Here’s an interesting way to promote solar, show how much electricity a solar array actually produces. That’s what California-based HelioPower did today with its new “Solar Overload” YouTube video.

Scott Gordon, HelioPower’s vice president of residential sales, shot the video at his Laguna Niguel, Calif., home. The 2,200 square-foot home has a five-year-old, 4-kilowatt photovoltaic array.

During the YouTube video (below), Gordon and HelioPower employee Brett Pursuit work to make Gordon’s electric meter go forward or buy extra electricity from the grid. It just took turning on all the lights in the house, two fridges, two DVRs, five ceiling fans, an attic fan a computer and a monitor, and a microwave oven. The microwave tipped the boat and ran the meter forward.

A couple of other household appliances, like a 3/4 horsepower pool pump and an older electric clothes dryer, were also enough to spin the meter forward, as you can see in the video.

But under normal use, even with an air conditioner and a surround-sound system on, the meter was still spinning backwards, with the solar system producing more than the house used.

“This five-year-old system is still producing grid-compliant electricity, and it’s producing almost as much as it was five years ago. I’ve saved over $10,000 in electricity in the last five years,” Gordon said in the video. “Had I waited for the latest and greatest technology to come out, I would’ve left that $10,000 on the table.”

It’s part of a series of educational videos that HelioPower is calling the Smart Meters and Solar series, said company spokesperson Glenna Wiseman.

“We just started this series,” she said. “The video that we put out last week was about how to read smart meters.”

She said the first video focused on smart meters since millions of people are now getting them, but aren’t really sure how they work.

The company will be doing more videos in the future and then repeat them in the fall, according to Wiseman.

Despite the campaign being just over a week old, it’s already increased interest in HelioPower, according to Wiseman.

“We already have business from our Smart Meter and Solar series,” she said. “We’re already seeing additional traffic to our web site.”

Image courtesy of HelioPower.