Last month, I wrote about how our rooftop solar panel production had declined from prior year levels for four consecutive months, lamenting the fact we spent most of the late summer and fall using up solar energy credits we needed for this winter.

Fortunately, our streak of weaker year-over-year solar production finally ended in December, when we experienced some unseasonably warm and sunny weather.

Our solar energy production climbed by nearly 50% in December relative to the prior year period, and was up by almost 60% compared to our paltry production in November.

Not bad for the month featuring the shortest day of the year – especially since we were still able to enjoy a White Christmas!

We still ended up using a fair amount of the solar energy credits we banked during the spring and summer to keep our electric bill as low as possible last month, but that’s to be expected this time of year.

With the days finally starting to get longer, there’s potential for even better solar energy production at our home in January and February. That said, I’m sure there are still bound to be a number of periods when our rooftop panels are buried under several inches of snow and ice before the weather really gets better!

The big question at this point is whether we’ll run out of energy credits for this winter in February or March. My hope is we’ll still have some credits available to offset our electric bill in March, but I think it’s going to be a photo finish as to exactly how long our rapidly declining bank of solar credits will last!