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Guam - With the rising the cost of electricity and two growing boys, Gen and Greg Calvo signed up for Micronesia Renewable Energy's Solar4All program.


"When we heard about the program that it would reduce our monthly power bills and things like that so we were really interested," they said. The Calvo family today flipped the switch and became the first Solar4All home on island. MRE vice president Jeffrey Voacolo told KUAM News, "We're really proud to say that the Calvos will be saving about $800 a year on their power bill without putting any money down whatsoever."


The Solar4All program is a partnership between MRE and Texas-based company Sunnova Energy. MRE installs the system for free and provides the maintenance for the life of the agreement while Sunnova monitors the system to ensure peak performance.


Sunnova CEO John Berger said, "We're excited to b here with MRE and Gen, our first customer here, to turn it on. I think that it's wonderful that the citizens of Guam now have the same access and same rights to cheaper power that m any other states back in the mainland US."


According to MRE, the solar4all program allows customers to pay for solar power by the month, just like a normal power bill, but lower. Savings will increase over time as power rates continue to increase. With the Solar4All program the customer can lock in lower electricity rates for the term of the contract.


Voacolo added, "You have to be a homeowner you have to own the deed and there's a credit check, but it goes very quick in a matter f three days we can actually have you under contract and within 30 days we can actually have the systems built on your roof and from Day One you're saving money."


And for the Calvo's that's a worthy investment. "When this program started they explained it very well, we didn't have to put anything down all we had to do is sign up for five years, within the five year option to purchase the panels if we want or continue on. So since then we didn't have to worry about installing any maintenance we decided to do the program," said Gen.


For more information on the Solar4All program you can contact Micronesia Renewable Energy at 632-2613.