User Guide
How to run an honest solar analysis in ten minutes — and how to read what it tells you.
1 · What Sunalysis is
Sunalysis treats a solar quote like an investment decision, not a sales pitch. You give it a handful of real numbers — what you pay for power, what the system costs, what it will produce — and it plays out thirty years of honest math: bill savings, battery behavior, electric-vehicle fuel, appliance conversions, maintenance, replacements, insurance, resale, and a fair fight against simply putting the same money in the stock market.
Three rules explain everything about how it behaves:
- Nothing is hidden. Every number traces to an input you can see, a default that is labeled, or a source that is named. Print the report and the assumptions print with it.
- Everything is editable. Every default is a starting point, not a verdict. Type over any of them and the whole analysis recomputes instantly.
- When in doubt, it under-promises. No tax credits assumed, no incentive income assumed, exports valued at your market's real (usually low) credit rate, and the market comparison is after-tax.
2 · Your two helpers: the ⓘ bubbles & Ask Sunalysis
Before touching a single input, know that help is built into every screen — you are never more than one tap from an explanation. These two helpers are why you don't need to memorize this guide.
The ⓘ info bubbles
Nearly every field, chart, and result has a small ⓘ beside it. Tap it and a plain-English note explains that exact thing: what the field means, where its default came from, and what changing it does. When a number surprises you, the ⓘ beside it is the fastest answer there is. (This guide's expandable "ⓘ More" boxes work the same way — tap any of them for the deeper story.)
Ask Sunalysis — the built-in AI assistant
How to open it: tap the “💬 Ask Sunalysis” button floating in the bottom-right corner (on phones it's also a tab). The same conversation follows you everywhere the Ask box appears.
How to use it:
- Start with the suggested questions. They're grouped by topic (Payback & returns, EVs & electrification, batteries…) and answer instantly from your own numbers — no waiting, no internet round-trip.
- Or type anything in plain English. "Why is my payback 11 years?" · "Is my battery too small?" · "What happens if rates rise faster?" · "Explain my export credit like I'm ten."
- Ask "what if" questions. This is the special trick: "What if I add a heat pump and one more battery?" — the assistant recomputes your actual analysis with the hypothetical change and gives you the resulting payback, return, and 30-year figures, without touching your inputs. New in v8.5, it covers eleven inputs: your electricity rate, annual usage, rate escalation, system cost, production, battery size and unit count, the outage reserve, EVs, appliance electrifications, and the hold period. (For a monthly-bill what-if it converts your bill to usage with your own rate and says so.)
- Ask about the charts themselves (new in v8.5). The assistant can read your 14-day Simulated Daily Energy Flow for any month ("Why is day 10 of July so low?" · "What does January look like?") and your year-by-year ledger ("What's my invested balance in year 12?" · "When do I pass $100k?") — computed answers from the same simulation and tables you see on screen, not guesses.
How the assistant works (and the Claude connection)
There are two layers. Layer one is instant and built-in: the common questions are answered directly inside your browser from your current results — tap, read, done. Layer two is the AI: when you type a question that needs real reasoning, it may be run through a Claude AI agent (Claude is Anthropic's AI model) to generate an accurate response. The agent is briefed on how this calculator works and answers from your current numbers — and for "what if" questions it can ask the calculator to re-run your scenario with the change and report the real result, computed by the same engine that computed your headline.
As of v8.5 the AI layer runs on Claude Opus — Anthropic's most capable model tier — chosen for the multi-step reasoning the new calculation tools require. When it needs a number, it asks your browser to compute it on the same audited engine that renders your screen, then answers from the real result.
If the AI is ever unreachable (you're offline, for example), the assistant falls back to its instant built-in answers — the feature never breaks. And per the privacy note above: no login, no account, nothing tied to your identity.
