Case Study: Discover how these NC homeowners found the sweet spot between comfort and environmental responsibility

Homeowners integrate renewable energy into Hendersonville dream home

When building their custom home in Hendersonville, NC, Mike and Ellen Herrick integrated renewable energy to find the sweet spot between comfort and environmental responsibility.

The Opportunity:

Mike Herrick loves Western North Carolina for the area’s temperate year-round climate — and his wife Ellen wanted to live closer to their grandkids, who all live on the east coast. But they had one main goal in common when building their house: to find the sweet spot between creating a comfortable home and being mindful and respectful of the resources they consumed to provide that lifestyle.

So when the couple began designing their dream home, they saw an opportunity to invest in renewable energy as a way to infuse their environmental values into their everyday lives. The Herricks both work from home for a software development company, another reason they prioritized energy reliability and efficiency.

The Work:

Type: Net metered solar PV with battery backup

Solar Panels: 28 Mission solar panels

Inverter: Solar Edge

Battery backup: Two Tesla Powerwalls

Installed: February 2019

Installers: Sugar Hollow Solar

Sugar Hollow Solar installed a 8.4 kWh rooftop solar photovoltaic system with two Tesla Powerwalls integrated for battery backup. The Herrick’s solar panel system works through net metering — a billing system that allows solar owners to receive credits on their monthly utility bills that are equal to the power they produce.

Sunshine powers their solar system, which earns the Herricks credits to use at night, or when the sun isn’t shining. Additionally, their two Tesla Powerwalls provide backup electricity for when the grid goes down — as well as decrease the Herricks’ dependence on the utility grid by storing a power supply to pull from when sunshine isn’t directly available.

The Result:

“Solar gives us the peace of mind that we're doing our part”, says Mike Herrick. Installing a solar panel system in their new home helped the Herricks build a life in line with their values.

Powering their home on solar has also translated into lower energy bills. Since the home is new, there were no pre-solar bills to compare against — but they report paying about $200 total for electricity usage in the last 12 months. Six of their last bills have been just the $15 connection fee to their utility. Interestingly, the single largest consumer of the solar power their home produces is their electric car — a Tesla Model 3 that they charge through a Tesla wall charger in their garage — so this also represents money that they’d be paying at the pump.

The Herricks are also now able to set their thermostat to a comfortable temperature, where previously they’d tried to save energy by keeping it set to the brink of uncomfortable. Ultimately, they enjoy being “solar pioneers” in their area: they often welcome curious neighbors who want to see how solar works.

In their words:

“Solar just makes sense. Why mine fossil fuels thousands of miles away, transport them to factories where carbon is released, then transport the electricity to your house, when sunshine is delivered (most days) directly to your house for free?

We wanted to take advantage of (solar) electricity as much as possible, so everything except our hot water heater is electric. At the suggestion of Sugar Hollow, we installed a geothermal heat pump to further reduce our environmental impact.

We were able to take advantage of federal tax credits for the solar installation as well as an incentive from Duke Energy (which Sugar Hollow was instrumental in procuring). Later, when we installed a battery, we were also able to get a federal tax credit to offset some of the cost. In our particular case, we felt confident that this was the right way to go for the long term so the incentives were secondary but it does certainly speed up the payback period.

We had the unfortunate experience of being without power for two weeks after Hurricane Sandy (especially painful since we had well water), so we knew that we wanted some sort of backup electric source and thought that a Tesla Powerwall would be much nicer than a conventional gas generator. Unfortunately, Powerwalls were not generally available when we built the house so we had that installed later. I should mention that we both work from home so power outages are also work outages.”