Solar Panel Reality - My Bill!

Our September '11 bill was about $150 less than Sept '10 and here in this illustration you see that our Oct '11 bill was also about $150 less than a year before. Currently SRP is estimating that our Nov '11 bill will be $15. I'd have to say that the design and work manship of our panels and installation is amazing and will obtain ROI in less than 2 years.

As you can see we are about 10 days from the end of our billing period and we have generated credits on 13 days. We are modifying to the EZ-3 plan where the peak hours are only from 3-6pm which is when we generate power regularly from the solar panels(Currently we are on TOU - Time of Use, and so we don't generate power 5-9am or 5-9pm). Once we are crossed over we show that our bill will go down even more. I'm glad that the panels are working out so well.

Andrew "living the Green" Brown

Officer Brad Jones EOW 10/29/2011

Last night I stood in line for two hours to pay my respects to Officer Brad Jones' family. They graciously thanked me and everyone in that line for coming. The Jones family is amazing and I'm grateful I can call them my friends. The community wanted to somehow honor Officer Brad Jones and the family is allowing this intrusion into their moment of grieving so that they can participate. Thanks Jones family for allowing us all to grieve with you and to honor all that is good about your son Brad Jones.

Andrew "Honored to know Officer Brad Jones" Brown

Phoenix West Maricopa Stake - Mormon Helping Hands Project

Last January I was asked by my Stake President to work with a community within our Stake that would be willing to work with us on National Make a Difference Day (Oct 22 this year). Because we had our youth serve in Tolleson the year before I reached out to Avondale. I sent a letter to the Mayor asking to be put in contact with the appropriate person and a few days later I had an email from Gina.

From the early stages they were excited as they had never done a project of this magnitude before . . . neither had I. I had been part of a project of this size (we initially offered 500 volunteers) but had never been in charge of the entire project. Avondale soon let us know that they'd be interested in a smaller of 250 or so. With this information our Stake Relief Society President was asked to reach out to Tolleson and to make arrangements to be part of their service project on the same day.

One thing led to the next, and an Eagle Scout candidate took on early stages of one house to get it ready for our project. The week arrived and we had a HUGE dinner of 650+ people on Friday night where our Spanish speaking wards prepared an amazing meal. We had a presentation by our Mission President on Mormon Helping Hands in the Haiti earthquake aftermath and then we let the attendants know what was happening at the project the next day. Avondale and Tolleson staff spoke on the great contribution this project would have on the community and expressed their gratitude. It was a totally successful dinner with many contributing to make it all happen.

Saturday began with breakfast burritos being cooked in time for the volunteers to arrive. We fed everyone with plenty left over. We made a last minute change sending 40 of our volunteers to Tolleson as they were short a few volunteers. We then went out to complete our project and our captains working with the Avondale city staff captains was a perfect approach. Our volunteers were assigned to work to their strengths and so youth and mature volunteer's skills were combined for the perfect compliment making each of the houses look amazing and every project was completed in a few hours and people went home knowing that they had accomplished something great.

Afterwards I communicated with staff at Avondale and they were happy with our organizational skills, our ability to take a couple hundred people (380+ participated) and break them into teams, perform meticulous service and work in such a cohesive way. I was so happy to be part of such an amazing organization.

Sunday morning I woke up and had this overwhelming sense of gratitude to all of the key players that had lightened my load and made this project a success. Though I'm sure there were more that I didn't know about, I wrote thank you notes through the morning and then went to our three stake buildings finding those that had contributed to personally deliver the thank you notes.

I know that Mormon Helping Hands is a key way for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to create a positive public affairs image and to give us a way to focus our energy in serving as Christ would have us serve. Our church's image was improved in these two communities and people realize that we care and we want to help and follow Christ's example.

Yesterday I dropped some stuff off at the Avondale staff location and met one of the Avondale captains - she was so impressed and she had one of the smaller team (because we sent 40 people to Tolleson). She had my son on her team and they knocked out the project in a few hours. She just kind of gushed about the project. I was already thrilled with our success and her comments just made the impact much more intense. It's good to be remembered, but better to be remembered in a good way. Success, Success, Success! I couldn't be happier!

