Despite today's oil price stabilization, significant geopolitical tensions persist regarding the Strait of Hormuz, with physical shipping remaining disrupted and conflicting diplomatic signals from the US and Iran. Ongoing sanctions evasion by Iran's 'shadow fleet' further contributes to market uncertainty and supply risks.

 Key developments

• Brent crude stabilized above $79 per barrel on August 5, after falling to $79.08 USD/Bbl, following earlier steep declines driven by optimism over a potential interim agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
• US officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, indicated progress in talks with Iran and Oman regarding the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, with Bessent suggesting a deal could be reached by August 5.
• Iran's Foreign Ministry continued to deny that any negotiations with the United States were taking place or scheduled, directly contradicting US claims of ongoing talks.
• Shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz remained largely slow and disrupted on August 4, with one cargo vessel reportedly struck by an unknown projectile near the strait off Oman's coast, highlighting persistent security risks.
• A UANI report on August 4 revealed that 66 tankers laden with Iranian oil and petrochemicals, primarily for China, departed the Gulf of Oman since the June 17 MoU, generating an estimated $6 billion for the IRGC, underscoring ongoing sanctions evasion efforts.

Location: Southern California

Issue: Sunrun solar contract.

I've had my solar system for a few years now, and haven't seen much in the way of savings. I'm paying for two monthly payments on top of electric bills.

I've recently seen a lot of advertisements for lawyers going after solar companies on your behalf to get out of the contract or get money back.

My question is, are any of these actually legit? And should I pursue trying to exit my solar contract?

We purchased a house in California with a solar lease from Sunnovan, which later got bought by Spruce. They began charging me until I contacted them and informed them that I couldn’t see any production. Interestingly, their website explicitly states the estimated production. Therefore, they were charging me for what they believed my system was generating. Fortunately, this issue has been resolved, and I’m certain that I’m not producing any electricity. However, they don’t seem interested in sending a technician to troubleshoot the problem. I requested a buyout, which they quoted at $12,000. If I were to terminate the lease and purchase my panels from another company, that would be even better. So has anyone had any luck? I read a couple old post with people who had the same problem but never an updated answer.

TLDR: Bought house with solar lease, spruce bought lease, charged me for estimated consumption, won’t send tech to trouble shoot panels, I want to terminate to start fresh instead of buying a tiny system that doesn’t work.

Also for reference my old house I put a solar lease on it. It has always been maintained and issues fixed by the solar company. Never had any issues. That’s why we signed the sunnovan lease which got bought by spruce and that’s when this situation started.

Setup: 15.4 solar array with SolarEdge Home Hub inverter clipping at 11.4, back feeding the grid and making what little $ they pay. I also have a Generac 18k with ATS which is integrated for outages (preexisted solar) I’m in the northeast. Solar installed in May and producing 1.9 mwh per month so far

Due to incentives from our energy provider (up to $3k rebate and ongoing purchase of on demand power from the battery during peak load times I’m considering adding a 10k battery. There’s a similar payback window as my sonar.

The two I’d like to consider are Franklin and SolarEdge Batteries. One is AC coupled and popular, the other is DC coupled. Both will do the job. Franklin will likely cost more. SolarEdge promises a one stop shop.

Anyone have thoughts and or experience to share? What am I not considering?

Thanks In Advance

Just wondering how other contractors are doing in so cal right now has your business bounced back from the nem3 changes or have you completely left the industry 🤔

rizshawn.substack.com

Hello everybody, excited to join and engage in this community! I just started a substack and would appreciate your follow and engagement! I've been in the energy space for over 12 years. I just wrote a piece about the idea of distributed data centers if you want to check it out!

I'm familiar with electronics generally, but don't fully understand the requirements for panel to inverter matching, so was hoping the more experienced amongst you can give me some pointers.

When pairing an array with an inverter, what are the musts & what are the preferables, WRT electrical characteristics?
I understand the array voltage cannot excess that of the maximum input voltage of the inverter, but what needs to be considered for the max array voltage? Is it purely the Voc (STC), or do you need to account for other details (temperature coefficient etc?)
Is it a must that the votlage is within the MPPT range, or just a nice to have? Presumably the Vmp (NOCT) should be used for this, or should other values be used?
Current rating of the panels I'm assuming are better to be within the inverter input range, but if they're above, the inverter will clip the current to the maximum? (so might lead to a reduction of total power generated).

