After getting through our despondency and desires to help Karma along the way in avenging the most recent theft from Solar Mart, a bit of good news has worked its way back to the farm.

Marc, a representative of a referral network, put us in touch with a solar installer that might be able to move us forward after having $31,000.00 basically stolen from us.  Troy, the contractor, seems to have us back on track.

Part of the dilemma of having the project be terminated has to do with the fact that power companies seem to hate solar users.  IREA, the power company out here, is going to start charging solar users a monthly connection fee to help offset revenue loss due to we people who think their product sucks!  After all, why out here on the high, treeless plains, would you NOT use the sun?  In addition, because the system has not been installed, we would also lose the federal tax credit which goes a long way to offsetting the cost of purchasing a system like ours.

If we were not able to get things going and had to start from square one, then the system would have to all be redesigned and re-permitted and the cost involved with that is roughly 10k.

Troy got in touch with IREA and the Arapahoe County permit department and was able to find out that 1.  IREA still has us listed as good to go on the hook up without having to pay the connection fees and 2. Arapahoe County has the permits approved and waiting and as long as we submit a letter stating we are changing contractors they couldn’t care less who does the installation!  Good news!  That means that of the $31k that was stolen, because we don’t have to re-engineer the thing, we will now be out 21k instead of $31,000.00 and we will get the federal credit.

Troy looked over the plans and if his cost estimate on parts isn’t worse than Solar Mart we are back in business.  We won’t have to pay anything until the gear is here, and then the final payment isn’t due until the thing is working and approved.  This is such a relief.  While it is no fun to have to eat such a large sum of money, what we stood to lose was worse:  No solar, no tax credit, IREAs extortion, and having to start over from square one.

We will likely make a decision this weekend.  His estimate now is that we could have the thing running by about Thanksgiving or the first part of December.

Once more into the abyss.  Never give up, never quit fighting, and never be afraid to stomp the life out of people who threaten your plans.