Andrew "couldn’t be happier” Brown

4 Decades Old

Yesterday I turned 40, it was a great day and I got to be surrounded by the people I love most. I got calls from distant family members, I got emails and cards from folks I care about.

I'm excited for this next decade as I try and make it the best decade of my life yet. That will be difficult cause I've had some amazing decades already.

Thanks to all of my amazing family for 40 great years, for my friends I've made along the way. The love and loss that has occured has made me who I am today . . . and I am a very happy person!

Andrew "gonna make this decade great" Brown

Nankoweap - Grand Canyon North Rim Hike 2011

Larry Orwig invited me on a trip many moons ago and despite my best efforts to solicit this trip to my friends, Larry and I where the only participants. Nankoweap is classified as the hardest hike in the Grand Canyon National Park but it is also listed with the most rewarding views. I've been to Thunder River and Deer Creek on the North Rim; so envisioning something more rewarding than that really appealed to me.

We started out our hike Friday AM, camping just outside of the park that night so the Saturday AM we could charge our way down into Nankoweap and see those rewarding views. While the distance is only 14 miles from the trail head to the Colorado River, the distance is deceiving since the trail is barely more than a goat trail in the best sections. This made the going slow, lots of climbing over rocks, skirting the edge of a cliff while trying not to slide off into the abyss. In short it took us 1.5 hours from truck to Park perimeter, 1.5 hours to Marion Point (Sat AM), 2 hours to the top of Tilted Mesa, 2+ hours down to Nankoweap campground. The thing is you are level with the South Rim at Tilted Mesa and then you do the complete drop down into the canyon from there, so in 2 hours and 4 miles we dropped 4,000 feet and I was absolutely drained, dehydrated (didn't bring enough water from the truck) and just short of passing out when we got to the river.

So here is the kicker, those amazing views at Nankoweap have been swept away earlier by a flashflood! The entire creek area is no longer sandy beaches and amazing views, it is all now boulders with pockets of sand trapped between them. The beaches are gone and to hike down stream is more like rock hopping. Fortunately I love rock hopping!! We stayed the night getting water from the creek/spring and trying to refuel.

Sunday we hiked down to the Colorado River (2-3 miles) making a detour to the granaries. It was supposed to be a light day since Larry and I had decided to cut our hike one day short since the side trails that we were previously thinking of hiking involved some major elevations and our promised Nankoweap views were no more. Along the Nankoweap confluence and the granaries were occupied with many rafting parties. We got down from the granaries and hung out with some boatmen (guides) refilling our water supply from them and having dinner on the beach downstream from the confluence. We then hiked up to the confluence of Nankoweap and back to camp. At camp we had one more series of refueling and hydrating in preparation of the hike out to Marion Point the next day.

Monday we got up and on the trail at 7am and charged up Tilted Mesa (yeah right). It took us 4 hours to climb (not hike, this was climbing). We got there and met a man "not feeling well" that refused our offers of water, food, minerals etc . . . we later heard back from the Park Service that he and his brother did get out safely. We were worried when he made the comment "This would be a great place to die". Yeah, that's nice for you while we all suffer from survivor’s guilt! Honestly though, we were so worried about getting our own hides out of the abyss, we didn't really know how to get him out too. Hiking from Tilted Mesa to Marion Point was more scary now cause frankly the trail doesn't exist for large portions and is very sketchy in even more places. Many times, hiking out I would step on a "secure" looking part of the trail and watch that part of the "trail" crumble and slide off into the abyss, leaving yet another void for future hikers. At Marion Point (a location that Larry had GRACIOUSLY cached 10 liters of water the weekend before, we had used 3 liters when we were going down, 2 liters was stolen by others and then we had 5 liters for meals and hydration coming out) we setup camp after having endured a slight rain from Tilted Mesa. We got our tents up just in time to dive in as it started pouring on us. After it stopped, we adjusted to ensure a drier experience if it rained again (Thanks Rachel for the suggestion to bring the Shammy - lifesaver!) and then made dinner . . . at this point I enjoyed my meal for 2 so much that I had another (feeling safe with all the water at our cache) and so I ended up eating 4 meals of freeze dried beef stew - DELICIOUS! As fate would have it, it started raining again and so we dove into our tents and then during the hardest part of the rain I heard voices asking if they could share our campsite. We got out after the rain and greeted the new arrivals - 3 men drenched, a day late from their itinerary and loving every minute of it. Shortly after salutations, it rained again and we all went to bed.

