MySunBuddy is an online marketplace that allows solar owners to connect with solar buyers. By simplifying the complex and bureaucratic process required to transfer solar energy across the grid, MySunBuddy creates new opportunities for homeowners to maximize their solar potential and build the most cost effective solar power systems, meaning more sun for everyone.
Inspiration
Going solar should be simple, but regulatory complexity means that your average resident needs to know a laundry list of arcane market rules and inscrutable utility tariffs to fully understand what they're buying and how it will benefit them. In some states, solar system owners that produce more power than they can use can transfer that energy to their friends and neighbors. This can encourage solar system owners to develop more projects, provide more clean energy and ultimately lead to further greenhouse gas emissions reductions. While these policies are great for consumers in theory, in practice, typical consumers don’t have the time to wander through the maze of regulatory requirements needed to complete these transactions. Recognizing that there has to be a better way, we created MySunBuddy.
How it works
Solar credit buyers and sellers can meet each other in the MySunBuddy marketplace and agree on a price that makes sense for them. Then we do the hard stuff. MySunBuddy streamlines the process by: • Verifying both buyers and sellers are eligible to trade under current utility rules; • Streamlining and simplifying the paperwork needed to arrange solar credit trading transactions with their utilities; • Ensuring that buyers are getting what they’re paying for, and; • Ensuring that solar credit sellers get paid. In short, MySunBuddy creates a marketplace where the transactive energy relationships of the future will be fostered.
Challenges I ran into
In retrospect, building a platform that fundamentally changes the nature of how consumers buy and sell energy might take longer than a weekend. We shot for the stars. We think we crashed into the moon. Hard.
Accomplishments that I'm proud of
The MySunBuddy team is two energy nerds and a programming geek. We’re lean, but in the course of two days we’ve built the framework for something completely new and transformative. We have a beta cloud-based web app, and we're pretty proud of that.
What I learned
Whoever this Falafel King fella is, he deserves an award all his own. Top notch eats. We also quickly learned what to prioritize when trying to build a web app and sales pitch in the blink of an eye.
What's next for MySunBuddy
The thing about the MySunBuddy team is that we all have day jobs. We think this thing has serious legs, but we’ve got to pay the bills. So, we’ll see where this goes! To get this market-ready, we’d probably need a few more tech brains- certainly front-end web developers, funding support, and a few months of full-time work on MySunBuddy.
MySunBuddy ADDRESS and LOGIN: http://mysunbuddy-bdb67.rhcloud.com/ (Login: chadseller Password: ireallyhopewewin)
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