The Seraphim SolarGram - June 2008
5 Years, and Counting!
5 years ago today Seraphim Electric Company opened its doors in Goldendale, WA. At that time we chose to incorporate as Seraphim Energy Inc. and do business as Seraphim Electric Company because we had a dream for becoming the region’s solar and small wind provider. As we start our 6th year it’s hard to believe how far things have come: Who would have thought that gas would be closing in on $5/gal? The federal tax credit for solar would increase from 10% to 30%? WA would have a performance-based incentive program modeled after Germany’s? Or that Oregon would offer a 50% business energy tax credit? All of these programs, coupled with a growing public awareness that “you’re only secure if you make your own”, have helped to fuel our success in renewables over the last few years.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank our customers, friends and vendors for their support and encouragement (sometimes patience) along the way. We are very excited to see what the next five years brings!
Solar Fuel Solution
Many of our residential solar customers have a dream. They are buying solar in order to make their own power and reduce their carbon footprint but this is just the first step – the prelude. Their real goal is to use the power that they generate during the day to charge their electric vehicle (EV) by night. They can’t buy a production EV yet but they can use today’s incentives to pre-buy their EV’s fuel. And they’re excited about it.
There are some who say these dreamers are crazy. They think EV’s are slow, expensive and the batteries won’t get them where they need to go. You don’t have to search very hard to find that quite the opposite is true: Electric faster that Lamborghini (this is a great video clip of what a thoughtful EV performance car can do). Lots of things are driving the EV excitement: Being 60% more efficient at converting energy into motion really helps. Being quiet helps. Charging the batteries by turning the motor into a generator rather than using the brakes really helps. No oil changes or idiot lights really helps. Batteries lasting 100,000 miles on current hybrids is helping. But doing the #’s really makes a difference:
At 30mpg and $4/gal gasoline it costs $13.33 to go 100 miles
Or $2000/yr to go 15,000miles (the national average)
At NW electric rates an EV can do 100 miles for about $1.10
Let’s convert that to solar power: A 2000W grid connected solar array will provide enough kwh’s in a year to drive an EV 15,000 miles. If you’re in WA, after incentives, a 2kw solar array will cost about $13,480. Divide that by $2000 in gasoline savings and you come out with a 6 ¾ year payback. Not too bad! Then comes the dreamer’s end game: 24+ years of free fuel (no OPEC, no $200/barrel worries, no trips to the filling station)!
For a residential customer in Oregon: After incentives a 2kw solar array will cost about $6,000. Divide that by $2000 and you’re driving on free sun rays after 3 year!
If a savvy business in Oregon wants to drive it’s EV fleet 100 miles per day it will need a 4.3kw system. After incentives this $38,700 system will cost them $2,365. Okay, they’d be offsetting $4866 in ever rising gas prices almost from the get go.
I just paid $4.79/gal (way down from $5.02 last week) to put on-road diesel in the Seraphim Mobile. They want $4.99 for bio-diesel in Portland. Whether the crisis is political or geological, religious or ecological I’m not buying another car until it has a plug on it. GENERATE BY DAY. CHARGE BY NIGHT: The solar EV solution.
Going Green, The Old World Way, By Karen Ann Cullotta
Chicago Tribune:
It did not take long, just a day or two after Earth Week ended, for the line of children walking to school to revert to a carbon-spewing queue of SUVs depositing those same kids at the schoolhouse door. The complete article can be viewed here.