Tuesday we got up, Larry was convinced that it had hailed on us through the night but the weather was amazing. Visited with our new friends and parted ways as we hiked the last 3 hours to the truck and headed off for lunch at Marble Canyon, drove through the rain to Phoenix and got home late Tuesday night totally exhausted.

A note on my truck; we had rattled my front bumper off on the way in and I had to reattach that, my battery cable rattled out of its connection, fixed that, my vacuum ball that controls the direction of airflow in the cab had melted against my exhaust the day before the trip and so the air only blew on the windshield, my transmission had just been rebuilt and had some hard shifting, my radiator was brand new but the manufacturer had a defect in this one so it leaked and because of the transmission place, I couldn't start my car sometimes because Park was misaligned. Poor Larry had to endure all of this as I was running around with my tool box addressing everything. Progress Note: to date it's all been fixed except for the hard shifting in the transmission and that is scheduled to be fixed soon.

On a separate note, my anxiety kicked in heavily on this trip, again Larry had to deal with this. For some reason after my hike in 2004 I have had an anxiety about being able to safely hike out despite rain, snow, or darkness. In 2009 I had repeated the hike that initially caused this anxiety and felt like I had slayed my demons. For the most part I had but I guess that I will always have a streak of anxiety. I sure am grateful for Larry's understanding as he was the only person I could share this with. Larry was a great trip leader and made this hike amazing. He made great choices in preparing for the hike, scheduling the hike, and modifying the hike as needed to accommodate our abilities once the realities of the hike occurred. Thank you Larry, it was a great hike!

"I'm a Mormon"

We have . . . FREE POWER!!

Yesterday SRP came out and "blessed" the solar panel configuration and has given us (and SRSW) permission to connect the solar panels to the grid and we started generating free power around 1030am. First day we have produced only 25 kWh of power but we also only used 50 kWh of power from the grid. One of our AC units was offline due to a capacitor going bad and we got that fixed at 8am so that kind of complicated a true reading of how much power we would normally use. I'm excited and am getting a sun tan just walking out and checking the 3 displays on the side of the house trying to figure out how much power is being made and how much weight in carbon emissions I'm saving this world.

So I called the accounting deptartment of SRSW to get "squared away" and the accountant was making comments like "ah geez" when I read the line about getting reimbursed $200 per day after Aug 5th. All in all we will be getting reimbursed a hefty amount and I'm hoping they don't figure it is cheaper just to take me out - ha ha (weak laugh).

So I'm sure that I'm the only one reading my posts but I must say it feels good to be using solar power and I'm anxious to see if my $400 electric bill that SRP was predicting for my next bill actually is at the end of the month.

Bottom line, after patiently waiting for over a year, getting a solar system installed on my roof that will generate 45% of my annual power cost a one time lease fee of $1914. That ROI worked out far better than I ever anticipated but it was a pain to deal with all the delays, failures on SRSW's side to communicate with me etc - still I'd say it was worth it.

Andrwe "living green" Brown

Solar Panels - still no final approval from SRP

So my solar panels have been on the roof for about 6 weeks but Salt River Solar and Wind (SRSW) has been unable to get SRP to come and provide a final inspection. I have recieved 2 city inspections and 2 SRP inspections but to date I haven't received the final SRP inspection which would allow my Solar Panels to actually generate power. So with record temps in Phoenix, I am not receiving the subsidized power from the solar panels on my roof. What a gip!!

The good news is that SRSW is reimburing us $200 per business day that SRP hasn't given final inspection on after Aug 5th. So that means to date I have a credit of$3,200. I can't beleive that SRSW would botch this up so badly, I even emailed them reminding them of this condition in the contract and in typical fashion, I didn't even get a reply from them.

