True South Solar Co. · Rooftop & ground arrays · Tinwhistle Bend, the Calumet Valley & the Odell Shore · Lic. TS-5502
Your roof already has an opinion. We read it first.
True South designs arrays that start with the compass, not the catalogue: azimuth and shade modelled hour by hour against twelve months of your bills, string or microinverters chosen by the roof’s argument rather than our inventory, and a production guarantee printed against the very model we quote from. Fixed prices, valley-wide, since 2014.
THE COMPASS RULE: an array pointed twenty degrees off true south gives up roughly six percent of its year — we would rather tell you at the free survey than sell it in August. Shade modelled before any quote; string versus micro decided by the roof; the guarantee written against the model.
Services
What the compass decides
01
Shade & azimuth modelling
A drone flight, a horizon trace of every tree, chimney and neighbouring gable, and an hour-by-hour production model run against your own meter history. If the honest array is six kilowatts against a salesman’s ten, you hear it from us first — the survey is free precisely so it is allowed to say no.
02
String or micro, argued by the roof
One clean unshaded plane favours a string inverter: a single serviceable part on the garage wall and a wiring diagram you can actually read. Cottonwood rows, dormers and stubborn chimneys favour microinverters panel by panel. We quote both off the same model and let the roof pick — about a third of our roofs end in micros, and the deciding shade map goes in your binder.
03
Batteries sized to the outage
LFP storage specced to the circuits an outage actually threatens — furnace board, well pump, fridge, the router — and sized to the February load, not the July one. Charging below freezing is blocked by the cabinet itself, and the transfer scheme is drawn, permitted and inspected before the first storm tests it.
04
Net metering, filed and trued-up
We file the interconnection, coordinate the meter swap, and model your crossover month from real bills so "basically zero" is a month with a name on it. Every March we read the year against the model with you holding the app — the same reading that pays the guarantee if the year fell short.
The rate card
Fixed rates, printed like a menu
Cash prices from last quarter’s valley installs — permits, interconnection filing and the ten-year workmanship warranty already inside the number, the 30% federal credit still to come off it. Which row your roof earns is decided by the shade model at the free survey, never by how the conversation went.
6 kW rooftop · string inverter$15,800 installed
24 panels on one clean plane, inverter on the garage wall
9 kW rooftop · microinverters$23,200 installed
Panel-by-panel conversion for shade that arrived with the trees
14 kW ground mount + battery$39,600 installed
Frost-footed piers, winter tilt, 13.5 kWh LFP storage
Battery retrofit$12,100 installed
13.5 kWh cabinet, load subpanel, outage circuits named
String-to-micro conversion$2,900 typical
Re-quotable on any array we built, shade map included
The March true-up visitincluded
Production read against the model, torque audit, wash
Why the shop exists
The model is the contract
A solar quote moves for one reason: nobody read the roof before writing it. Ours is modelled to the tree, quoted off the meter, and then floored — the same three paragraphs, the same number, for every customer since 2014. When the year lands under ninety-five percent of model, the March reading writes the cheque and nobody argues with arithmetic.
Ninety-five percent, in writing
Year one, the array makes 95% of the modelled kilowatt-hours or True South credits the shortfall at your net-metering rate. A miss caused by our sizing is fixed with hardware at our cost — it has happened three times in eleven years, and all three arrays have since beaten their models.
How it goes
Survey to March true-up
The same sequence on every job — the only variable is your project.
Week 1
The compass survey
Drone flight, azimuth reading, horizon trace, twelve months of bills. You get the shade map and the honest array size in writing — yours to keep whatever you build, and valid ammunition against any quote in the valley.
Weeks 2–3
Permits & interconnection
Building permit, utility filing, the HOA packet if your street cares. You sign twice across the whole project; every milestone date rides between the two signatures, and the guarantee paragraph sits directly above the price.
Week 4
Set & torque
String or micro as the model decided. Flashed attachments under the shingles, rail squared to the ridge, every fastener torqued to a written value, and a thermal walk of the attic the next morning before the ladder comes down.
Every March
The true-up
Production read line by line against the model with you holding the monitoring app. Over the floor and we shake hands; under it and the credit posts before the icicles melt. Wash and re-torque happen the same visit, free, for ten years.
2025 — 2026, the valley
Roofs with opinions, honoured
Six of the forty-two arrays True South commissioned last season, photographed at interconnection. String and micro both in here — the captions say which, because the shade map already did.
Before you call
Fair questions, compass answers
The five every valley kitchen table reaches by the second coffee. The shop line at the bottom runs seven to five, valley-wide.
My roof faces east-west. Is solar still honest?
Usually, at about eighty percent of a true-south roof’s year — the model will say to the kilowatt-hour. East-west arrays still clear the payback line in most valley bills because morning production sells into the morning tariff, and two small strings often beat one big south one. The survey prices all of it; what we will not do is quote a south number for an east-west roof.
String inverter or microinverters — which is better?
Neither, universally, and anyone who says otherwise is selling inventory. A string inverter is one serviceable part instead of forty and wins on any clean plane; micros win where shade moves across the roof through the day, because one shadowed panel only slows itself. We quote both off the same shade model, show you the difference in kilowatt-hours, and take the smaller invoice as often as the bigger one.
What exactly does the production guarantee pay?
Year one, 95% of the modelled kilowatt-hours or we credit the shortfall at your utility’s net-metering rate — and if the miss came from our sizing, we add the panels at our cost instead. The model, the guarantee and the payback line are three paragraphs of the same contract, above the price, before the deposit.
How does net metering actually reach my bill?
The meter runs both ways: midday production spins against your night use, and the utility trues up on the twelfth month at its published avoided-energy rate. We model your crossover month from real bills before you sign, so the promise is a month with a name on it — and every March we read the year against the model with you.
Will a battery carry the house in an outage?
The circuits you name — furnace board, well pump, fridge, medical, wifi — through a normal night and most of the next day, automatically and in about twenty milliseconds. A grid-tied array alone shuts down with the street by code; storage is what turns generation into independence, and we size it to the February load, not the July one.
Two outfits quoted me ten kilowatts off a satellite photo. True South flew the roof, traced the maple, and said six and a half was the honest array — then guaranteed it. First March reading came in at 97% of model, the oaks are still shading my breakfast table, and the payback line in my contract says 8.4 years. The compass people are the only solar people.
Eleven seasons
The valley, in figures
Free compass survey anywhere in the valley, most within the week · (555) 020-4471 · hello@truesouthsolar.example
Get the compass read for your roof
Send the address and a recent bill if you have one. The survey is free, the model takes three business days, and the fixed quote that follows carries the shade map, the guarantee paragraph and the payback year on the same page. hello@truesouthsolar.example