Solar Panels East West Facing Roof

Split your array in two and put half on the east and half on the west although arguably you would get similar results to the above two options.

Solar panels east west facing roof.

Panels mounted on a standard pitch roof facing east or west will produce approximately 15 less output than panels mounted on a south facing roof of a standard pitch. If an east west split of solar panels is desired where some panels are facing east and some facing west then normally those panels would be placed on separate strings and a two input inverter would be used. At higher pitches the difference increases. We assumed a 40 elevation for the roof.

However solar panels can be orientated on any roof that faces south of either east or west. An example of a south west facing roof. Of course you cannot install east west facing solar panels on your roof if it does not already slant in those directions. They would then be in the shade during the first half of the day.

You also can mount solar panels on roofs that face east or west on the roof of another building like a barn or garage or on the ground. Solar panels should face south for any home in america to obtain maximum power generation. Put your panels on the west roof and take as much sun as you can in the evenings. In winter when the sun is at an angle less than the pitch of the roof the panels will receive no sunlight.

With east or west facing panels the sun will be behind the roof for half the day. If you went with a professional solar installer they probably had a good reason to install panels facing east rather than west. Solar arrays that are situated east west can squeeze in more rows and panels and therefore a greater generation capacity than their south or north facing cousins. Updated may 18 2020.

Therefore directions like southwest or southeast are fine. Why orientation matters with rooftop solar in general solar panels that are oriented directly east or directly west will produce about 20 percent less electricity than if they were facing south. In contrast a north southern hemisphere facing roof gets sunshine from dawn to dusk. Technically east facing panels can get as much sun as west facing ones as long as there are no other issues like morning fog or clouds or shade.

That s much better than most people would guess and even an east west facing roof can generate around 80 of the maximum.