The good news is the city and SRP are really impressed with the workmanship of SRSW employees that do the work on site - that's gotta count for something right? I'm sure hoping that SRSW honors the contract and gives us back the $$ they owe us from missing the cutoff date . . . they have had our $$ since Aug 2010 and this is the best they can do after a year? Crazy!!

Andrew "just want my solar power" Brown

Solar Panels on the Roof!!

Hoot Hoot!! Well complaining to the BBB was an amazing way to go. Complaining to the ROC would have required a lot of work, but still I was about to do it when I was saved by the solar company responding. Thankfully BBB was all on-line and was simple to do. I forwarded the email from BBB stating that I logged a complaint to Salt River Solar and Wind and they suddenly had answers for me and wanted to work something out - what I wanted all along!

So what changed - I accepted an offer to lease the system paying a one-time lease instead of a purchase. The purchase would have been for about 14k out of pocket while this lease is for about $6k. The lease is for 20 years and they will keep the system working for that time period replacing expensive inverters etc as needed. I signed over all of my tax credits, state and federal, and of course the utility rebate.

Even though initially the tax benefits and rebate had the appearance to actually make me $300 more than what my out of pocket costs were, having talked to my tax person clarified that I wouldn't be able to realize all of those tax benefits . . . so best case I would have been able to use up to $4k of the benefits making the true cost about $10k for my panels.

By switching to the one-time lease (don't have to make monthly payments, just pay the approx $6k up front for the 20 year) I won't have to worry about reclaiming $$ from my taxes for the next 5 years. After 20 years we negotiated to have the panels become our property. Speaking of negotiation, we were able to get 2 more panels out of the deal to maximize the size of the system so now instead of having 40% of our power supplied we will have 43.6% of our power from solar power - not a big change but over a year it's about $100. Over the next 20 years it adds up and will help on my ROI.

So while I must say I really worked over the original contract they submitted to me, it paid off, but not as much as having complained to BBB. Yesterday they added the electrical and framework to the roof mounts and put all of the panels under my porch. Early this morning we woke up to the sweet sound of panels being installed on our roof. Now we just need to wait for SRP and the city to bless the panels and we are good to go.

I'm so excited, the excitement I felt in August of '10 is back and if I'm lucky we'll have free solar power by Aug '11. Thanks BBB.

Andrew "Squeaky will gets the grease" Brown

Solar Panels - 10 months after the purchase

Well back in August 2010 I posted that I was excited about getting solar panels for our home and they should be installed by Christmas - HA! We have only progressed to the point where 10 months later we have mounts on our roof but no solar panels. We have watched our original SRP rebate come and go, watched our SRP rebate extension come and go, and now are applying for a new SRP rebate that is about $4k less since we can no longer renew the $10,750 rebate. The good news is that we received in writing from the company that we won't be charged the difference. At the same time they have no idea when our solar panels will get here.

In their defense, solar panels have been getting installed like crazy in solar farms, for businesses, and residence like me since the government started incentivizing us with tax deductions etc. Only 10 years ago solar panels were hardly ever installed and even then it was mostly a solar water heater. So, apparently solar panels have a higher demand than supply. With this being the case and knowing that a 5Kw/h system costs about $25k it seems that customer service would make sure I'm apprised of my ongoing status right?

Well as it turns out, unless they have good news - no news is bad news. And apparently the contractor I went with (Salt River Solar and Wind) doesn't like to spread bad news and so they don't return calls, when you get someone that will respond to you they don't have answers and they are incapable of providing you answers. So I continue to not get answers on my install and just as I'm about to contact BBB and the Registrar of Contractors I get an answer of "hey, we are working on it and we understand you are frustrated" but after another week goes by, still no one can provide and answer. I just sent another inquiry to the company . . . I hope after 10 months I can get an answer. So now I’m looking at the BBB site and it shows that of the 16 solar panel installers, this is the only one with complaints and as I viewed most of the complaints I see that they are all related to delivery. Just our luck.

