Home Solar Power Saved My Marriage

We met in college, Sarah and I, a couple of self-described new age hippies. We fell instantly in love with each other and our ideals. We had Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, The Beatles, Joan Baez and Arlo Guthrie on our iPods. Global warming, the burning of fossil fuels and unsustainable farming practices were our combined enemies. We were convinced that our generation could save the world and our legacy would be a safe happy planet for future generations.

We would open a bottle of wine and have long philosophical conversations about ourselves and the future. The two of us were very much alike yet delightfully just different enough to add spiciness to our conversations, fun spirited debates were the norm. She was a vegetarian that loved bacon and I ate meat but always tried to eat local free range organic meats (unless I stopped at a taco truck or Jack-In-The-Box).

We ended up falling deeply in love, moved in together, and finished school. We both had promising career opportunities ahead of us and were looking forward to our future together. Marriage was the next logical step and we took the plunge into marriage with great passion and excitement, the future promised great happiness.

Fast forward to present time; careers (me an accountant and Sarah an architect), kids, and financial concerns settled in like a San Francisco fog bank. We worked, ranted about work, paid bills, followed the kids around, had sex once a month (whether we needed it or not) and lost our ability to have our fun idealistic conversations. The “spark” had been snuffed. Our marriage was dull and I was scared.

Then it happened one night completely out of the blue: The kids were in bed early for once and I had settled in front of my PC and Sarah was enthralled by her iPad when we simultaneously happened onto information about home solar power. Sarah perked up, “Hey Jason” she says “did you know that installing an average 5kW home solar power system has the carbon offset equivalent of planting 106 trees a year for 20 or more years?” That excited me a bunch, but the article I was reading really got my accountant juices flowing: “That’s really cool” I said “what I’m reading here says that we could get solar power installed for free, how could that be?”

Those discoveries started sparks flying again. I started diving into the financial advantages of home solar power and Sarah started researching the physical aspects of switching to solar power. We had something new and exciting to discuss every evening. I learned about solar leasing, Power Purchase Agreements and Outright Purchase of home solar energy systems and that it is really possible to get home solar installed absolutely free, that’s exhilarating. Then I would eagerly share with Sarah how we would be able to profit over $20,000 dollars or more over the life of a lease while adding about $15,000 tax-free value to our home (we live in Baltimore)as well. Then Sarah would share with me how easy it was to make the switch to solar: Our house was just a normal house but the roof system and material would easily support a roof-top solar system. We were also situated correctly in an unshaded area to maximize the efficiency of a photovoltaic system. And we were both totally jazzed about the how much good solar power can do for our environment and the future of our children and grandchildren.

Discovering home solar power rekindled some buried ideals of our youth and got us communicating again, we relearned what was important to us, and how much we loved the excitement of working together towards common goals. We fell gloriously back in love. Thank-you solar power you are not only saving me tons of cash but you helped save my marriage as well.