Florida Solar Design Group

05/18/2026

We installed this solar energy system on a new off-grid home on Cayo Costa. We chose Enphase Energy microinverters for the house solar panels because we had 15 different orientations and two different pitches. This would not work well with a string inverter, but microinverters capture maximum energy based on their individual orientation. The microinverters are AC-coupled with a hybrid inverter system with a larger DC-coupled array with a single orientation and no shading potential.

This system is designed to cover 100% of the property's needs with no generator for redundancy!

Installed with a 3-rail system from IronRidge, the solar panels are there to stay under any conditions.

04/23/2026

Check out our new infographic on SHEPH, a modern alternative to traditional solar pool heating panels!

Full version here:

https://floridasolardesigngroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/SHEPH-vs-Traditional-Solar-Pool-Heating.pdf

04/17/2026

Replaced a ten-year-old off-grid solar system last month for a Southwest Florida family who could not run air conditioning through the night. The husband wanted to deliver on his wife's request for comfortable sleep. The old system just would not let him.

And worse: they had no way to know why. Was the solar array undersized? Were the batteries failing? The old "dumb" inverter gave them nothing to work with.

We swapped the 4.4 kW legacy inverter for an EG4 FlexBOSS21 (16 kW), replaced the lead-acid battery bank with two EG4 All-Weather LFP batteries, and upgraded the ground mount from twelve 335-watt panels to sixteen 460-watt bifacials.

Full story: https://floridasolardesigngroup.com/upgrading-an-old-off-grid-solar-system-the-real-win-is-visibility

Here is the kicker. The biggest upgrade was not power. It was visibility. They can now see every compressor cycle on each mini-split, measure exactly how much energy each one consumes, and track battery state of charge against their actual consumption patterns. That turns an off-grid home from a mystery into a managed operation.

Is it perfect? No. Modern systems have dark start, arc fault quirks, and the occasional firmware headache. But the tradeoff is worth it.

If you are running a legacy off-grid system that cannot keep up anymore, the technology has moved on in a big way. We are happy to look at what you have and tell you honestly what makes sense.

04/11/2026

Solar Fencing?

https://floridasolardesigngroup.com/solar-fences-cool-concept-bad-idea-for-southwest-florida

Sounds like a great idea at first, but there are a lot of impediments to pulling this off.

A Client Asked Us About Solar Fences. Here Is Why We Said No. A client recently asked if we install […]

04/10/2026

Your solar panels produce electricity. Your home uses electricity. Sometimes you produce more than you use. Sometimes you use more than you produce.

Net metering is the system that keeps score.

I have written thousands of words about net metering on my blog. Detailed posts about reading your FPL bill, understanding the law changes, figuring out why your monitoring app and your utility statement never agree.

But I realized I never wrote the simple version. The "explain it like I just heard this term for the first time" version.

So I did. One post. Three scenarios. No jargon. Just how it works, why the numbers look the way they do, and links to every detailed post if you want to go deeper.

If you have solar panels in Southwest Florida, or you are thinking about it, this is the starting point.

https://floridasolardesigngroup.com/infographic-how-netmetering-works-the-basics

04/10/2026

Is plug-in solar (balcony solar) safe? Short answer: it can be, but often isn't.

Your circuit breaker is supposed to protect you. But plug-in solar can trick it into ignoring a fire hazard hiding inside your wall.

It is called breaker masking. Solar power feeding into a shared circuit reduces the current the breaker sees, so it never trips. Meanwhile, the wiring downstream carries the full load. On a 15-amp circuit, that can mean 25 amps flowing through wire rated for 15. The wire overheats, the insulation melts, and a fire can start without a single warning.

Germany figured this out years ago. They capped plug-in solar at 800 watts, certified the equipment, and now have over a million systems running with virtually zero safety incidents. The U.S. is catching up, with more than 20 states pushing legislation in 2026 and a brand-new UL 3700 safety certification for plug-in solar products.

The technology works. The physics are sound. But only when people respect the limits and buy certified gear.

If you are curious about plug-in solar, or if you want a properly designed system for your Southwest Florida home, we can help you sort through the options.



https://floridasolardesigngroup.com/is-plug-in-solar-safe-the-wiring-danger-that-marketing-will-not-tell-you-about

04/09/2026

Solar panels floating on a pond in Bonita Springs? That's not science fiction. It's happening right now.

Bonita Springs Utilities just approved a 1.5-megawatt floating solar array at their East Water Reclamation Facility. The system will float on an existing retention pond and generate about 60% of the facility's electricity. Total cost: $3.95 million, with a projected payback of about 10 years.
The technology is called floatovoltaics, and it's been growing rapidly worldwide. Florida has actually been a leader in this space. Altamonte Springs, Miami-Dade, Tampa Electric, Duke Energy, Orange County, and Orlando all have floating solar projects already in operation.

Why water instead of land? The cooling effect of water boosts panel efficiency by 5% to 15% compared to panels baking on a hot roof or the ground. And the panels return the favor by shading the water surface, reducing evaporation and suppressing algae growth.

We don't install floating solar at Florida Solar Design Group. Our focus is residential rooftop systems for homeowners in Southwest Florida. But I find the concept genuinely interesting because it uses space that would otherwise just sit there doing nothing. That's a smarter approach than consuming usable land for ground-mounted arrays.

For your home, rooftop solar is still the best option by far. Your roof is already there. No substructure needed.

https://floridasolardesigngroup.com/floatovoltaics-bonita-springs-utilities-goes-solar-on-water

04/07/2026

Your solar system is probably saving you more than your electric bill shows -- and most people have no idea.

https://floridasolardesigngroup.com/solar-production-vs-utility-credits-why-the-numbers-never-match

Here's what's happening. Your FPL or LCEC meter is a net meter. It only records what crosses the boundary between your home and the grid. When your solar panels produce electricity and your home uses it at the same moment, running the AC, the fridge, the pool pump during the day, that energy never touches the meter. The utility never sees it. It doesn't show up as a credit.
Your solar monitoring app might show 1,500 kWh produced. Your utility bill might credit you for 600 kWh "generated." The gap, 900 kWh, was consumed directly in your home. Same dollar value. Zero paper trail.

I had a client call last week, convinced their system was broken because the numbers didn't line up. The system was working perfectly. They were just reading two different measurements and expecting them to match.

If you have solar and your bill credits seem low compared to what your app shows, this is almost certainly the explanation.