“We have no trees around our house, we get beat to death by the sunlight, so we’ve been discussing how can we better use that sunlight since it’ll take 50 years to grow a tree to cover some shade, so one of the things we came up with was the solar idea,” says San Angelo homeowner, Donald Barnhart.

“Especially as the summer kicks in and the heat gets really high, people are trying to save on their electric bills,” says Solar CenTex representative, Kayla Donahue.

“Can’t lie about that, that’s one of the benefits of solar is being able to feed your own electric power,” says Barnhart.

The Barnhart’s electric bill averages around $230 a month. So, the family turned to San Angelo’s first solar panel company, Solar CenTex for their install.

“We anticipate as this system takes hold and everything starts flowing and running correctly that we could possibly knock that down to as low as $50 to $60,” says Barnhart.

“It’s really low maintenance and at the end of the day you’re being green. So, people love to say that and so they can be green while saving green,” says Donahue.

“I relied on them a lot to help me out and tell me what would be best for our area and our usage, so relied on them of a lot of that,” says Barnhart.

A solar panel system can cost anywhere from $10,000 to $30,000 depending on the usage needed.

” In a couple of years as the savings go, we’ll make back the difference it’ll cost us to have this put in,” says Barnhart.