The farmhouse shown to the left is a custom frame home with 2"x6" walls, low E windows and standard grade fiberglass insulation. Siding is a composite fiberglass and concrete lap siding over 1/2" plywood, and the roof is built of 24 gauge steel. The front porch and windows are oriented towards the southeast, which provides moderate passive solar heating. The main sources of demand heat are from a high efficiency wood burning stove on the main level, and a propane furnace in the basement with baseboard radiators throughout the house. The water heater, oven, range and clothes dryer are propane powered, as is the 12 kilowatt backup electrical generator. Other kitchen includes an electric refrigerator, a dishwasher and a microwave oven, and there is a standard electric clothes washer. Two pumps are installed. The deep well pump feeds a 1500 gallon concrete fresh water cistern buried below the ground. The second pump is a smaller energy efficient piston pump that pressurizes the house by pumping from the fresh water cistern. All electricity to the house is produced in the detached garage either via the inverters or the backup generator. This allows standard electrical wiring within the house which conforms to the National Electrical Code (NEC), and therefore a separate non-conforming direct current (DC) wiring system is not needed. Service to the house is rated at 100 amperes, 220 volt AC.

The photovoltaic array is the collection of all of the solar panels hooked up to the battery. While it is aesthetically pleasing to have all one type of panel in the array, this is not necessary, and as long as the charge control devices are properly matched, the array can be expanded with different types and sizes of panels as the system grows. Shown to the right is an array of polycrystalline Solarex panels wired series-parallel to produce approximately 1.5 kilowatts of electricity in full sun conditions.

This array consists of three sub-arrays of eight panels, and each sub-array has it's own fused disconnect and individual wiring underground to the main junction box on the outside of the garage. Another fused disconnect is located at the point of entrance to the garage, and large copper cables connect this last disconnect to the DC disconnect for the charge controller located in the equipment room inside of the garage.