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Solar tax credits run out at the end of this year — better get those panels on your roof before they do.

Or maybe you should just wait because Congress, if the Senate approves an extension passed overwhelmingly by the House last month, is doubling the cap on the credits to $4,000.

What's a green-thinking person to do? Not to mention a big company considering going solar — or a utility company with plans to begin generating more power from renewable sources?

The experts have no answers, other than to lay out the economics and let you decide for yourself.

The uncertainty is caused by the fact that federal tax credits for renewable energy end this calendar year.

Come Jan. 1, if Congress and the president don't enact new ones, the federal credit of 30 percent of the cost of renewable-energy systems can no longer be used to offset the cost of your new solar system.

For homeowners, it's not a huge consideration. The credit is currently capped at $2,000 and although that's a good chunk of change, the other incentives still available — a rebate from your local utility company and a state tax incentive of $1,000 — will still defray more than half the cost of most photovoltaic systems.

The other consideration for the homeowner is that the federal tax credits could improve next year.

A bill that passed the House last month extends the credits for six years for residential solar and doubles the cap to $4,000.

The solar industry hopes to amend that bill when it comes up in the Senate to remove that cap entirely.

Leon Robertson of Green Valley said he knew the arithmetic when he decided to install a 5-kilowatt (5,000-watt) photovoltaic system on his roof two months ago. "I operate on what the current situation is," he said. "The politics are always changing."

Robertson received a rebate from Tucson Electric Power of $15,100 on his $32,300 system, installed by American Solar Electric Inc., a Scottsdale-based company.

When he files his tax return next year, he can additionally claim a $1,000 credit from the state of Arizona and $2,000 from the Internal Revenue Service.

(The credits are figured on the total system cost. The rebate is considered taxable income.)

Robertson is not losing any sleep over the fact that if Congress doubles or drops the cap on the tax credit, he could have saved an additional $2,000 or $7,690. He figures he already got a good deal.

Based on his experience so far, Robertson said he expects to save about $840 in electrical costs per year.

That's a 6 percent return on his $14,200 investment, he said.

Without the rebate and the credits, solar wouldn't make financial sense, he said. "It would net out in favor of keeping what you've got."

But Robertson, a retired epidemiologist, has reasons other than economic for going solar.

He said he's convinced of man's role in climate change and concerned about rising energy costs. That's why he drives a hybrid vehicle in addition to living in a solar-powered home.

Corporations are more concerned with the bottom line, and they need a guarantee that the tax credits will stay around, said Monique Hanis, spokeswoman for the Solar Energy Industries Association.

If the Senate doesn't pass the eight-year extension of corporate tax credits for solar, 4,000 megawatts (a megawatt is 1 million watts) in utility-scale plants will be in jeopardy.

Those planned projects, including several in Arizona, need the certainty of future tax credits, Hanis said.

Rebates and state tax credits, not to mention rising utility costs, will keep residential solar installations on the upswing in Arizona, said Tom Alston of the industry group Solar Alliance.

Commercial projects will suffer, he said.

"It has to be done by the end of 2008, which is getting to be a very tight deadline," he said.

"If it doesn't get extended, I would suspect that the number of commercial systems we do in the state drops dramatically. I don't know if you'd do any," said Alston, who is manager of policy and business development for American Solar Electric Inc.

Hanis said the industry and its environmental allies are hoping for a strong vote in the Senate for extension.

There is widespread support for solar, she said.

The impasse comes because Democrats, sticking to a promise to "pay as you go" on any budget bills, propose to offset the cost of the tax credits by eliminating some others.

Eliminating credits is looked on as a tax increase by the Bush administration, Hanis said.

"Incentives do cost money," she said.

"You need to pay about $8 billion over a 10-year period" for the solar part of the $50 billion package of tax-credit extensions passed by the House, she added.