Joe and Cindy Hurston are living in their new home free from the burden of a monthly bill from their electric utility. Thanks to LifeStyle Homes, Extreme Makeover Home Edition, and a generous donation from Siemens Industry, Inc., the family now lives in what's known as a “Net Zero Energy” home. The term simply means the home will produce at least as much energy as it will consume during the course of a year. They'll still receive a monthly statement, but over a twelve month period, the family's electric bills will net an estimated annual cost of $-257.00.

According to the energy raters at Home Audit Technologies, the home, which has 3432 square feet of conditioned space, is estimated to have an annual energy usage of -2758 kWh. On the US Department of Energy's EnergySmart Home Scale, a typical existing home of this size scores a 130. A comparable new home built to code would score a 100. In order to meet the Builders' Challenge, the home would have to score at or below 70. The Hurston's SunSmart home is estimated to overproduce by 2758kWh, hence the -3 HERS score.

To start with, LifeStyle Homes included all of their standard energy efficiency features found in the SunSmart home package: CF bulbs, radiant barrier, high SEER HVAC, Solene solar hot water, provided by UMA Solar, Energy Star appliances, low-E windows, etc. Siemens Industry, Inc. provided a 9.2 kW photovoltaic solar array. Enphase Energy provided the microinverters, the Envoy monitoring system, and the Enlighten monitoring service which will provide the Hurston's with a 24/7 on-line view of what their system is producing. “Joe was like a kid at Christmas when I showed him the view of his roof modules right on his laptop,” said Jacque Wirth, director of sales for Solar Energy Systems of Brevard, “He grinned from ear to ear as I showed him how each individual module displayed it's real-time output”. The family is thankful that they'll be able to take the money they used to send to the electric company, and pay it forward toward their Air Mobile Ministries.

“We were so excited when Jacque said she and Carl were coming to give us a system walk-through,” said Hurston, “They showed us how simple the solar hot water system is, and I feel better knowing the sun will heat our family's hot water FREE for the nest 20 plus years. Now that I see what it's been doing for the last few weeks, I realize this system's even better than I thought!” Now that the family is able to view their system's production, they can see exactly how much energy they are no longer paying for. The Enlighten site even gives cumulative carbon footprint data, for example, it shows how many trees would have had to be planted to offset the carbon emissions, and how many gallons of gas would have been used to make the utility power they avoided. “It's always a thrill to see the look on the customer's face the first time they see the usage on their utility meter stop going up, and start coming down,” said Carl Moody, owner of Solar Energy Systems of Brevard, “We have really enjoyed our SunSmart partnership with LifeStyle Homes the past few years, “Together, we make it possible for every new home buyer to attain huge energy savings from the day they move into their new SunSmart Home. We were honored when Jake asked us to head up the layout, and installation of the photovoltaics on the Hurston's house. There's nothing as rewarding as knowing you helped LifeStyle Homes build this family a home that will assist them in furthering their stewardship to the world”.

"On a roof with this many hips, it was a challenge to find enough space for the 40 modules that made up the Siemens 9.6 kW PV system." said David Nye, lead installer for Solar Energy Systems of Brevard, "We designed a layout which optimized the location of each module. We installed the solar thermal collectors on the West roof of the garage. Working through several nights of extremely cold weather conditions, everything came together on schedule; and we were cranking out some serious wattage by the time the crowd of volunteers and visitors shouted, Move that Bus!".