Sunrun Brightbox Introduction:
Home solar batteries are becoming an essential part of adding solar panels to your home. As power outages increase and more electric utilities move to time-of-use (TOU) rates or fight to remove net metering policies, home solar batteries provide a real benefit to homeowners. The nation's largest solar company, Sunrun, has been at the forefront of providing homeowners with affordable home solar batteries with its Sunrun Brightbox solution.
The Sunrun Brightbox solution allows homeowners to get a solar battery with a $0 down solar and battery installations as a service. In addition, the Sunrun Brightbox allows Sunrun to manage, monitor, warranty, and replace a homeowner's battery for the solar and battery agreement length. By providing maximum peace of mind and removing the upfront cost of a battery installation, the Sunrun Birghtbox has become the nations leading solar battery for homeowners.
What does the Sunrun Brightbox do?
The Sunrun Brightbox is Sunrun's propitiatory battery management solution. Brightbox allows Sunrun to optimize a home battery's performance to ensure maximum battery health, battery backup functionality, and the best savings possible.
The Sunrun Brightbox is programmed to optimize a home solar batteries backup solution. As the massive power outages in Texas in the winter of 2021 showed, batteries can help protect homeowners. By combining data from thousands of solar and battery installations in a specific area, Brightbox can ensure that a home's solar battery is correctly set up to help power a home during an extended power outage.
Sunrun has also designed the Brigthbox solution to help protect homeowners against the utilities that have changed Net Metering policies. For homeowners under the time-of-use rate structure, the Brightbox Battery can send power into the home or the grid when it is the most financially beneficial for the home.
A big part of Sunrun's long-term plan is to work with electric utilities to help better support the grid. For example, the Sunrun Brightbox solution allows homeowners access to Demand Response Programs. Demand Response Programs allow electric utilities to pull power from a homeowner's battery for financial compensation. In addition, the programs can help fight power outages caused by forest fires or in response to a utility closing a power plant.
Sunrun can retroactively enroll Brightbox customers into these programs, helping homeowners see additional financial value from the batteries installed at their homes.
In Hawaii, Sunrun Brigtbox customers can also be included in the Kukui Hele Pō Grid Service program. The Kukui Hele Pō Grid provides Brightbox customers with a $300 gift card and a discount on their Hawaiin Electric bill in exchange for the utility to pull small amounts of power from the battery. This program is only available for Sunrun Brigtbox customers, allowing them to help support the grid and receive financial benefits that customers who get batteries from other companies will not be able to take advantage of the benefits of a solar battery.
What batteries do Sunrun use for the Sunrun Brightbox?
When the Brightbox solution was initially launched in 2015 in Hawaii and California, it was designed with the LG Chem battery. However, since its initial launch, the Brightbox solution can also be paired with the Tesla Powerwall 2.
The flexibility of offering different battery providers allows Sunrun to address customers with different needs. For example, for homeowners looking for closer to full home backup, the Tesla Powerwall 2 provides a usable capacity of 13.5 kilowatt-hours. On the other hand, if a customer is more concerned about affordability and just backing up critical loads in the home, the LG Chems 9.3 kWh of usable capacity is a great solution.
The Tesla Powerwall 2 and LG Chem RESU have strengths, but when paired with the Sunrun Brigthbox, some product limitations can be avoided.
In the future, Sunrun may continue to utilize different batteries for the Brightbox solution. Sunrun's commitment to updating the product will allow it to continue to lead the home solar battery space.
How does Sunrun financing work with Brightbox home solar battery?
When many homeowners think about adding a battery, they believe that it will be prohibitively expensive. However, Sunrun has grown to become the largest solar company in the nation because of its unique offerings of a $0 down monthly power purchase agreement, prepaid PPA, solar loans, and cash offerings.
Sunrun's focus on financing offerings that make sense for all types of homeowners is one of the things that makes the Brightbox such an excellent option for homeowners.
With the $0 down monthly power purchase agreement or lease, Sunrun can offer homeowners solar and battery systems without paying anything upfront. As a result, more people can see the benefits of battery backup and protection against the time of use rates structures by removing the upfront cost of adding batteries.
If customers are interested in owning the system, they can purchase the Sunrun Brightbox via cash or a solar loan.
