Wexus (Water-Energy-Nexus) Blog. Insights for driving impact and efficiency with IoT technology

How to Use Your Solar ROI Dashboard

Written by Chris Terrell | May 17, 2024

Track your Solar ROI in real time. 

 

How Can I Sign Up for a Free Demo with My Data?

If you’d like more information about how Wexus software can maximize your solar $ ROI and drive efficiency across your operation, click here to schedule a demo and free proposal or email us at ops@wexusapp.com.

What Is the Solar ROI Dashboard?

Wexus is dedicated to helping our customers save money, energy and time.

We take the pain out of stacks of utility solar bills and mountains of utility meter data so you can quickly find the value of your solar investment and ensure it's performing as designed.

We've created a first-of-its kind Solar ROI Dashboard with unique features to help you automatically track and optimize your solar bills and costs ($) as well as maintenance.

  • Quickly see your solar energy production and credits (kWh) versus your actual on-site energy usage from single or multiple solar arrays.
  • Instead of sifting through piles of confusing utility bills every month, you can quickly see your total solar savings $ on a monthly, annual, and true-up basis - and compare against your estimated cost without solar (i.e. what you WOULD HAVE spent). 

 

What Drives the Solar Dashboard?

With the Solar Dashboard, Wexus grabs your solar bills and utility meter data on a daily basis.

Wexus then automatically displays your Cost With Solar and estimated Cost Without Solar and Net $ Savings to ensure your investment is performing at its best - or to identify areas of improvement.

 

How Can the Solar Dashboard Detect Equipment Issues?

With the Solar Dashboard, it's easy to detect in real time any under-producing or non-producing solar arrays. Energy production will be reduced month-month or in some cases fall to zero. Some common causes of under-producing solar arrays we've seen over many years include:

  • dirty or damaged panels that need washing (due to dirt, pollen, wildfire ash) or replacement (due to hail storms, vandalism, etc)
  • damaged, malfunctioning or improperly installed inverters that need to be reset or replaced
  • damaged, malfunctioning or improperly installed single-axis racking systems that are no longer tracking the sun's motion

Monthly Solar Report: Right to your inbox

Wexus automatically pushes the solar information you need straight to your email inbox every month. No more sifting through utility bills to figure out how much $ you're saving with solar - or spending hours trying to figure out your true-up credits. 

This is a great way to identify potential equipment / maintenance or account billing issues BEFORE they become a larger problem and BEFORE your solar array "drifts" for months without producing the expected ROI. 

 

Energy Credited vs Used Chart: How we calculate your energy production vs consumption

This chart shows 3 different values:

1) Light Green bar: how much energy your solar array was credited (i.e. excess energy sent back to the grid) by your utility company for a particular month.

  • This shows the excess energy produced by your solar array - AFTER accounting for the total energy consumed on site by any equipment tied to the array.
  • This data is pulled directly from your utility meters.

2) Orange bar: how much energy your equipment tied to this solar array used/consumed for a particular month - like HVAC, lighting, irrigation pumps, etc.

  • This data is pulled directly from your utility meters.

(3) Grey popup box: the total 'net energy' for this solar array i.e. the total amount of energy credited back to the electric grid minus the total amount of energy used/consumed on site.

  • A negative amount shows you CONSUMED MORE ENERGY ON SITE than was credited back to the electric grid.
  • A positive amount shows you CONSUMED LESS ENERGY ON SITE than was credited back to the electric grid.

You can toggle between three different time periods:

  • annual true up
  • annual calendar year
  • month

Note: if there are any months with missing data, this is most likely due to the cadence of your utility billing cycle. Calendar days/months don't always match with utility billing days/months. For example, not every single meter/billing account will have an available bill on the first of the month.

This information may be backfilled later, after the actual utility bill arrives in your utility's database system. You may also see two bills appearing in the same calendar month, which may explain a month with no generation/usage and the next month with very high generation/usage.

We'll also enter default values for your solar proposal/equipment specification data. To improve accuracy of this chart, send us a copy of your original solar proposal.

 

Total Spent Chart: How we calculate your solar bills

This chart shows 2 different colored bars depending on the type of data Wexus has available from your utility provider:

1) Light Green bar: how much your actual solar utility bill was for a particular month.

  • This is pulled directly from your utility's billing data.

2) Dark Green bar: how much your estimated utility bill would have been for a particular month if you had NOT installed solar.

  • This amount is estimated based on your utility meter's usage data and utility rate plan, including energy and power/demand charges.

Break Even Analysis Chart

This chart shows how your solar array is performing in line with your original solar proposal estimate.
  • The grey line shows the original estimate based on your solar proposal/pro forma or default values.
  • The green line shows your actual performance from your utility meters, utility bills, and from your original solar proposal (i.e. equipment specification data and pro forma).
  • You can toggle between three different time periods: annual true-up, annual calendar year, and month.

    Note: The platform will enter default values for your solar proposal/equipment specification data. To improve the accuracy of the data, send us a copy of your original solar proposal or pro forma.

Solar Use By Equipment

This chart shows how much solar energy each piece of equipment consumed from your solar array in percentage terms.

This is very useful for determining where your largest energy consumers are, and whether you need to reduce - or add - energy loads to the array. This can help balance your production vs consumption and resulting solar credits to maximize your $ ROI.

  • Wexus pulls this data from your utility meters.

*Note: the data may be grouped by equipment type or by each piece of equipment, depending on how your Wexus account is set up.

 

Weather Chart

This chart shows how much solar radiation was produced in your local area and how the weather - like cloud cover, rain, fog, hail, etc - may have affected your array's production. 

  • This data is obtained from the nearest weather station with your zip code.

Energy Offset 

This chart shows how much energy your solar array produced - based on the design and size of the array - versus how much energy you consumed on site.


How Can I Sign Up for a Free Demo with My Data?

That's a quick review of the Solar ROI Dashboard in the Wexus software platform.

If you’d like more information about how Wexus software can maximize your solar $ ROI and drive efficiency across your operation, click here to schedule a demo and free proposal or email us at ops@wexusapp.com.