One of the most important things to consider when designing a home is energy. Having reliable energy is a must. There are many options for energy, but the one that’s taken the market is solar energy.

Solar energy is energy that comes from the sun, which is transferred through solar panels and turned into usable electricity. According to an article published by the Texas Tribune, in Texas nearly 20% of the power grid comes from solar panels.

Due to their efficiency, people around Texas are looking into buying these panels. But the process of installing and creating an efficient solar system for a house is not as easy as people think. 

One of the biggest factors that make solar panels efficient is their cost, saving you around $1,500 annually on your electricity bill. For most people that’s a lot of money saved, except for the fact that just installing solar panels on average costs $14,280 according to an article published by Energysage. Due to the high cost of the panels, the payback period is between 7.5 to 9.4 years.  That’s almost 10 years of owning a house just to break even on money saved. 

Another problem with solar panels is that they sometimes cause leakage through the roof. After being in the negative trying to save back the money you spent, you have to spend extra money on repairs. With all the money you are spending to maintain these panels, you would expect the energy to be reliable, but since solar panels run on the sun, on cloudy days and at night they don’t work. 

Despite these challenges, there are a number of benefits to installing a solar panel system on your house. When the power grid goes out, you keep your power throughout the day while the sun fuels your house. Texas is known for its lack of stability with the power grids, causing outages all around the world due to overuse of energy. The winter storm that happened in 2021 was caused because the grid couldn’t handle the level of energy used. This could easily be prevented by taking advantage of solar energy instead of relying on the grid. With reliable energy and the fact you aren’t paying monthly some people would say that’s enough of a reason to buy a solar panel. 

There are still many things uncertain, but with the technology solar panels will power a bright future!