3 · Before you start: gather three things
| Get this | Where from | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| A recent electricity bill (the monthly amount you pay, and your annual kWh if shown) | Your utility's app or a paper bill | Your bill ÷ your kWh is your real price of power — more accurate than any regional average. |
| The installer quote, if you have one | Your installer | Two numbers matter most: the net cost (after incentives) and the estimated annual production in kWh. |
| Optional: your Green Button file | Your utility's website — look for "Download my data" or "Green Button" | Your actual hour-by-hour usage. Sunalysis reads it to fill your monthly usage automatically and sharpen the analysis with your real daily pattern. |
No quote yet? Fine — check "No installer quote yet?" in section 1 and Sunalysis designs a system for you, which you can then take to installers as your benchmark.
4 · How the calculator thinks (the map)
Sunalysis computes everything once, in order, from one set of inputs — so it helps to know what flows into what:
| You enter… | It drives… | You see it in… |
|---|---|---|
| Your region / state (always first) | Default electricity rate, export/credit rules (California = NEM 3.0 net billing), solar seasonality, gasoline price, tax treatment — every default downstream | The header badge; every defaulted field; the report's assumptions page |
| Monthly bill + annual kWh | Your real blended rate ($/kWh = bill ÷ usage) — replaces the regional default the moment both exist | "Calculated from bill" note under the rate field; every savings figure |
| System net cost + annual production | The core return: payback, IRR, 30-year net | The header bar; everywhere |
| 12 monthly kWh (optional grid) | Seasonal accuracy. Takes over from your annual figure only when all 12 months are filled. | Month-by-month chart; seasonal report page |
| Green Button upload (optional) | Fills the monthly grid for complete months AND refines the used-at-home vs exported split from your real daily pattern | "Measured" labels; Energy Security; sharper payback/IRR |
| Battery choice | Evening self-use, time-of-use shifting, and the Energy Security layer | Battery results: Energy Security score, the savings-vs-independence chart, Ownership tier |
| EVs + appliance conversions | The "multiplier": fuel and gas-bill money you stop spending, plus the new electric load your roof must feed | Solar-budget bar; electrification pages of the report |
| Financing choice (cash / loan / lease) | Cash and loan show ownership returns; lease/PPA switches to an honest "is this lease worth it" analysis | Header bar; "How are you paying?" |
| Hold period, market return, tax rates | The market comparison — solar vs the same dollars invested | "Compare to market investing" |
5 · Where to start, and why
- Quick Estimate — a guided, numbered flow; a trustworthy answer in about ten minutes. Start here.
- Full Analysis — every lever: exact tariffs, month-by-month data, battery models, panel models, financing detail, taxes. Graduate here when you have a quote in hand or want the printable, defensible version.
6 · Quick Estimate — section by section
Running example (California): a home paying $300/month, quoted $30,000 net for a system producing 13,000 kWh/year.
§1 — Your system & energy details
- No quote yet? Tick the checkbox at the top and Sunalysis sizes a system from your usage instead — skip the cost fields and come back when quotes arrive.
- Gross cost, then net cost. Gross = the full contract price; net = what you actually pay after incentives. Net drives your return.
- Annual production — from the quote ("Year-1 production: 13,000 kWh"). The ANNUAL/MONTHLY toggle accepts either form.
- Your current usage and bill. Enter both if you can — together they compute your real rate.
- Usage timing — pick the day-pattern that sounds like your household (home in the day / out until evening / balanced). It shapes how much solar you use directly vs export.
- Upload your real data (optional). The upload card takes your utility's Green Button file (CSV or XML) — it fills the 12 monthly kWh for complete months and sharpens the split with your real pattern. Already have solar? Use the Enphase production button for your solar data instead.
Gross vs. net cost — why both, and which goes where
Example: contract price $30,000, minus a $9,000 tax credit → gross $30,000, net $21,000. Net is your real money at risk, so payback/IRR/net gain use it. Gross is what the hardware is actually worth, so insurance and resale value use it. Enter both when the quote shows both; if you only enter net, Sunalysis works fine and simply treats the hardware value conservatively. Common mistake: putting the after-incentive price in both boxes overstates nothing — but putting the pre-incentive price in the net box makes your payback look ~30% worse than reality.
Bill, kWh, or both — what should I enter?
Both is best: $300/mo ÷ 12,000 kWh/yr = $0.30/kWh — your true blended price, automatically used everywhere. Bill only: Sunalysis estimates your kWh from the regional rate — decent start, less precise. kWh only: it prices your usage at the regional default rate. The note under the rate field always tells you which source is active, so you're never guessing.
