Take Part - For good reason: Photovoltaic panels that capture the southern sun generate the most electricity—as much as 20 percent more power than west-facing panels—and the best return on your investment.
So homeowners whose roofs face west may decide it just doesn’t make economic sense to go solar. Only 9 percent of 110,000 residential solar arrays in California look toward the Pacific Ocean, according to a new study by Opower, an Arlington, Virginia, company that analyzes consumer energy use for utilities.
There’s just one problem: South-facing panels produce power at the wrong time of day. Electricity production peaks around noon, when no one is typically at home and demand is low. As the sun moves lower in the sky, the amount of electricity generated by south-facing solar panels plummets after 3 p.m. and flatlines in the late afternoon, when people arrive home and crank up big-screen televisions and other appliances.
Panels facing the setting sun, on the other hand, continue to generate electricity until late in the afternoon, just when demand peaks. That means putting more solar panels on west-facing roofs could eliminate the need for carbon-spewing fossil fuel “peaker” plants that are fired up to meet spikes in electricity demand
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