Unless you’ve lived under a rock, you’ve undoubtedly heard the news about the Coronavirus spread. If you’re thinking about solar, it’s important to think about how the Coronavirus may have an effect on putting solar panels on your roof. Just a quick recap: The coronavirus originated in China and has spread throughout the country and into many other parts of the world. This post is less about the general impacts of the Coronavirus and more about the impacts the Coronavirus has on the solar industry.
As you probably know, many of the consumer goods that Americans buy are from China. This also applies to several of the top manufacturers of solar panels, equating to more than 70% of solar panels as late as 2017. Even if you opt for solar panels made by LG, Panasonic (which closes its Buffalo, NY plant), and Hanwha, many of the other solar components that go into putting together a functional system are from China. The severity of the Coronavirus has caused there to be a grinding halt to factories’ output in China throughout many different industries, which also includes the solar industry.
The more prominent solar manufacturers like LG, Panasonic, and Hanwha Q Cell don’t make their panels in China. While that may sound like a good thing, the fact is that a significant amount of the actual PV cells that go into solar panels are from China. Besides the PV cells and other solar components that go into the picture of putting a solar panel together, one has to think about the bigger picture of global trade and how the spreading of a virus will impact shipments back and forth between countries.
What does the Coronavirus 19 mean to your solar installation?
What this means for you if you’re thinking about buying Solar sometime in the future is that there is a chance that a limited supply chain may cause a delay in manufacturing and or delivery to the final destination, in this case, your roof.
If the global supply chain of solar components slows down, it can further compound the busy season of the solar industry here in the United States when the temperature starts rising. When people start running their air conditioners to get a break from the heat, they are reminded of the high electricity costs when they get their bill a few weeks later.
Then, many people started to think about Solar again and the benefits of reducing the cost of electricity by installing solar panels. Now factor in that in 2020, the tax credit is slated to drop to 24% in 2021, and there will be many people rushing to install Solar when supply might be lower than anticipated. Between the summer month’s air-conditioning usage, people hurrying to install before the end of the year so they don’t miss out on 26%, and now this forsaken
What does the Coronavirus 19 mean for solar? Of the tax credit, it’s already going to be a busy season in the Solar The Street. That’s not even considering supply chain constraints and delays in manufacturing that may come about or have already started from different governments’ efforts to control the spread of the virus. When you factor in all of these variables, solar panel installation turnaround may likely be longer than average and more expensive than you’d like it to be.
It’s already a known fact that during the summer months, when demand spikes, the price follows suit, which is why Drone Quote.
So what can you do about it?
Well, if you’ve already committed to installing Solar in 2020,, then you’d be doing yourself a favor to consider it seriously if you haven’t already. If you’ve been sitting on quotes waiting for the right time to buy, that time quickly passes. Before you know it, people will come around to installing Solar so that they don’t lose on the tax credit, and can beat the summer months, and the next thing you know, you’re looking at a longer time to install solar.
If you haven’t already got quotes for solar, it wouldn’t hurt to start looking now. To get your quotes promptly and without having to sit through multiple sales presentations and people coming in and going out of your house, you can rely on DroneQuote. We’ll provide you with an easy and hassle-free process that’s completely online, so you don’t have to sit through long meetings. We can provide you with multiple quotes from multiple installers on an online dashboard that allows you to quickly compare the quotes that are put together for you without so much as a single in-home sales presentation and with the sharpest pricing you’ll get from anybody.
Even if you don’t use DroneQuote or you’ve already been thinking about solar for your home, we encourage you to act on that thought because you’ll be placing yourself in the queue for installation that much sooner.