What does the usage-timing choice actually change?
Solar makes power midday; the question is whether you're home to use it. "Home during the day" → more solar used directly (worth your full retail rate); "out until evening" → more exported (worth only the credit rate — in California a few cents). Two identical homes can differ by hundreds of dollars a year on timing alone. If you upload a Green Button file, your measured pattern replaces this guess entirely.
§2 — How are you paying?
Cash, loan, or lease/PPA — this one choice sets the lens for your whole return:
- Cash — the classic view: you pay once, savings pay you back, everything after payback is yours.
- Loan — enter the rate and term; Sunalysis shows the levered version (little money down, interest counted, breakeven shifts accordingly).
- Lease / PPA — you don't own the system, so "payback" doesn't apply; the calculator switches to the only honest lease question: do the payments beat the bills they replace — and when does the annual escalator catch up?
Cash vs. loan vs. lease — a 60-second decision guide
Cash maximizes lifetime gain (no interest) and suits money that would otherwise sit in low-yield savings. Loan keeps your cash free; if the loan rate is well below your solar return, the leverage works in your favor — enter your actual quoted APR and watch the header strip. Lease/PPA means the escalator is everything: a 0% (fixed) escalator is the safest structure; a 3%+ escalator can quietly outgrow the utility savings in later years — the analysis will show you exactly when, if ever.
§3 — Refine your analysis (3.1 · 3.2 · 3.3)
3.1 · Add a battery
Pick a real model (warranty, chemistry, and usable kWh shown) or set a custom size. The battery earns money two ways — using more of your own solar after sunset, and shifting energy into expensive evening hours — and both are computed honestly, degradation and future replacement included.
Do I even want a battery? (California vs. 1:1 states)
Under net billing (California NEM 3.0): exports earn pennies while evening grid power costs ~10× more, so storing your surplus instead of selling it is where the money is — the battery is usually the deal. Under 1:1 net metering (some other states): the grid already credits you at retail, so a battery adds little arbitrage value — its worth is backup power, and Sunalysis will tell you exactly that rather than invent savings. Either way, the "Savings vs. independence" chart in the results shows what each added kWh actually buys you — in bill savings and in hours of independence (two lines, your pack marked on both).
3.2 · Add an electric vehicle
Set how many EVs, miles per year, and when you charge. The savings are real but come mostly from gasoline you stop buying — priced honestly against the electricity the car now uses.
Overnight vs. daytime charging — why the window matters
Charge overnight (the typical commuter) and most charging electricity comes from the grid — the EV still wins big, because even full-price electricity beats gasoline (~$1–2 equivalent per "gallon"). Charge daytime (work-from-home, weekend driver) and your own panels feed the car nearly free. Pick the window that matches your life; Sunalysis prices each honestly rather than assuming the sunny best case.
3.3 · Add appliance electrification
Tick what you'd convert — heat pump, water heater, stove, dryer, pool. Each shows the fuel money you stop spending and the electricity it adds. The $/yr box shows the modeled fuel saving; if you know your real number, type it and yours wins (marked "your figure" everywhere it appears).
Why an appliance can show a small — or negative — saving
The honest math: fuel avoided minus what the new electricity costs you. With cheap natural gas and expensive electricity, an induction stove might save $80 of gas but cost $85 of power — a small negative is the truth, not an error, and the real wins there are comfort, air quality, and dropping the gas line. Expensive fuels (propane, heating oil) are usually big wins. The full reconciliation is on the report's "Your home: gas vs. electric" page.
§4 — My system analysis
Nothing to enter here — this section reads back what your inputs imply: whether the quoted system is sized sensibly for your usage (or, in no-quote mode, what size you'd need), roughly what a battery would back up in an outage, and your solar-supplied picture. Use it to sanity-check a quote before you sign: an oversized system exports cheap power; an undersized one leaves savings on the table. There's also a metering selector (1:1 vs net billing) if your utility's scheme differs from the state default.
§5 — How long will you stay in this home?
