I recently helped Sandy install solar panels on his roof. As part of Ontario's Feed-In Tariff program, the province will pay up to 80 cents per kWh for energy generated from a rooftop PV system. That is a pretty good deal, and means that the system will pay for itself eventually.

Sandy engineered his roof to be at the optimal angle for solar panels. He had enough space for 52 panels, each capable of generating 188 watts of power (the panels are 240 W, but they are limited by the inverters), which means that his total power generation fits just into the 10 kW limit for the residential Feed-In Tariff program.

On this day, we got off to a slow start, partly because we were nervous about damaging the panels, which cost almost $800 each, and partly because we wanted to make sure they were placed in the exact spot on the roof, as small errors in measurement may have thrown off the entire installation. Eventually we got a rhythm going and we were able to install one panel every 10 minutes. We installed 20 panels before it started raining and we had to call it a day.

The next day, Sandy and his friends got the time down to 5 minutes per panel, and they were able to install the other 32 panels in one session. In this photo, you can see Sandy up on the scaffold waiting for me to get up on the roof to take the panel from him. Sandy's friend Wayne is also waiting for me to go up the ladder first, as the first one up had to walk backwards with the panel.

Technical details: This photo was taken with my 5D Mark II + Tamron 28-75mm at 40mm, ISO 200, f/4, for 1/500th of a second.