6.37 kW Solar & 18 kW Generac for Heli in East Windsor, NJ

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Solar Critter Guard, Solar Panel Installation and Standby Generator Service in East Windsor, NJ by Green Sun Energy Services.

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East Windsor, NJ · Client since September 2019

Heli in East Windsor has been a Green Sun Energy Services client since September of 2019. The array went up that November, the standby generator already on the property came onto our books at the same time, and in June of 2023 we replaced that machine with a new Generac.

19 panels on the existing roof

Nineteen LG 335-watt panels, 6.37 kW in total, on Unirac mounting with a SolarEdge SE5000H HD Wave inverter and an optimizer on every panel. Estimated first-year production is 8,861 kWh and the utility is JCP&L. It was commissioned on 21 November 2019. A hundred and forty-two feet of critter guard went on around the array at the same time. The gap beneath a panel is sheltered and dry and makes an attractive nesting site, which is not something most owners think about until something has moved into it.

The design took several passes before it was settled, which is worth saying because it is normal and is often presented as though it were not. A roof has ridges, vents, plumbing stacks and setback requirements, and the arrangement that produces the most power is frequently not the arrangement that looks right from the street or leaves room to work safely. Going back and forth over that is the job, not a delay in it.

The actual delay came from the township. Permitting timelines are outside a contractor’s control entirely, and the only thing that can be offered is to handle the process and keep the household informed while it runs its course.

The generator, taken on in 2019 and replaced in 2023

The standby machine here was installed by another company — a Generac 20 kW from the 5800 series, model 5887 — and its servicing came to us in October 2019, alongside the solar agreement. It was last serviced on 26 May 2022.

The replacement was commissioned on 8 June 2023: a Generac model 7226, rated 18 kW on propane and 17 kW on natural gas, running on gas here. The load calculation under NEC Article 220 Part IV put the minimum at 15 kW for 2,832 square feet of living space, so the machine sits above what the house asks of it rather than exactly on it.

There are two furnaces in this house, and while both burn gas neither will run without electricity — so heat is among the first things an outage takes away in January. That is the argument for backing up the whole house rather than a chosen list of circuits, and it is what the 200-amp service-entrance-rated transfer switch outside beside the meter does. The survey found nothing on the panel that needed load management to make it work.

One contractor, two systems

Solar and standby generation meet at the same place: the service panel. Both are wired into it, both change what that panel is doing, and both have to be right about the same set of facts — the size of the service, what the household actually draws, and what the utility will and will not permit.

When two companies own those two systems, neither has the full picture, and the household becomes the person carrying information between them. When one company holds both, the survey done for the generator informs the array and the other way round, and there is one number to argue about rather than two that disagree.

That is the practical case for holding both under one roof, and it is a better one than any bundle deal.