Slide your realistic horizon. Solar isn't a trap if you move — the system adds to the sale price — and this section shows where you'd land if you sold in year 5, 10, or 15: savings banked so far plus the home-value premium, minus what you put in. The chip on the card shows your at-sale position live.
How the home-value premium is estimated
A per-watt method from published research (LBNL's Selling Into the Sun and Zillow analyses), capped at the hardware's installed cost and aged down as the system gets older — a directional estimate, clearly labeled, not an appraisal. The conservative reading: even at year 5, premium + banked savings usually beats having done nothing.
§6 — Compare to market investing
The brave question most solar tools won't ask: would the same money simply do better in the stock market? Sunalysis invests your exact cost at a market rate (default 10%, editable), taxes the gains the way they'd really be taxed (your state included), and puts the two side by side. Solar's edge: its "returns" are tax-free bill savings, immune to market crashes, and stacked on top of a home-value premium.
Fair mode vs. Skeptic's View
Fair mode nets out real-world investing frictions (fund fees, the behavior gap) — the return a normal investor actually keeps. Skeptic's View gives the market its rawest, most generous number. If solar still wins in Skeptic's View, the case is bulletproof; if it's close, the honest answer is "both are good uses of money" — and the tool will say so.
7 · Full Analysis — section by section
Running example (California): a $90,000 whole-home project producing 30,000 kWh/yr, home using 20,000 kWh/yr, with a Powerwall 3, two EVs, and a heat-pump HVAC + water-heater conversion.
① Your energy baseline
Your pre-solar life: usage, bill, rates. This is where accuracy lives:
- Retail rate — auto-calculated from bill ÷ kWh when both exist; the note beneath always names the active source. Override with your exact tariff anytime.
- Export / NEM credit — what the utility pays for exports. California's default (~$0.03–0.08) is deliberately low because that's the NEM 3.0 reality.
- Time-of-use windows — if your plan has peak pricing (California's 4–9 pm), enter the rate and hours; battery value is computed from them.
- The month-by-month grid — type 12 monthly kWh from your bills (or let a Green Button upload fill them).
The grid's two safety rules
(1) The grid takes over from your annual figure only when all 12 months are entered — a half-filled grid never silently changes results; the annual number stays in charge and the helper text says so. (2) An upload auto-fills only months it covers nearly completely (≥85% of days); partial months are flagged for you to type. Both rules exist so incomplete data can never quietly understate your usage.
Time-of-use in one example
Suppose off-peak is $0.30 and 4–9 pm is $0.60. Evening is exactly when your panels stop producing — so without a battery you're buying the expensive hours from the grid. A battery charged on your free midday surplus discharges into the $0.60 window: that spread, times the energy shifted, times ~365, is the battery's arbitrage income — computed with round-trip losses and degradation included.
② Solar system
Everything from Quick §1, plus the deeper levers: pick your actual panel model (its first-year settling and yearly degradation feed the 30-year math; a what-if compares panels side by side), enter installer monthly production estimates if you have them, or let "No installer quote yet?" design the array and battery for you.
How good is the production number on my quote?
Installers estimate production with shading and orientation software — usually decent, occasionally sunny-side. Cross-checks: (a) the ⓘ shows your region's typical kWh-per-kW — divide your quote's production by its kW and compare; (b) after signing, upload real production (Enphase) and see; (c) the ±15% sensitivity band shows your result if the estimate runs hot or cold. If the deal only works at +15%, that's worth knowing before you sign.
③ Battery storage
Same decision as Quick 3.1 with full control: number of units, usable-capacity override, degradation rate, reserve floor for backup, and the replacement year and cost (defaulted to the warranty term — edit or untick to suit). The results' "Savings vs. independence" chart shows what one more unit really buys — more bill savings, or independence only.
New in v8.4.4 — the outage reserve now drives the whole analysis. The "Reserve held for outages" slider lives on the redesigned Energy Security tile (which now shows your energy self-supply and your time-on-own-power side by side, each labeled). Because a battery kWh held back for a blackout can't also shift daytime sun into your evening, moving the slider recomputes everything live: your solar-supplied %, your Energy Security, and — in most regions — your payback, IRR and savings. The one exception is 1:1 net metering, where exporting and re-importing a kWh net to the same retail credit, so a battery there is backup value only and the reserve leaves your bill unchanged (it still moves your self-supply %).
