WHEN most of the houses near him were in darkness after Hurricane Beryl hammered sections of Jamaica, Delroy Garwood’s family of four had enough electricity to share with a neighbour.

“They ran their extension, they were able to plug in their fridge and run lights from my solar system,” a cheerful Garwood told the Jamaica Observer last week.

He had every right to be in a good mood as he and his family had been “very comfortable” during and after the storm. His only worry had been whether his solar panels would remain affixed to his roof when faced with heavy winds. Ahead of the hurricane he had called Enersave Solutions, the company he bought the system from, and they assured him the panels were “installed to standard” and should be fine. They also suggested that, for his peace of mind, he could add a few sandbags to hold them in place.

“I did not go the route of the sandbag and I rode out the storm. I had absolutely no power issue. I had power straight through the entire hurricane,” said Garwood.

The engineer’s four-bedroom house in Meadows of Irwin, St James, has been powered by the sun since 2022. He said he made the decision to go solar because his monthly Jamaica Public Service (JPS) bill was “running out of control”.

It all began with COVID-19. His children, now 14 and nine, were at home and he watched his JPS bill climb.

“For them to be comfortable we had to install air conditioning. So that eventually drove up my JPS bill from the low $20,000s to the high $30,000s going to even $50,000. That was my main driver for going the route of solar,” said Garwood.

Now his bill is about $3,000 each month. That covers the periods when his battery has run out and the system automatically switches back to the JPS supply.

“I have a hybrid solar system, so I am not sending power back to JPS. I am producing power and it is stored in the battery; that power is utilised whenever the sun is not out. So in the nights I have the battery to supply me up to the morning. Presently my solar system powers the entire house,” Garwood told the Sunday Observer.

He began with six panels, a battery and an inverter. He later added another five panels to generate more power. Initially he had a 110-voltage water heater attached to the system but he later switched to a solar water heater that creates its own power. He also has a 220-volt dryer but because it pulls a lot of power, he tries to use it only when the sun is very hot, so it does not use the battery.

Garwood plans to add another battery so he can store more of the power generated by his panels and his wife and children can get more use out of the air conditioners. There are 12,000-btu units in each bedroom and a 36,000-btu unit in the living room.

“For the kids I now run the air conditioner for an hour-and-a half in the night to cool down their rooms. Then I turn on the fan for it to keep their rooms cool. It powers the air-conditioning units, powers the fridge and all the lighting,” he added.

Garwood has been singing the praises of solar energy long before Hurricane Beryl. He said his experience has been a good one from the time of application for service up to now.

For the initial six-panel system, he paid down a 50 per cent deposit and within three days the company’s technician was at his house doing the installation.

“About an hour after that, I had full power. As a matter of fact, while they were installing the solar panels they started charging immediately. The technician said to me, ‘As soon as the inverter is powered up, you will be able to go at full air conditioning’. And so said, so done,” said Garwood.

He added that the installation process took about three hours.

“As soon as the switch was turned on my entire house was on solar from the sun. The battery was being charged, because it was installed about two o’clock, and I was on full solar from the panels,” he told the Sunday Observer, still in awe of the power of solar two years later.

Garwood had a few tips for anyone thinking of going solar. For example, there must be wall space inside to mount the inverter and place the battery.

“It does not use a lot of space. If you have a blank wall anywhere of about 6 x 8 feet, it can support a full solar system. Right now I still have space for an additional battery and an additional inverter on my small 4 x 6 feet wall,” said Garwood.

He did have one word of caution however.

“You have to be careful about the company that you are going to purchase the system from. When you’re doing something new, or something that you’re not fully aware of, you want technical support; you want to be able to call the company and get good feedback if there’s an issue,” Garwood stressed.

With his engineering background he has been able to follow instructions over the phone and fix minor issues when they arose. He explained that while the system is “maintenance free”, a JPS power surge may cause it to go into protection mode and shut down.

“If you are not technical, you will need the support of the company to reset your system. So you need to choose a company that would give you good support. Enersave is one of them, based on my research and experience. It is a company that I would recommend to anybody to purchase their system from. I’ve gotten very, very good support from them,” said Garwood.