Personal Information:

Personal Comments:

We have lived off the grid since the late '70's and went thru all the experimenting with home made wind generators, gas gensets, water wheels, all kinds of inverters starting with the 500 watt TrippLite, etc. We expanded our little 10x17' to a 2000 sf log home with all the modern conveniences. Our power system(s) include the original 12vdc throughout the house (almost never used), ac through most of the house with a small inverter (tripplite to Trace 612 to Powerstar 1300 to Trace UX612SB and in1993 added a 24vdc bank of 16 T105's and the SW4024 (still in use). We supplied our power from 6 Solec 70 watt panels (24vdc) and 3 Kyosera 35 watt panels supplying 12vdc to 6 T105's. The 12v system runs our RF12 and the backup systems if needed. In 1998 we added 8 Solarex SX75's to the 24v system on a top of pole rack keeping the 3 kyosera panels to run our SunFrost. The T105's were replaced with 8 Trojan L16G's which are still limping along today (Nov.2006) with the recent upgrade to 12 EC115's on a top of pole rack and adding an MX-60. (sold the solarex 75's and rack) We had run a 250 watt windseeker for about 5 years til it self destructed. and replaced with a Bergey 1500. I Sold the 1500 in 2003 and went windpowerless for a few years and now will be replacing it with a Bergey XL.1 with the tower moved up the hill and raised in height from 84' to 140'.

My wife Marilyn and our daugher Zoey (13 years old) raise sheep, christmas trees and timber on our 100 acres and try to scrape a living out of the farm and selling solar. I worked from 1990 to Sept of 1999 for NRG Systems manufacturing wind measuring equipment and doing field installations. In Sept of 99 I had such a backlog of solar installations to do that I decided to make the break and run my solar business full time. Most of my work is off grid as we are in a rural area. We love visitors and have had the honor of having many industry folks here including Robin Gudgel of Midnite Solar, Hugh Piggott, the wind guru and others at our beautiful mountain home. All wrenches are invited to visit.. of course not all at once!!! SolarFest 2007 will be here in Vermont on July 13th and 14th... a great excuse to visit us here. I have been head of power at the festival for the last 3 years and get to use the festival site (now permanent) as a great showplace for the latest technologies. Check out the website www.Solarfest.org (revised 11/15/2006)

Business Information:

Business Comments:

Central Vermont Solar and Wind is a full service RE sales and installation company with myself and five employees working out of a 1500 sf office/showroom/workshop on River Street in Rutland, VT. Our area of operation is Vermont, Eastern NY, Western NH. We specialize in off-grid solar and wind power systems but are starting to get more requests for grid-tied PV and wind systems. The business was started as a part time endeavor in 1996 and became a full time occupation in 1999. After three moves since working out of our house, and already tight for space in our new location, we are growing rapidly with the help of a great crew of 5 full time employees and a few part timers. With incentives in Vermont and the Federal Tax Credit, our grid tie sales are growing though we still have the reputation of being one of the top off grid installers in the state. With a dozen grid tie systems and well over 125 off-grid installations behind us, we are now seeing more work than we can handle. Our plans are for 30 to 50% growth per year.