④ Electrification
Quick §3.2/3.3 with the hood open: per-appliance fuel type (gas / propane / oil — propane and oil conversions save far more), run-window (a pool timer runs on solar; cooking happens at dinner), seasonal month chips (heat the pool May–September only), equipment-cost option (charge each conversion's upfront premium into a blended return), and per-EV mileage, efficiency, insurance and premium fields.
"Include equipment costs in ROI" — what that toggle does
Off (default): the analysis assumes you'd replace dying appliances anyway and counts only the operating savings. On: enter each conversion's incremental premium (heat-pump water heater price minus the ordinary tank you'd have bought) and Sunalysis shows a second, blended return with that equipment charged at year 0 — the honest all-in figure, side by side with the solar-only one.
⑤ System analysis
The same read-back as Quick §4, with more instrumentation: sizing verdict against your (now electrified) load, backup-power estimate for your battery choice, solar-supplied share, and the design optimizer's view if you're in no-quote mode.
⑥ Financing
Split in v8.3: what used to be one long section is now two — ⑥ Financing (how you pay) and ⑦ Moving, repairs & insurance (what ownership really costs). Same controls, same math; each now has its own card and its own chip in the jump bar.
Cash/loan/lease details (Quick §2's engine room). Your financing choice is the single biggest lever on your return — cash and loan show ownership returns; lease/PPA switches to an honest "is this lease worth signing?" analysis instead.
⑦ Moving, repairs & insurance
The long-run ownership costs: the resale-premium method and sale-year (what the system adds to your home if you move), the maintenance reserve, inverter replacement by inverter type, and the insurance line — every deduction the headline already subtracts, visible and editable.
The costs people forget (already counted here)
A maintenance reserve on a five-year cycle, an inverter replacement in the mid-life years (type-dependent), your battery's future replacement, and a home-insurance bump that escalates — all already subtracted from every headline figure. That's why Sunalysis numbers can look slightly lower than a glossy brochure's: the brochure didn't subtract them.
⑧ Investment comparison
Quick §6's assumptions, exposed: the market return (default 10% gross), your hold period, your federal bracket and state capital-gains rate (pre-filled from your state at 2026 law, editable — labeled "up to X%" because it's a top-bracket estimate), the risk-free alternative, and Skeptic's View. If your state pays SREC / incentive income (NJ, PA, MD, DE, OH, VA, WV, DC, MA, IL), the SREC field appears in the baseline section automatically — enter your installer's estimate and its program years; it's never assumed and it's flagged as taxable.
8 · Reading your results on screen
- Payback — the year accumulated savings equal what you spent. After that, each year's net savings are money ahead (scheduled costs like a battery replacement still land in their year — already counted).
- IRR — the return rate of the whole 30-year cash flow, tax-free (bill savings aren't income). Compare it to the ~7–10% people hope for from markets, pre-tax.
- Net gain · 30 yr — everything in, everything out, over your hold period.
- Solar-Supplied % (formerly Self-Powered %) — the share of your home's electricity supplied by your own solar + battery.
Deeper layers below the headline: the Energy Security score (how much of the year, played hour-by-hour, you'd run on your own power) with the "Savings vs. independence" battery chart (two lines — bill savings and hours of independence — with your pack marked on both) and your Energy Ownership tier; the Solar Window Reward (what each kWh moved into solar hours is worth under net billing); the year-1 accounting (every dollar of the first year, itemized); the month-by-month chart; the market comparison; and the ±15% band on the headline — a decision that survives the low end is a safe decision.
Why two lines? Money and independence are different questions
The teal line counts energy: of all the kWh your home uses in a year, how much do you supply yourself? Every self-supplied kWh is one you don't buy, so this is the bill-savings view. It flattens at a “knee” because the battery's job is the night — once it can hold a typical night's worth, there's little energy left to capture. Deep night at a home is a refrigerator and standby loads: many hours, few kWh.