The ability to chose the solar and battery plan that makes the most sense for a Brightbox client is one of the reasons that we work with Surnun. By ensuring that we have a variety of financing solutions for our customers, we can always find the right financing option for customers looking to add a home solar battery.
How much do solar batteries cost?
Solar batteries vary in cost depending on the battery type and in what state the batteries are installed. With the Sunrun $0 down monthly option, customers do not have to pay anything upfront for their solar battery.
For customers looking to purchase their solar battery, the price will vary depending on the battery type. For homeowners looking to add the LG Chem Resu, the price will usually be between $6,500 and $8,000 in addition to the cost of your solar installation.
For the other group of customers who would like to purchase the Tesla Powerwall 2, the price usually falls between $9,000 and $12,000, in addition to the cost of your solar installation.
When factoring in the cost of adding a solar battery, it is essential to consider how many batteries a home needs. When considering the pricing of a battery, it is essential to understand the objectives for the battery.
Customers looking to increase the amount of energy stored might find that adding a battery is a cost-effective solution. Because of economies of scale and soft costs, adding additional batteries usually costs less per unit than adding the first battery.
What does the Sunrun Brightbox warranty cover?
Sunrun excels at providing customers peace of mind when switching from utility power to solar and battery electricity. Sunrun has made this security a central focus of the warranty and coverage of the Brightbox Battery solution.
For customers who add the Brightbox Battery with a power purchase agreement or lease, the warranty and coverage Sunrun provide makes it the solar industry's best battery coverage.
The batteries that go into a Powerwall 2 and LG Chem RESU are similar to those that go into a phone or computer. That means that charging and discharging the batteries are essential to the long-term health of the home solar batteries.
The Sunrun Brightbox monitors the battery to make sure that the battery is charging and discharging correctly. This can help address minor issues before they become significant and harm the battery's long-term health.
Not only does Sunrun monitor and program customers batteries who get the Brightbox with a lease or Power Purchase Agreement, but they also cover the battery for 25 years! The Powerwall 2 and LG Chem RESU have a 10-year warranty. That means that if the batteries run into any issue, Sunrun will replace the batteries at no cost to them.
Because Sunrun can cover the Brightbox Battery for 25 years, this can provide $10,000s of battery replacement over the life of the Sunrun lease or Power Purchase Agreement.
When adding a battery, it is essential that your partner provides a strong warranty and has the financial backing to be around to stand by the warranty they provide.
We work with Sunrun because it is a publically traded company that has been in business for over a decade and has a strong balance sheet. The financial strength of Sunrun gives Alchemy Solar the confidence to know that when our customers get a Brightbox Battery, Sunrun will be around to stand behind the warranties it promises.
Where is the Sunrun Brightbox available?
Sunrun initially only made the Sunrun Brightbox available in specific markets. However, as more utilities have moved to reduce the value of Net Energy Metering like San Diego Gas & Electric and natural disasters have to lead to extended power outages like those caused by Hurricane Ida, Sunrun and Alchemy Solar can now offer the Brightbox battery in all markets that it does business.
Arizona
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Hawaii
Illinois
Massachusetts
Maryland
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
Pennsylvania
Puerto Rico
Rhode Island
South Carolina
Texas
Vermont
Washington, D.C.
Sunrun Brightbox Conclusion: Why Alchemy Solar thinks the Sunrun Brightbox Battery is the best solar storage solution for our customers?
For Alchemy Solar, our focus is always on finding the best solar and battery solution for our customers.
In Hawaii, where Hawaiin Electric (HECO) has implemented its Demand Response Battery Bonus program, or in California with the Self Generation Incentive Program, we don't only want to make sure our customers get the full economic benefit of their solar batteries, but they have batteries that work for that are reliable, warrantied, and provide them with protection against power outages.
After over a decade of working in the solar industry, it is clear that the best product for our customers is the Sunrun Brightbox Battery! The Sunrun Brightbox battery provides the best warranty, technology, and performance of any battery solution. Most importantly, Sunrun's $0 down solar and battery lease or Power Purchase Agreement provides every homeowner with the ability to take advantage of the financial benefits and security that home solar battery backup provides.
If you are a homeowner interested in learning more about the Sunrun Brightbox solar battery, schedule a free consultation with Alchemy Solar today!