What Happens to Solar When the Snow Melts?

How soon can you expect to get REAL POWER producing again?

This is a follow up article to: What happens to solar panels when it snows?

So the snow storm is over, and it is two days later. We got about 8 inches of snow. My system actually produced 7.87 kWh for all of yesterday, so the melting of the snow started almost immediately.

Look at this pattern of numbers from my solar system monitoring output.

As of 11am on 2nd day after snow, my system had already made 3.31 kWhs of electricity.

I left the system in the orientation it truly is on our house, so you could see the effect placement has on how quickly the snow melts.

The panels on the northwest corner area of the array are still not producing. Why is that?

The panels towards the top of my roof are producing the most. Why is that?

When selling solar systems in Colorado, I am almost always asked about the effect snow would have on production. Luckily, as a solar owner I could speak from experience about it.

Solar panels are usually black (if not black, very dark) to help them absorb more sun light. Lighter colors reflect, darker colors absorb. It isn’t about warmth, it is about light intensity. As they are darker, they usually start out warmer than the roof around them. (See this article about temperature differentials around…