30 March 2012
Solar homeowners aren’t granola-crunching, left-leaning hippies, according to a poll by One Block Off the Grid, a company that connects US homeowners with solar deals in their communities. One Block Off the Grid polled 200 people to find out why they went solar, and the answers seem to dispel the solar proponent stereotype (see the full infographic).
More than doing it to help the environment, homeowners polled say they did it for the money, with nearly three in four saying they wouldn’t have installed solar panels if there was no economic benefit.
One a scale of “one: extremely liberal” to “seven: extremely conservative,” the average solar homeowner describes himself as a 3.34, between “someone liberal” and “middle of the road.” And he’s likely a he: among opposite-sex married couples, the man was the first person interested in going solar (68% of men compared to 11% of women) and he was also the person who did most of the footwork to make it happen (77% of men compared to 15% of women). This is interesting because 77% of women take primary or equal responsibility for paying the electricity bills.
Some 70% of solar homeowners say they’re “savvy spenders/budge conscious” and they’re not rich, with a combined household income of between US $76,000 and $100,000. They do save money, averaging $1,471 annual savings after installing a solar system.
Additionally, 18% of solar owners have been in the US military.
