Legion Solar – Do-it-yourself Solar System

Last time I wrote about Faraday Grid. Energy Close-up Engineering Column, #StartUp4Energy puts together technical and economical technologies in which everyone can invest through CrowdFunding websites, joining the worthy Startup projects from all over the world. Today we talk about Legion Solar, a startup project from California.

When we purchase from a traditional solar system company, we usually pay for “overhead costs” such as licensed contractors, electricians, sales consultants, permits and liability insurance. Legion Solar, on the other hand, is an affordable, flexible, do-it-yourself (DIY) solar solution. The inventor of Legion Solar and founder of PLX Devices Inc., Paul Lowchareonkul, has manufactured more than 40 products in the last 14 years. PLX is located in the heart of Silicon Valley, California, where technology and innovation has been the driving force since the digital boom. Thanks to Kickstarter and 13,000 backers, they have been successful in several projects and Legion Solar is one of them.

The strengths of this technology are (1) easy to install and (2) pays for itself 3 times faster than traditional systems. Moreover, traditional solar panels require the user to commit to a certain size system, and, probably, upgrading these systems is complicated and expensive. Legion Solar, on the other hand, offers a flexible system that meets your current budget, needs, and lifestyle. In the future, if the customer needs a bigger system, adding panels is easy – look at the gif.

Usually the solar system require evaluations, permits, and professional installation teams. The American startup offers a variety of DIY solutions that allows setting up the system without compromising the integrity of the roof. Legion Solar is plug-and-play and anyone can do by himself! It is also more cost effective than the competition. The average solar panel systems usually cost more than $4/W, even if now the costs are decreasing all over the world, but the regular future consumer of this technology will pay only $3/W.

Legion Solar’s light weight – about 8 kg – panels, include plug and play technology and a variety of mounting options that make it easy to install. They are also building an online installation guide with DIY tips, tricks, and best practices in order to help their customers. Last but not least, it will be possible the monitoring of the energy savings with the Legion Solar App, which communicates with your SolarHub and allows to monitor the system’s performance from anywhere.