Rooftop Solar Saves The Most Money In These States – CleanTechnica

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Where does it save the most money to put solar panels on your roof? There are big differences across the United States, and Payless Power recently crunched the numbers to identify which states are home to the biggest savings.

According to their research, these are the ten states with the most estimated yearly savings from going solar:

1. Hawaii $2,360
2. Connecticut $1,734
3. Florida $1,668
4. Alabama $1,638
5. Georgia $1,578
6. New Hampshire $1,563
7. Tennessee $1,553
8. Louisiana $1,538
9. Massachusetts $1,534
10. Maryland $1,522

Saving any money is great. Saving more than $1,000 a year? Extra great. Saving more than $1,000 a year while helping to stop climate change and air pollution? Extra, extra, extra great!

Interestingly, that’s not where the most solar power is installed. “California, Nevada, and Massachusetts topped the list of 50 states with an impressive 27.8%, 25.3%, and 24.5% of their electricity sourced from solar power, respectively,” Payless Power writes. Even just looking at solar panel installations per capita (focusing in on rooftop solar), Connecticut and Florida are not at the top. “Regarding solar panel installations per capita, Nevada (34,728) and Hawaii (33,685) emerged as frontrunners, illustrating a significant number of solar-powered homes. These states contrasted sharply with North Dakota (23) and West Virginia (188), where solar-powered homes per capita were notably the fewest.”

Naturally, just looking at pure capacity totals or dollars invested, the three most populous states in the country: California, Texas, and Florida.

Returning to the topic of solar power savings, even in the worst states for solar power savings, you’re saving nearly a thousand dollars a year on your electricity bill — $742 in New Mexico, $881 in Wyoming, $826 in Utah, $976 in Colorado, and $982 in Wisconsin. That said, there’s still the cost of the solar panels and their installation. So, the bigger factor the Payless Power analysis looks at is estimated payback time, or return on investment (ROI). In the case of those bottom five states, that estimated ROI is 24 years to just over 30 years. Admittedly, that’s quite a while, but with a loan, it’s something you shouldn’t really notice or still might have a monthly savings on.

In terms of the best ROI:

• Florida’s estimated payback time is just 12.76 years
• Hawaii’s estimated payback time is just 10.05 years
• Connecticut’s estimated payback time is just 14.09 years
• Tennessee’s estimated payback time is just 14.47 years
• Georgia’s estimated payback time is just 14.59 years

After that period of time, your bank account is pocketing more than $1000 per year, sometimes more than $1500 per year.

There’s much more in the report about solar incentives, solar policies, solar savings, and solar investments. Check out the full report for more fun. You can also plug your own numbers into a solar calculator on the site to try to estimate your own costs and savings from going solar if you so choose.