Timo runs his whole house, including hot water and two electric cars with solarZero. He got the solarZero system installed in July 2018, and supplements the solar energy with 100% renewable energy from retail grid energy partner Ecotricity. He’s thrilled that his power bills are now a very low $60/week in the summer and $80/week in the winter to run not only his home but his two electric vehicles as well. Timo even runs his small business, Kāpiti Goodies, from home with solarZero, powering the EVs used to deliver gift baskets to customers.

New home, new energy

When Timo was building his new home in Waikanae, he decided it would be a good time to consider cheaper and cleaner energy to power his home. He discovered that solarZero, new to the market, offered homeowners a unique option - solar energy without having to purchase, install or maintain the system.

With a laundry-list of things to choose and countless decisions to make on the new build, Timo says not having to worry about the type of solar energy system to get made his decision to go with solarZero a no-brainer.

As an early adopter of new tech, Timo loves the idea of ‘streaming the sun’ and has been a valuable customer, patiently working with the solarZero team to work through some initial issues. He accepts that the service is still very new and the technology is continuously refined and improved. That patience has paid off and he now enjoys significant cost savings on his power bills.

Timo is a spreadsheet and tech fanatic and the solarZero customer web-based dashboard mysolarzero is a tool he uses several times a day to monitor his solar energy production and power usage.

“My wife thinks I’m obsessed but I want to maximise the use of solar.”

And, motivated to use 100% renewable energy in their daily living, Timo also has two electric vehicles – a Nissan Leaf and a Kia Niro EV. 

“The best thing about running my home on solar energy is being able to charge our cars with sunshine! It’s the combination with Ecotricity that makes it really special though because both our household and the cars run with 100% renewable energy.”

Timo looks forward to more of his community joining him in running his home on solar. In fact, some of his neighbours are already solarZero customers. That’s great news for Timo. As part of the Grid for Good, he and his solarZero neighbours are helping NZ homes run on 100% renewable energy. And that’s great news for NZ and for the planet.