On the flip side, as of May 1, 2011 the state of Arizona just increased all installs to a tax deduction of $6750 from $1000 so now we can charge more off over the next 5 years so that is worth the wait. I hope the next time I post anything about the solar panels they are installed – if not I’m sure it will be full of legal entanglements we are getting into.

Andrew “hope we get panels soon” Brown

"Unto Whom Much is Given" . . . Shadow Leadership

Today while I was running I thought back to my Canada Winnipeg Mission. My 2nd to last Zone conference had just ended and some of us missionaries were visiting outside of the church building. Suddenly we heard tires squealing from intense breaking, we spun around just in time to catch what appeared to be a blanket flying through the air and papers seeming to explode from the blanket. Then someone said, "Someone’s been hit!" We ran over and found an unknown Elder with his suit jacket flipped over his head as he lay on the ground. We helped him free his head from his jacket and he kept lifting his head and dropping it on the pavement. I ran back to my car and popped the trunk and grabbed our emergency blankets to put under his head. His arms were flailing as he seemed to be reaching for comfort and to be assured that everything was going to be ok. I reached for his hand and held it firm, squeezing it periodically to keep his focus. This was before cell phones and some one had already run into the church to call 911 (an Elder had to shove a sister off the phone because he didn't have time to explain the urgency). I now started checking out this Elder to see what the damage was . . . oh man, how is his knee aimed to the left while his foot is aimed to the right? That must be broken, I looked at his pant leg and there was no blood dripping from it - "Did you guys give him a blessing yet?" Yep, it came from a sister. Here we were, some 20+ missionaries constantly teaching of the priesthood and in the panic of a car accident none of us were composed enough to initiate a priesthood blessing.

My former MTC companion whom I had always detested as our personalities always conflicted took what I thought was the easy route, he administered the anointing of this Elder. When he had completed the anointing I looked up and saw the man that I always had looked up to and admired . . . my Mission President - President Christensen. I moved to give him room to seal the blessing as I looked upon him with eyes of admiration knowing if ever there was a man that could exercise his priesthood and administer to an accident victim and make him whole, it was President Christensen.

"Go ahead Elder Brown." I had not expected President Christensen to defer the sealing of the anointing to me . . . in fact I felt that since I didn't have good feelings towards the person that had just anointed that I should excuse myself . . . but here was a suffering child of God waiting for a blessing!! I silently made amends for my failure to forgive my MTC companion and to hold him blameless for my antagonistic feelings I had every time he came around - the failure was on my part and I made this my responsibility to resolve and did so in a moment. My hands were now on the Elders head along with my MTC companion and my Mission President. A blessing was pronounced. Afterwards I continued to hold this injured Elders hand until the paramedics showed up.

A few days later I visited the Elder in the hospital. He had two bones broken in his leg that required a 6 inch incision for the plate now securely screwed in place. He was released from the hospital the same time that we were to have regular transfers. He became my last companion as I was about to culminate two years of service.

In the last month, I washed his wound and dressed it 2-3 times a day as he currently wasn't able to keep it free of infection. Soon the infection was gone and it was showing a nice pink as it quickly healed. We baptized a mother and daughter that month - political refugees that had sought refuge by immigrating to Canada. We had choice experiences as I catered to his needs but ultimately as we taught this family on the second floor of the apartments, he had to hop up the flight of stairs to be with them and teach.

I look back and I think of President Christensen, why hadn't he led? How did he know that the little kid that I was, needed the purifying realization that my harbored feelings towards my MTC companion needed to be detoxified? How did he know that I needed to pronounce this blessing upon this Elder to have my faith and understanding expanded? I don't think he did know, I think that he was expert in practicing shadow leadership. He allowed me, the untrained, and the inexperienced, to feel the gravity of that situation and to have the chance to grow from it as I exercised the priesthood.

I learned plenty from President Christensen. He had shared the story of his daughter and her near death as he was a young father and the faith that he exercised in asking Heavenly Father for her to live. Not even 2 years later I would hold my own firstborn's lifeless body and with President Christensen's pattern before me I would exercise my faith and my priesthood in asking Heavenly Father to give my infant son life and to allow him to stay on this Earth in our family. We still had to perform CPR, suck fluid out of his lungs; but life was given to our son who is now 17 years old.

