Page 5 Fall Home Improvement 2026 Lincoln Daily News One other benefit Pals pointed out was the improvement of your property value. Solar panels are not built to be removed. They are designed for each home individually. That being the case, were the property owner to move after they had solar panels installed, it would increase the value of the property. Additionally, it could be a reason to buy should someone be looking for a home with that feature. While solar panels do have their benefits, not every home is going to qualify. Pals shared that when finding out whether a home can have solar panels installed on it, the first and main step is “qualifying the site.” The most important, and probably most obvious, consideration is determining how much access to sunlight a roof gets. Large trees can cast shadows over roofs and make capturing the sunlight difficult. It is also important to consider which way your roof is facing. In the northern hemisphere, it is important to have “south-facing roof areas.” Due to the sun rising in the east and setting in the west, it is important to have parts of your roof facing these directions too. If your home does not qualify, that does not have to be the end of it, however. If your property has a lot of land, there might be a sunny area where a ground-mounted system can be installed. If you have barns on your property, solar panels might be able to be installed here as well. Another thing to consider is that each electric company has its own policies around solar panels and the power it generates. For Ameren, Pals shared they use something called “partial net metering.” Pals explained that, as a home uses power, the meter on the home will tick forward as more kilowatt hours are used. At the end of the billing period, Ameren will read these meters and determine how much the homeowner has used and what they owe. With partial net metering, however, as solar panels generate power, the electricity will go back through the meter and go to Ameren. As this power goes through the meter, it will push the meter back, offsetting what has been used. If the home is using less power than the panels are generating, the meter number will go down. If the home is using more power than the panels are producing, then it will still go up, but slower depending on how much power is being generated. At the end of the month, Ameren will charge the homeowner for what was used, minus what they generated. For example, if a home used 900 kilowatt hours, based on the 11.326 cents mentioned earlier, their bill would be around $102 for the electricity, plus other fees that Ameren includes in their bill. If that same home generated 800 kilowatt hours with their solar panels that month, their electricity usage would only cost them a little over $11. Should a homeowner generate more power than they use, they are not paid directly by Ameren for this amount. According to Pals, it is added as a credit to the account. In future months, if the solar panels did not generate as
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