March 6, 2020
Using the same approach as you would to find any service provider, we will focus on the three fundamentals—pricing, quality, and service. These three fundamentals are not just for solar, but can be applied to any buying decision that you are making as either a residential homeowner or large corporation.
Pricing: Is the entity the highest, lowest or mid-range?
Quality: Low, high or medium?
Service: Low, high or medium?
No organization will ever be able to score high for all three of these items, it's just not possible. This is a law like the law of gravity. The key component is leveling our solar bids from installers and contractors to properly assess all three of these items transparently. Today, we are only going to focus on how this is done for pricing purposes. You will have to stay tuned for future YSG Solar blogs to learn about service and quality.
Pricing for solar is done on a per-unit basis—which is done on a per-watt basis. The per-watt basis is under DC, not AC. First, take the gross cost of the equipment before any cash incentives, New York State tax credits, or federal Investment tax credits are applied. Once you have this gross contract cost, look for total system capacity rated in DC. We are going to divide the cost into our capacity to understand what our gross price per watt DC is. This allows us to compare all options evenly.
The next step is to understand allocations on a per-watt basis, to the following buckets:
Modules
Racking
Inverters
BOS
Labor
Profit
Interconnection Fees
Other
This will allow us to understand the budget for each item. Certain installers and contractors will not provide you with this type of information. This is when you use your friend Google to help you get a price range and then go back to the per watt price you have already calculated.
We hope that you found this guide useful for finding a residential solar contractor in New York. Whether you are looking for rooftop solar for your pitched/flat roof or are looking for community solar options in New York, YSG's Energy Consultants are here to help you.
YSG Solar is a project development vehicle responsible for commoditizing energy infrastructure projects. We work with long-term owners and operators to provide clean energy assets with stable, predictable cash flows. YSG's market focus is distributed generation and utility-scale projects located within North America.
If you’re a Long Island, or NYC, resident interested in going solar, contact YSG today. YSG Solar has over ten years of experience in the solar industry, and plenty of options for every customer’s energy needs. Contact YSG Solar today to find out how much you could save on your utility bills. Send us an email, or call the office at 212.389.9215 to learn more.