In the San Fernando Valley, homeowners like Dickinson and his wife, Sara, a jewelry designer, have become the unwitting faces of the solar energy movement - residents who didn't set out to be green activists but for whom going green makes sense now more than ever.

The Dickinsons are getting a 23 percent discount on solar panel installation arranged by One Block Off the Grid, an Internet-driven group that in a year has become the nation's largest solar-buying collective. In its short organizing campaign in Los Angeles, the firm has already assisted 102 clients.

"They were able to negotiate a much better price than anything I found on my own," Dickinson said.

With David Dickinson's exorbitant monthly electric bill to chill two wine cellars, run two refrigerator-freezers and heat a pool at his 2,000-square-foot ranch house, it long made sense to go solar.

"But the upfront cost was just too high," said Dickinson, 57, a Canoga Park manufacturer's

controller.

That was even with a 30 percent federal tax credit offered this year, a California state rebate of 10 percent and additional city incentives.

Then Dickinson heard about a San Francisco-based firm that pools homeowners who want energy-saving solar panels on their roofs into large communities that can get better rates by buying in bulk. The company then

brokers significantly lower prices from local installers. Substantially lower cost

This past week, workers began installing 34 photovoltaic panels to the roof of the Dickinsons' 1960s style four-bedroom ranch house - and put the Dickinsons on the solar energy grid.

Dickinson said the deal negotiated with regionally based SolarCity by One Block Off the Grid will cost him about $6 per watt of power capacity. According to the California Energy Commission, the average total cost of a solar photovoltaic system is almost $8 per watt.

Even after customers like Dickinson pay for an inverter to convert the DC power the panels generate into the AC power appliances use, the deal negotiated by One Block Off the Grid is substantially lower than the average in Los Angeles.

"We wanted to create a group purchase program that makes it easier for people to get into solar energy - one that makes them more comfortable with the process," said Dave Llorens, co-founder of One Block Off the Grid.

The group's name comes from its goal of removing one average block's worth of electrical usage each time it runs a community solar purchase campaign in a city.

One Block Off the Grid, according to a spokeswoman, makes its profit through finder's fees paid by local installers.

Since its founding in June 2008, the company has mounted campaigns in the San Francisco Bay Area, San Diego, New Orleans, Phoenix and Denver.

In its Los Angeles campaign, which began last week and runs into next year, the solar-buying collaborative has been assisting potential clients through its Internet site, www.solarlosangeles.1bog.org. The Web site uses an online tool allowing homeowners to call up a satellite-generated image of their roof and find an estimate of solar rates and costs.

The Dickinsons also benefited financially from the overall reduction in the cost of solar panel installation - a price drop brought on by the recession, according to Lyndon Rive, chief executive officer of SolarCity, the largest residential solar panel installer in the country.

Solar demand still high

"Solar has reduced in cost because the panel manufacturers had (manufactured) overcapacity, and that dropped the price," Rive said. "Eighty percent of all solar (panel installation) is financed, so the manufacturers (were) expecting there would be financing before the financial collapse.

"The financial collapse didn't hit the demand for solar. The demand for solar is still extremely high. But the ability to finance things was reduced dramatically."

In California, since the energy crisis of 2000-2001, demand for solar power has increased by 2,800 percent, according to the Environment California Research & Policy Center. Yet, solar power today makes up less than one half of 1 percent of the state's electricity supply.

Two years ago, California established a $3.3-billion campaign to increase the use of solar statewide, employing rebates and tax credits as incentives to consumers who install energy systems.

Since then, the number of homes and businesses using solar energy has more than doubled, growing from 23,000 in 2006 to 52,700, according to the California Public Utilities Commission.

But though the solar energy business is a $40 billion-a-year business worldwide, it remains far from fulfilling the future envisioned by green activists, with California still well off the pace of its goal of adding 3,000 megawatts in solar panels by 2016, enough to power 600,000 homes.

For the Dickinsons, the savings will mean that going solar - a project originally priced at more than $40,000 for their home - will cost them in actual out-of-pocket expenditures $12,000 to $14,000.

That's possible, Dickinson said, because of the One Block Off the Grid pricing, an almost $20,000 rebate from the city's Department of Water and Power and a $7,500 tax credit from the Internal Revenue Service.

And that's just the beginning of his savings, according to Dickinson's calculations.

Saving about $2,000

He estimates his annual electric bill savings will be about $2,000 and that, at current rates, his new solar system will have paid for itself in eight years, after which time the energy for the Dickinson home will be free.

Add to that the Dickinsons' smaller carbon footprint. According to solar energy estimates, during its lifetime the average solar system cuts 36 tons of carbon dioxide - a key pollutant in global warming - or the equivalent of not driving 227,733 miles.

"I believe there is a problem with global warming and energy - I believe it," Dickinson said. "It was financially feasible now. I had the money to do it (and) with the tax credits it really made sense.

"I wish everyone had solar panels in their house. I think it would make a big impact."