power your household needs: If your household needs to use a lot of energy, you'll see more savings from going solar.
• Your home's orientation toward the sun: This, and your roof configuration, affects affect how much energy your solar panels can generate.

Although a solar panel system costs a sizable chunk of money upfront, it can save you a considerable amount over the lifespan of your panels. The question of how much, though, depends on several factors, such as the amount of daily direct sunlight available and your local electricity rates.

Solar Incentives in Lancaster

Because solar power is better for the environment than fossil fuels, there are various government incentives in place to encourage its adoption. When you install solar panels on your house, you can take advatage of the federal tax credit, or ITC. This credit currently lets you lower your tax bill by 26% of the cost of your solar panels. Plus, there are often some local incentives that you can benefit from to further save. In the table below, you can read about the incentives you qualify for in your area.

Environmental Impact of Switching to Solar in Lancaster

If you're planning on adding solar panels to your home, one of the major reasons why may be to reduce your carbon footprint. A question many people might have in mind is how much can they really help protect the environment by switching to solar power anyway? If your family uses lots of energy, you can impact the environment even more by switching to solar energy. Though solar panel production releases carbon dioxide emissions, the panels make up for it by greatly decreasing the amount of CO2 you would have been responsible for if you still used nonrenewable energy. In Lancaster, you can reduce your carbon footprint by 20 pounds a year with solar panels. As you can see, using solar power has so many other perks beyond saving money. One of the major ones is that you can help save the environment too.