Review for New England Clean Energy

Office location: 335 Schooner Drive Suite 430, Oakley MA, 01749

01/28/2023
Ken R Ashland, MA

Communicative and helpful every step of the way

We bought our system from New England Clean Energy partly because they are well-rated. But the tipping point was seeing them mentioned in YouTube videos where a number of homeowners talking about the general topic of solar say '...oh and by the way, we are really happy with New England Clean Energy.' Our own experience has been equally outstanding. Our system is located in Ashland, MA -- 10kV AC with a max DC output of ~7.2kV -- 24 panels with individual inverters. We own the system and expect a dollar break-even of ~8 years (tax incentives help a lot). Where the system will likely last 25 years ...that's a lot of free electricity. There are many small steps to this process, and the company told us (accurately) that this would be a lengthy project. Installation of electric boxes, conduits, and meters takes a few hours. Installing the panels is a day or two. The rest is paperwork, permitting, inspections, and startup permissions -- and also for us, having our roof redone ahead of time and trees removed -- both long planned. The panels aren't particularly heavy, but it was time for a new roof, and adding solar was the impetus. The inverters and control electronics are made by Enphase (panels by an equally reputable manufacturer). Enphase provides a web service where we can monitor the performance of the system including each individual panel. We've had the system running since October -- around four months. Enough to see it making as much power as we expected. We have net metering, which means that if we make more power than we use, we produce an Eversouce credit balance which helps to cover a month when we might make less than we use. Credits are applied (or used) once a month when Eversource reads our meter and generates a billing statement (daily fluctuations don't matter). To keep us from electrocuting line workers, the inverters shut down during a grid power failure -- that's how every net-metered system works. We had one installation hiccup -- our house turned out to be a bit smaller than originally measured and the system that showed up on the truck was not going to fit. We had two choices -- leave two panels out or mount them on a less efficient surface. In the end, we wound up moving the two orphan panels to a 'summertime' position (when we use the most power) and the hiccup made no material difference. All the same, the company reached out to us and sent a meaningful discount for the momentary anxiety. Very Professional! New England Clean Energy walked us through the installation of a reliable system that is doing the job, and we found them very communicative and helpful every step of the way. I strongly recommend this company.