Review for Black Platinum Solar

Office location: 765 Sarong Crest, Albertville AZ, 85020

11/05/2021
Howard Jow Glendale, AZ

Buy your panels and microinverters with 25 year warranties

We started taking bids for solar earlier in 2021. Some companies only wanted to push an expensive lease option that would have cost us more than $60000 out of pocket by the end of the lease! Sure, they take care of all maintenance and repairs, but when you do a little bit more research you can find that reputable companies have 25 year warranties on their products. Luckily, I started reading about microinverters and decided that I wanted an Enphase microinverter instead of a string inverter. From there, I searched Enphase's website for an installer in my zip code and Black Platinum showed up as a "platinum" level installer. At the time, the next one listed had a "gold" status. We got a quote for $38000 for 13.3kW with LG Panels and Enphase microinverters. The payoff at the time was ten years, but recently Arizona is pushing APS to cut the off peak time from 3pm to 8pm to 4pm to 7pm and they are forcing them to stop charging people with solar for a grid connection fee. These changes will definitely shorten our payoff time a little. Black Platinum had us make the payments in four phases which worked out for us to help space out the large checks. The first phase involves getting city permits, the second phase is installation, and the last phase is APS approving the install and giving you the go ahead to flip the switch and turn on the system. We opted for no battery in our system since our solar buyback rate is locked for ten years. After ten years, I'm anticipating battery technology to be much more superior along with the Enphase technology for being able to go "off grid" while still being connected to the grid in the event of a power outage. After the install, we had a few hiccups that either we solved or Black Platinum solved: 1. One of the trees that the previous owners planted was shading my roof and blocking sun to three of my panels. I had my landscaper trim the tree down beneath the roof line on my house. He still needs to work with my neighbor to trim the same tree on my neighbor's side. The three panels are probably running at about 60% right now (up from 16% when they were shaded). 2. Three panels did not have power after the system was turned on. Two of them weren't plugged in correctly and the third needed a new microinverter. I coordinated with David (Sales Manager) to get the repair team to my home to fix these three panels. I love the Enphase Enlighten app for my Android phone. It shows your energy use so you know when you are doing things during peak energy charges. It helped us realize that if we shower between 3pm and 8pm it uses 5kW just to refill the water heater. Now we shower outside of that window given that our APS bill is negative at the moment (it could be even more negative). The way our system is designed we are expecting to get money back during the cooler months and we're expecting to pay some money during the four hot months in the summer. It should balance itself out. We are looking forward to getting the rebate next year and hope that the solar tax credit is extended to help more people get solar in the future. During each phase of getting solar, David was in touch with me constantly via text on my phone. I was also in touch with John Black (owner), Melia (permits), and David via email. All of their estimates for the time frame for permits, construction, and APS were pretty spot on. They had to cut into the wall in my daughter's room and garage to help hide the power conduits and it's very professional. The drywall people patched it up like it never happened and we just happened to have painted my daughter's room recently as part of a kitchen remodel (using the same painters). A few coats of left over paint and we can't even tell anything happened. I highly recommend Black Platinum if you are considering going solar and I have given their information to a few of my neighbors who are thinking about it for themselves.