The orange line counts hours: of the year's 8,760 hours, how many does your home run entirely on its own power? It keeps climbing after the teal line flattens, for the same reason in reverse — a bigger pack bridges deeper into winter nights, converting many grid-touching hours into solar-supplied ones while moving almost no dollars.
How to use it: the battery size where the teal line flattens is the right size for your wallet. Anything past that is an independence purchase — more of the year without the grid — worth it if outages, rising rates, or self-reliance matter to you, but it won't meaningfully cut your bill, and Sunalysis won't pretend otherwise. (Under 1:1 net metering only the orange line appears — exports earn full retail credit there, so battery size barely changes your bill either way.)
What's new in v8.5 on the results screen
The savings-vs-market chart answers first, proves second. "Your savings vs. the market — year by year" now opens with a three-chip verdict strip — payback year, the year-30 solar path, and the same money left in the market, with a ✓ on the winner. On the chart itself: a "Paid off" marker sits where your line crosses zero, each line prints its year-30 value at its end so the final ranking reads at a glance, hovering a year lists every line's value in the same top-to-bottom order as the lines, and clicking a line spotlights it (the others dim and a chip names it — click empty space to bring them all back).
A copy correction worth knowing: the reinvestment projection invests each year's savings starting in year 1, not after payback — the engine always computed it that way (that's the standard fair comparison, since the market side's lump sum also works from day one), and some older on-screen wording said otherwise. The Reinvestment Case's "Show me the year-by-year math" table now states plainly that the "Saved that year" column is exactly what the 100% path invests (the 50% path invests half), with a worked year-1 example.
The 14-day simulation got three refinements: a physics guard caps every simulated day at ~8 kWh per kW of your array (the excess is spread over the other days so the month still reconciles); a battery footnote in the "How to read this chart" dropdown explains why a day can self-supply a little more than it produced (the pack carries charge across midnight — nothing is ever created over the full cycle); and a month-totals strip under the share bar shows the month's real produced/used kWh plus the 14 days' sky mix.
The month-by-month chart, explained (new in 8.3)
The Monthly accounting chart in the Drivers tab now opens with a plain-language key. Each month gets one column: everything above the 0 line is what your solar produced (teal = used at home, orange = exported), the grey bar below the 0 line is power you still bought, and the dark line is the grid net — exports minus imports, read on the right-hand axis. Every term has its own ⓘ bubble with a worked example, including the two-axes distinction (bars read left, line reads right — different scales, so compare bars with bars).
The Simulated Daily Energy Flow (new in 8.3)
Directly below the monthly chart lives a day-level view: two typical weeks for any month (tap a month chip, Jan–Dec). It is built from your actual monthly result — system size, battery, EVs and appliances included — and only the day-to-day weather pattern is simulated (sunny, partly cloudy, cloudy, rain, storm). The simulated days are balanced so the two weeks average back to your month's real numbers: sunny days sit above your true daily average, storms below it.
Tap any day's column for its numbers: produced, home used, solar-supplied, exported, grid-supplied, and grid net. With a battery configured, the violet dashed curve shows the pack's charge hour by hour on the right axis (0–100%): it sits at its low at dawn — the evening and night have drawn it down — refills through the morning (typically full by mid-morning on clear days), and drains again after sunset into the next day's dawn. Whatever is left at dawn carries forward; the pack never resets overnight. The dotted line is your outage reserve (set on the Battery tab, default 15%) — the slice never spent on everyday cycling. Pinch the chart (or use the − / + buttons) to stretch the 14-day view and inspect any day hour by hour — zooming is purely visual, so every number stays exactly the same. The day tiles read the curve for you: battery at dawn (the day's low), peak charge with the hour it was reached, evening + overnight draw, and next dawn — and day N's “next dawn” always equals day N+1's dawn, so you can follow the charge from day to day.
On your phone: the collapsing bars (new in 8.3)
On phones and foldables, the header, results strip, Quick/Full tabs, section-jump chips, and the results navigation (Drivers · Comparison · Evidence · Audit & context) all slide away as you scroll down, leaving a thin sliver with your live headline numbers — Payback, IRR, Net gain, Solar-supplied — so the whole screen belongs to the content. Scroll up any amount, or tap the sliver, and everything returns. The jump chips know which mode you're in and carry you straight to any section.
