Installing Solar Panels with Batteries in Illinois: We decided to take the plunge!

Introduction

Illinois is becoming increasingly favorable for solar installations due to state incentives, falling solar panel costs, and rising electricity prices. Combining solar panels with batteries can provide additional benefits, such as energy independence and resilience against power outages. We are currently installing solar with batteries. After the recent wind storms that took our power out for a week, we were looking at solar or a generator. With solar and batteries we will still have power when commercial electric goes out, additionally the ‘fuel’ is solar which will save us the cost of propane a generator would have used. We are even considering swapping our gas fueled items to electric.

Power going out for a week is a very rare thing where we live. I can think of two times in the last 30 years that it has happened. The first we weren’t living in the area, but it spurred my parents, my aunt and at least one cousin to invest in a generator. The second convinced us. Living in the country when the power goes out, we are not only without electricity, but also water. For us the thought that the solar plus batteries would power us during storms and also reduce our electric seemed like a win-win.

In reality what we are finding a few months after was that 1. we should have researched the loan more 2. I’m not positive the amount of solar panels we added is enough and finally 3. The batteries were not enough to…