Thanks to all of you who practice shadow leadership - to allow people like me to benefit from real life experiences as we struggle to grow and understand the things that will bring us happiness.

Andrew "Been-In-Many-Great-Shadows" Brown

Tons of Good News

Yesterday was a day of lots of good news. It started out with an email announcing the mission call of my Aunt & Uncle, Janet and Dennis, have been called to serve a mission at Cape Verde. It is a former colony of Portugal off the western coast of Africa. 4 Islands make up the country. They will be missionaries with the Perpetual Education program for the church and will be speaking Portuguese, a language he learned on his mission in Brazil. I'm so thrilled for them and the example they are to the rest of us!

Glory's sister has been trying to have a baby with her husband for several years and we just learned that a recent procedure was successful. She is pregnant after 10 years of trying! Now we wait to find out if it will be a single child, twins, or triplets!! We are so happy for her and her husband who have always been great with children.

We received a text during our family scripture reading last night. Apparently our son who does regular exchanges with the missionaries did some old fashion tracting on one of the nights. He ran into Patricia Sanchez, a 20 year old lady who had just finished praying for answers in her life. Because she was more comfortable speaking Spanish, the La Joya ward missionaries continued to teach her and she was baptized last night. A flurry of texts were exchanged with the missionaries to catch him up on the excitement. What a thrill to know that our kid has had a successful tracting experience before he has even gone on a mission.

Finally, yesterday we visited with the Estrella ward missionaries and they let us know that the folks that we had over to our home on March 5th have continued to receive the missionaries and are enjoying the message that they have to share. We knew we should have this activity at our house and we invited many of our Spanish speaking neighbors and our friends Lucy and Carlos Rivas. We had a great night and the missionaries shared a brief spiritual message in Spanish. We felt a bit left out but we knew our purpose of having the get together was being fulfilled. We hope to hear continued good news and hope the missionaries will take advantage of the natural friendship Lucy and Carlos developed with our neighbors.

I was really amazed that so many amazing things were realized yesterdays and just wanted to leave a quick blurb that life is good.

Kensie Brown - Hair Designer/Colourist

My sister Kensie recently moved back from Kirkland, WA after 16 months of working as an Assistant and Hair Designer/Colourist. She had the experience of a life time but Arizona has called her back and it is time for her to start her own business here in Phoenix.

Growing her client base in a new area in the hair industry can be very tedious and just plain hard. That is why I need your help and referrals to start the word of mouth. Below is a link that connects to the Salons website where she works. All you have to do is fill out your name, email, and choose HAIR as your voucher and as a first time client you will receive 50% OFF your service(s).

http://www.salon3121.com/id69.html

If you agree that her service is exceptional, all I ask in return is that you tell people about her.

Please forward this message to a friend so that the word of mouth can spread...

Kensie's Accomplishments:
The Academy of Cosmetology 2008-2009
Redken Product and Color line 2008-2011
Redken Creative Color Academy 2010
Hollywood House of Hair 2010
American Crew Line 2010

Children First Academy - so COOL!

One of my business customers is a school in downtown Phoenix that focuses on "at-risk" students and homeless children. In their attempt to provide these children with the tools they will need in life, they teach some truths that I find very refreshing. One sign had always caught my eye since the first day I visited the school. This weekend I took a picture of it.

Everything in this school is setup to give children the understanding they need to break the cycle of being at risk, for being homeless. The school has amazing teachers and administrators. My son earned his Eagle Scout award by performing his Eagle Project there. My second son is now gearing up to repeat this action as he is learning to make contact and follow up with the service/volunteer director for the school.

Above the school principles office is this saying: "We teach them correct principles, and let them govern themselves." How cool is that? This philosophy is why I think Children's First Academy (CFA) is so cool!

Children's First Academy, thanks for all you do for the community and for allowing the community to serve you.

(if you can't read the picture, this is what it says:
I am NOT the experience nor actions of my parents
It matters not how I became
But that I am
I am courage
I am compassion
I am hope
I am strong . . . I am here
You cannot define me as I choose who I become
I am the future