GAF Timberline Solar Shingles vs Solar Panels: Cost, Pros & Cons

There are two main ways to install a solar power system on a residential roof. You can use traditional solar panels, which are anchored to your roof structure with a specially designed racking system, or you can use solar shingles with built-in photovoltaic cells.

High-quality solar panels can last more than 25 years, and they save hundreds of dollars per year. However, solar panels change the appearance of your home, and there are homeowners who don’t like their appearance. Solar shingles are a great option if you want to generate your own electricity but don’t like the look of solar panels on the roof.

GAF has been a leading provider of roofing materials for more than a century. They are currently owned by Standard Industries, and they have a network of over 10,000 roofing contractors across the US. In 2019, they created the GAF Energy business unit to focus on solar power systems for homes and businesses. In 2022, they launched the GAF Timberline Solar Roof, which earned more than 30 awards in less than a year.

In this guide, we will compare the GAF solar roof with traditional solar panel systems, discussing the typical costs of each option along with their pros and cons.

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PV Solar Panel System Cost 2023: Pros and Cons of Solar Panels

Sunlight made into electricity. It’s that simple. Enough electricity to power not just a few appliances, but an entire home, including transportation in case of battery electric vehicles (BEV) or plug-in hybrids. That’s where we are quickly heading, but let’s deal with the basics of solar power for homes, first.

Solar and PV Encapsulated
Effective Means of Capturing Awesome Power
System Components and Function
Hiring A Contractor – Solar Panel Installation Costs
How Many Solar Panels Do I Need?
Advantages of PV Solar Panels
Disadvantages of PV Solar Panels

Solar and PV Encapsulated

PV stands for Photovoltaic. — The quantifiable process of converting sunlight (solar) into electrical power. For the conversion to be realized and useful, the right semiconducting material must be in place. — This results in efficiency that helps us put into perspective how solar energy can and does compare to historical methods of producing electrical power.

Solar cells are the fundamental, man-made part. Each cell produces about 1 to 2 watts of power. While that isn’t much, for the small size they are, it’s actually quite sufficient.

Group cells together into modules and stack modules into arrays, and suddenly kilowatts of electric power can be realized. To visualize what we are communicating, check out this short video from the U.S. Department of Energy.

For the solar cell to be effective and efficient, it must be properly housed and protected. Durable glass for its transparency is the obvious choice and results in the modules we call PV solar panels.

A module can be as small as those found on calculators, which date back to mid-20th century technology. Or modules can be arranged as solar arrays, which today is what we consider to be a solar panel system.

Contemporary solar cells are manufactured in about a half dozen ways. The ongoing and still most popular material is crystalline silicon. – Its relatively high efficiency in converting energy supplied by photons to electrical power is why it continues to be popular.

Monocrystalline vs. Polycrystalline Solar Panels

There are two main types of solar panels on the market today: monocrystalline and polycrystalline.

Monocrystalline panels provide anywhere from 17% to 22% solar energy-to-electricity conversion efficiency, while polycrystalline panels achieve between 13% and 16% conversion efficiency.

Thanks to their higher energy conversion efficiency, monocrystalline panels are more costly on a per watt basis than polycrystalline panels, but they do occupy less space on the rooftop.

If a rooftop span and size are limited, then it makes sense to pay a little extra for high-efficiency monocrystalline panels from manufacturers like SunPower, LG, and Panasonic.

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Home Solar Prices Increase Again – SEIA Solar Report (September 2022)

The Solar Market Insight Report is a quarterly publication that describes the current state of the US solar industry, providing the latest data on installation volumes and costs.

The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) and leading consultancy firm Wood Mackenzie work together on each edition of the SMI report, and the Q3 2022 edition was published on September 8.

Here we will summarize the main points from their latest report, focusing on the residential solar market.

  • Across all market segments, the US solar industry deployed 4.6 gigawatts (GW) of capacity during Q2 2022, and the accumulated solar capacity throughout the country now exceeds 130 GW.
  • To put this figure into perspective, the US now has enough photovoltaic capacity to provide electricity for 23 million households.
  • Residential solar panel system costs increased by ~6% in Q2 from Q1, averaging $3.25 per watt installed, before incentives.
  • A typical 6-kW PV system now costs $19,500 before the incentives.

Solar PV remains the fastest growing electricity source in America, representing 39% of power generation capacity installed during the first half of 2022.

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