“My introduction to solar came through a community college course in Denver. I was working in the gasoline business and considering something radically different as I was exploring next steps. I enjoyed the class and thought, ‘ok, let’s take this to the next level,’ and signed up for a class that lasted two weeks, including a hands-on rooftop installation here in Tucson.

The course took a very holistic approach to sustainability, and I was initially drawn more to rainwater harvesting than solar. I began volunteering with Watershed Management Group, which is where I was referred to TFS and began my career in solar.

As soon as I started in the industry, I immediately wanted to have solar. My solar system and first water harvesting cistern ended up being installed at nearly the same time in 2011.

I initially had little knowledge of the cost of the technology or who bought it; my awareness of solar was small outside of my individual experience. At that time, I was looking at it from an environmental perspective. I didn’t know about the water connection yet, but I clearly understood the environmental aspect of cleaner air. I love the concept of making your own energy, and that was reinforced by working with TFS.

Living with my solar system has been great. I intentionally oversized in preparation for an electric vehicle someday. It’s a great feeling to know that the system on my roof is responsible for meeting all of my energy needs. My home is all-electric, which is really helpful from a sustainability mindset. Many people are able to offset all of their electricity usage from solar, but they’re still using gas for their furnace and heating water. Even with the Tesla, the system fully covers the needs of charging it as well as the energy needs of the household.

The water savings with solar is huge; it was an eye opener for me, and it’s really an eye opener for our customers, too. When you see the math behind those water savings, it’s often bigger on an annual basis than people who are building cisterns to gather rainwater. If you’re offsetting 500 gallons a month with an average solar energy system, that’s 6,000 gallons a year. That’s much larger than the size of a cistern for an average family. When I talk to clients about the environmental benefits of solar, I tie the water savings right back to the Sonoran desert and the arid southwest. Much of Tucson’s water comes from the Colorado River and as that supply is reduced over the years, we can offset more and more of the river’s water with solar.

The bigger picture of what happens at my home is the educational aspect. It's super important to me to demonstrate by my behavior what's helpful to the planet. Some of that is from solar, some is from planting native plants, growing food, a compost toilet, greywater, and now transportation in the form of a Tesla electric vehicle. With all of those things, it’s a continuum. I didn’t start out the day I bought my house thinking it would lead to what it is today. I didn’t think that even my lifestyle would be that way - that I would be harvesting water to this degree, generating solar to this degree, driving a Tesla.

Along that continuum, I started with the basics that gave me the biggest environmental benefits: solar and rainwater harvesting. Building from those blocks, an infrastructure comes together and life builds up around it. If you were to look at the house on day one and today, it has become a jungle of native plants, and it isn’t from pumping water up out of the ground. It’s from nurturing what’s there. This latest step, an electric vehicle, is just one more thing to be done on this continuum towards self-sustainability.

When I started working in solar sales, everything was based on finances. When I asked customers about what interested them in solar, the vast majority said “I want to save money.” They would sometimes follow up with environmentalism, but it was rare as a top priority. Today, six years later, the majority of people I’m talking to say “it’s the right thing to do” or “I want to make a difference.” They might follow up with financial concern, but it usually starts with the environmental aspect; and often when people see the price it ends up being lower than they had assumed, despite already deciding it was desirable. Solar, today, is accessible to a wide variety of economic levels of the community; it’s become something that so many of us can do.

My solar is visible right from the front of my house, I participate in WMG’s Homescape Harvest Tour; I want people to see it and get curious about it. I doubt I’ll ever be off the grid; I like some resiliency, but I prefer the idea of participating in the community. When my system has extra energy it is feeding the homes nearby, helping TEP offset peak demands. It’s much better to be able to speak to customers from experience of owning my own solar system. I can speak confidently to how their generation will change throughout the year, the lack of necessity for cleaning and upkeep, and more, because I experience these things with my own system.”