Your session also survives a reload now: close the app, fold your phone, come back — your region, mode, inputs and place are restored (for up to 14 days). The one thing that cannot survive a reload is an uploaded data file (Green Button usage, Enphase production); the app shows a notice and takes you to the upload card to re-attach it, and until you do, results are computed from the model rather than your measured hours.
9 · The printed report
The executive summary is the whole story on one page — read it in this order:
Near the end, Sources & Methods and the assumptions ledger list every input, default, and method note — the pages to show a financial adviser or a skeptical relative. Brief is the same math in three pages for forwarding; the Quick path prints its own shorter report automatically.
The Full report’s energy pages now match what you see on screen. The “Your energy, month by month” seasonal chart prints the weather-adjusted grid estimate (red bars below the zero line — storm and cloudy days included) instead of the ledger’s netted months, with the caption and legend saying so; its solar-supplied callout reads both ways, e.g. “~89% weather-adjusted (monthly ledger: 98%)”, and the at-a-glance grid-import stat is likewise labeled weather-adjusted. A new page follows it — “Two typical weeks of real weather” — printing a summer and a winter 14-day stretch from the daily-flow simulation at your real configuration only (on-screen what-ifs never print): each day’s stacked column with its red dashed consumption box and battery curve, the 14 days’ solar-supplied share, and a storm-day stress line. The “30 verifiable factors” page now also notes that beyond the modeled factors, the report’s illustrations run on the same engine. Financial figures everywhere keep using the monthly ledger; the weather adjustment is a display estimate, and the Brief report is unchanged.
10 · Troubleshooting & common mistakes
| Symptom | What's happening | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Your opening screen looks different from this guide | Installer-branded copies replace the general landing page with the installer's own | Nothing to fix — pick your region and everything from there matches this guide |
| "This looks like a solar home's utility file…" on upload | Your Green Button file shows real solar exports — so it records grid draws, not your home's full usage (the daytime load your panels serve is invisible in it) | Type your true monthly kWh (bills or monitoring app) and upload your production file via the Enphase button |
| "This looks like your solar production file…" or "…looks like a utility usage file…" on upload | The file landed on the wrong of the two upload buttons — Sunalysis checks the data's shape (homes always use some power at night; panels produce none) | Use the button the message names: Usage · Green Button for utility files, Production · Enphase for your solar system's own export |
| "…contains power readings (kW demand), not energy (kWh)" | That's a demand file; summing it would overstate usage several-fold | Download the energy / usage interval file instead |
| "…only covers N days" | Utilities often default the download to one day | Re-export with a full 12-month date range |
| Entered some monthly kWh but results didn't change | By design — the grid takes over only at 12 of 12 months | Fill all 12 (or let your annual figure carry it) |
| No SREC field where the guide shows one | It appears only in states with an SREC/incentive market (NJ, PA, MD, DE, OH, VA, WV, DC, MA, IL) | If your state isn't one, SRECs don't apply to you — nothing is missing from your math |
| Results look too good | Usually a double-counted incentive or optimistic production | Net cost = what you actually pay, once; read the ±15% low end; ask the installer how production was estimated |
| Results look too bad | Usually the export credit doing its job — under net billing, exports earn little | That's the honest math. Look at the battery and Solar Window Reward: use more of your own power |
| A number surprises you anywhere | — | Tap the ⓘ beside it, or ask Ask Sunalysis "why is my ___ ?" |
| Want to start over | — | Clear Data (top right) resets everything |
Sunalysis v8.4.3 · Arev Analytics — Solar Investment & Return Analysis. This guide uses California (NEM 3.0) as its running example. The calculations and every step work the same in other regions and in installer-branded copies — but a branded copy may lock the region, start from different defaults (blank or pre-filled), and use client- or installer-facing wording, and the opening screen changes. Good-faith estimates, not guarantees; confirm rates with your utility and prices with your installer.