City environmental specialist Lewis Percy said it’s a simple way for people to determine the cost benefit of installing panels.

“The whole process is extremely quick,” Lewis said. “You log on, you input your address, and select the size of your home and within a number of seconds, that calculator will give you your solar potential, and also the cost and the benefit from a financial perspective.”

Percy added that the city’s calculator is not a replacement for a site survey, which can produce more specific results, but is a good starting point to explore solar options.

“You can very quickly get an idea of ‘is my house actually, you know, pretty well positioned for solar, or might I need to talk to someone to understand why it’s not showing the results I’m expecting?” he said.

Zeno Renewables specializes in residential solar installations. Co-CEO Kai Fahrion said while a federal grant of up to $5000 for installing energy efficient upgrades to homes has boosted solar uptake, even without the government support solar pays for itself.

“Financially, it makes sense. You’re seeing paybacks in seven-to-nine-year period, if not quicker. So yeah, it makes sense. Day and night. It makes sense.”

In explaining how it makes sense both day and night – since there’s no sunshine at night – Fahrion pointed to Alberta’s microgeneration agreements which allow homeowners to feed excess power back into the grid through bidirectional power meters. 

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