Solar Panels and Solar Batteries: Working in Concert to Save Electricity Use in Your Home

In the recent year, many companies have introduced home energy storage systems.  From recognizable names like Nissan, BMW, Tesla and Mercedes to lesser known names like Sonnen and Rosewater Energy, the number of companies involved in the solar battery industry has never been bigger.  These systems allow you to store a sufficient amount of power to supply your home’s energy needs off the grid for a couple of hours.  Usually home battery systems are paired with solar panels so each system can run while the other system is off line.

So what is the difference between these two types of systems? Do you need solar panels to have a battery system? Let’s compare the two and see which one might be the best first step.

First, it’s a given that both types of systems represent a significant investment and an upgrade to your home. Likewise, both can help you save money on your energy bill but in very different ways.  Solar panels represent a more passive approach to your energy bill by producing energy to help offset your energy needs.  Generating most of their power during the middle of the day, solar panels help roll back your energy usage by returning power to the grid. However, most solar panel owners are unaware that if there is a power outage in your neighborhood, you still lose power … even if you have solar panels.  That is because solar panels do not have storage capabilities.

Here’s where a home battery system comes in. It stores power that can be used when you want it (i.e., during a power outage or charging your electric vehicle at night).  Indeed, there can be other instances where you might want to switch your house to draw off the battery pack.  For example, using smart home technology you can set your home to draw power from the battery during the time of the day when the energy company is charging the highest time-of-day pricing for power from the grid.  This allows you to offset your monthly energy bill.

Battery systems are  traditionally paired with solar panels so you can make the most out of your solar energy generated, the system can be used to save you money on your energy bill even though it have to charge.  But to be clear, it is not a requirement to have solar panels in order to deploy a home battery system.

Although solar panels come at a significantly higher investment cost, they offer a greater cost reduction tool.  In contrast a home battery system is significantly cheaper, but is it only an offset tool to your energy cost.  So, for now, even though there are seemingly more entries every day into the home battery market, solar panels still offer a great direct cost savings for your monthly energy bill.

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