There are a lot of factors that can affect the performance of your solar panels and the economic benefits they can generate—things such as where you live and how sunny it is, how much you pay for electricity, which way your house faces—even the pitch of your roof. Variety is the spice of life, but the diversity of our architecture can affect the performance of solar panels. It’s important to understand how those differences in production performance related to the angle of your roof will affect the overall financial performance of your solar power system.

You don’t need optimal conditions for your solar power system to be a great investment. One of the biggest myths about the financial viability of solar is that it requires a really sunny location and a south-facing roof. While these may be ideal conditions, folks outside of Southern California with roofs that face other points on the compass, such as east to west-facing roofs, can still satisfy most of their electricity needs and reap significant financial returns when they adopt solar power systems.