Although Jim Malin’s home is situated within a dense forest above south Lake Samish, it’s difficult to miss. His property is an enthusiastic homage to renewable energy resources. Four solar panels, immediately visible to visitors, provide Malin with 450 watts per hour, enough to run his fluorescent lights and small appliances.
"In one to two years I expect to be living entirely off the grid," Malin said. Nodding his head and grinning, he added, "Man, it sure is gonna be a nice feeling to unplug Puget power forever."
Energy conservation is a topic close to the hearts and wallets of anyone who receives a monthly bill from an energy company. Individuals who want to conserve energy and money are opting for more environmentally friendly power sources such as solar or wind. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, 30,000 to 50,000 American homes use the sun as a power provider.
To power the rest of his house, Malin turns to other means. Behind his home, three radiating blades of a metal wind generator gleam in the sun, looming nearly 100 feet in the air. The wind generator provides his home with up to 1,000 watts of energy per hour, turning on when the wind reaches 12 mph, Malin said. During fall and winter, when his solar panels are functioning at roughly 20 percent capacity because of cloudy weather, the wind generator can provide Malin’s home with 50 percent of its electrical needs.
Malin is 95 percent free from the public power grid during the summer and 80 percent during the rest of the year. Before his system was installed, Malin was paying Puget Sound Energy $35 a month for electricity. After installation of his solar panels, Malin said he hasn’t received a power bill exceeding $7 since winter, when it climbed to $12. Malin has remained connected to the utility grid to power his stove-top range, his electric hot-water heater in the winter and his deep-well pump.
Backwoods Solar Electric specializes in serving homes so remote that access to utility lines is not practical. Tracey Gentleman, Backwoods’ data-entry, accounting and shipping specialist, said it is not feasible to operate major heating appliances with solar energy because they require 20 to 100 times more energy than smaller appliances such as televisions. Homeowners can use other fuels to power large appliances at lower costs. For example, Malin uses wood to heat his home instead of an electric heater.
"It is not an economically feasible idea for a home to try to combat high energy bills by adding solar panels," Gentleman said. "More energy is not the answer. Conserve what you have first. This is especially important considering an efficient solar power system can cost, at a minimum, $6,000."
Because solar power is initially more expensive than energy from a power company and can replace only a limited amount of power in a home that is connected to the grid, Malin said conservation is as important as replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy sources.
"If someone is living in the city and looking for a cheaper utility bill, I recommend adding a couple of 50- to 200-watt solar panels and then consciously work to cut energy usage by one-third. Doing so will reduce the stress on an old and failing power-grid system," Malin said.
The Grid-Intertie System is another choice for homeowners in the city looking to put distance between their home and the utility power grid while not being wholly independent of it. This setup allows homeowners to switch back and forth between a photo- voltaic system and the grid. Homeowners can use grid energy with a modest solar power system, effectively keeping the home powered on consecutive cloudy days.
Rick Todahl, an ironworker who lives near Alger, is in the process of upgrading his solar-energy system to include the Grid-Intertie System. His motivation is a $20,000, 12-panel photovoltaic system that generates 1,200 watts per hour — more energy than his 5,000-square-foot home actually uses. With the Grid-Intertie System, Todahl can buy the power he needs from the utility grid and sell back whatever excess electricity his system produces. PSE will buy only the equivalent of the electricity that his home uses throughout the year. This essentially cancels out the electricity he buys and zeros out his meter. Todahl projected that he will break even on his system in eight years with the Grid-Intertie, four years earlier than he would have without the upgrade.
Todahl, a man who seems most comfortable cruising around his property on his four-wheeler, lived in an off-the-grid cabin for six years before moving into his home near Cain Lake. During his first year in the cabin, he lived without electricity and water. Then he bought his first inverter and panels to run his lights and television. He continued to upgrade his modest system until moving to Cain Lake. Connecting his Cain Lake home to the power grid would have cost $45,000 because of its remote location, he said.
"After I got familiar with PSE, I quickly realized I wanted to distance myself from them," Todahl said.
Instead of paying to extend the power lines to his home, Todahl invested in a solar-energy system.
"I’m not a conservative energy user," Todahl said. "I don’t own a single fluorescent light... I’ve just gotten comfortable with having my own system and used to the independence I have from fluctuating power rates."
Though Todahl is enthusiastic about his alternative energy source, this setup is hardly common.
"Only 51 of 1 million PSE customers are using the Grid-Intertie System," PSE energy adviser Joel Smith said.
According to the PSE Web site, the energy company is offering a financial incentive to prospective solar-energy customers. In Whatcom County, PSE is offering a $575 rebate for each kilowatt of capacity installed in a system.
"More education is essential for the promotion of solar energy; that is what will breed wider acceptance," said Celt Schira, an electrical engineer and the owner of Schira Consulting.
Speaking rapidly and making emphatic gestures, Schira attempted to expel paragraphs of information in one breath while discussing solar energy.
"The technological engineering is entirely adequate. Now social engineering and change are necessary for advancement," Schira said. "Once renewable energy sources are demystified, they will be utilized far more often."
Three years ago, Schira Consulting installed two solar panels on the Community Food Co-op roof in Bellingham. The co-op’s system can produce one to two hours of light should a power outage occur.
"Just enough time for orderly closing procedures," general manager Jim Ashby said. "We want to be a part of the larger environmental mission. We’re here to set an example and make solar power more visible in the community."
The solar power inverter is located near the main entrance. The co-op has a larger display case planned for the inverter to call more attention to it, Ashby said.
Doug and Christine Park also use solar energy to power their home. This was not by choice, however, but out of necessity. The Parks live in an off-the-grid home off Chuckanut Drive. Their house is tucked deep in the woods, long after asphalt turns to gravel. When the Parks moved into their 1,800-square-foot home six years ago, they discovered it would cost $40,000 to $80,000 to extend the power lines out to their property, which was outside the public grid’s coverage. Instead they opted for solar panels. Six panels on their roof produce 400 watts per hour to power their home. According to the World Resources Institute Web site, the average residential energy customer in 2001 used more than twice that amount.
Everything in their home is wireless. They use laptops instead of desktop computers, cell phones instead of a land line and have no desire to get cable television, they said. All their light bulbs are fluorescent, using only about 11 watts each, or one-fifth of the energy a traditional 60-watt incandescent bulb uses. Numerous large windows maximize the amount of light entering the home. Their refrigerator and clothes dryer run on propane, and they never use the heat drying cycle on their dishwasher, they said.
"There are times when you feel like a pioneer," Doug Park said. "You can’t call the power company if a tree falls and disturbs your power flow. Instead, you get out there with a chainsaw."
They also have eliminated a large portion of phantom loads, which gobble up a considerable amount of energy, they said.
Digital clocks, answering machines, television sets, VCRs, stereos and any devices that have an instant-on capability have phantom loads because they sit in a home and continuously consume small amounts of electricity. To reduce phantom loads, people can plug the appliances into a power strip with an on/off switch, Shira said.
"We may be cutting-edge now," Doug Park said. "But I bet 20 years from now this will all be unremarkable."