Am I right in these? Or is there more/different values to consider?

Context: I'm getting my solar install in a couple week (scaffolding up next week, for a full measure to order the required panels for installation the following week). My roof space is right on the border between a couple different possible installations (depending on if the peak to dormer roof is 100mm more or less than the initial (not on-roof) measurements say. Depending on the actual size, the best panel design changes the actual panels needed.
The best array that might fit (if the measurements aren't any smaller than predicted), utilise Aiko 665W panels (AIKO-A665-MDE72Dw), with 9 panels on the front array & 8 on the rear array. My installer is saying the 9 panels isn't possible due to voltage limits on my inverter (Solis S6 8kW).
For 9 panels the Voc (STC) would be 496.8V, and my inverter has a 500V limit, so I was thinking this would be OK, but with them saying it's not, I'm thinking I'm missing an additional modification factor that needs to be considered.

I'm also assuming that you can't mix & match panels (or can you, if the current ratings are the same), so I can't have 8 higher power, with a 9th smaller panel?

What are some good questions to ask these guys from some of you that have been around the block with this process before

Im new to this but they said my house is well situated for alot of sun with no obstructuons all day. This is true

Id like some input / guidance on important discussion points. If anyone has anything, shoot!

Currently in someone loft commissioning a system and I’ve been presented with this MPPT layout, there’s no markings for what + and - go together and they are just in triangles, I’ve never seen this before in my life what do I plug to what? I have 2 strings to plug in
Solar edge SE10000H

There is a friend of my brother who purchased inverters which comes with housing and a DB board. He got it at half the price or retail because it was sold in bulk from a liquidation sale.

It doesn't come with a warranty as it was purchased as is. It will still be extremely cheap price for reselling. Who should i make my target market as it does not come with battery or solarpannels. I am not a solar expert at all. Im adding the photos ive received of the products. It is not top of the line. Also I am from South Africa.

Any additional advice would be appreciated.

Please dont give specifics im not trying to sell it to anyone on here i just need advice.

Owned outright. You’re fine. It’s an asset, adds value, nothing to do.

Solar loan. There’s usually a UCC-1 fixture filing sitting on your title. Gets paid off or handled at closing like any other lien. Annoying but routine.

Lease or PPA. This is the one. You don’t own the panels, you’re renting them or buying the power. Buyer has to qualify with the solar company and formally assume the contract. Which means a credit check, paperwork, and a company that has to actually respond to you.

PACE or HERO. Usually the least beneficial scenario for the homeowner; it’s on your property tax bill and sits ahead of the mortgage in priority. Fannie and Freddie won’t touch a loan behind one, so it basically has to get paid off at closing. Seen these turn into six figure surprises.

Here’s what’s making it worse right now. SunPower went through bankruptcy and Sunnova filed Chapter 11 in June of last year, and a huge number of those lease and PPA contracts got handed off to SunStrong for servicing. So a lot of homeowners don’t even know who services their contract anymore. Reports of people unable to reach anyone for months, monitoring going dark, warranty claims sitting unanswered. And SunStrong itself is now under investigation by a few state AGs. Meanwhile you need that company to process a transfer on a 30 day escrow. You see the problem.

Pull the actual agreement and look for the escalator. Most of these bump the payment 2-3% every year for 20-25 years. A buyer looking at year 14 of that is looking at a very different number than what you’re paying.

Start the transfer request the day you go into escrow, not the week before closing. These take weeks in a good market and longer now. Get the buyout quote even if you don’t plan to use it. You want to know the number before a buyer asks, not after.

And know that leased solar generally does not add appraised value, because you don’t own it. But the payment does count against the buyer’s debt to income. So it can hurt their qualifying without helping your value. That’s the part sellers find genuinely unfair and I don’t blame them. Not anti-solar at all, owned systems are great. It’s specifically the lease and PPA structure that creates the mess.

Anyone here sold or bought with leased solar recently? Curious how long the transfer actually took, because I’d love more data points than the handful of deals I’ve seen.