Posted: 4/18/2011 2:13:29 PM EDT
| A neighbor just had solar panels installed on his roof. A question, when production of power exceeds demand, the power is diverted into the grid. Does this really benefit the power company, cause after all, they are generating power anyway |
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A neighbor just had solar panels installed on his roof. A question, when production of power exceeds demand, the power is diverted into the grid. Does this really benefit the power company, cause after all, they are generating power anyway A little bit, but not much. Peak demand is usually somewhat after peak solar production. But having generation at the demand location, rather than hundreds of miles away saves a lot of transmission loss. |
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Alot of power companies (mine does) have an option where you buy "Credits" that are for green power , they then use those credits to buy power from people who are plugged into the grid. Most power companies will buy the power, but i don't know how it benefits them outside of government subsidies and the like. |
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Quoted: I harvested 6.4 Kilowatt hours yesterday. That will indeed run the bleeding fuck out of a small drill motor. 3 days this year have taken in over 9 kilowatt hours of solar power. What I need now are some more batteries to store the excess energy. How many watts is the array you're using? |
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What is the output of the panels? The church camp where my daughter goes installed a couple of panels. The caretaker was really proud of them, he even had them mostly pointing into the Southern sky. I pointed out that they would power a small drill motor. I have to ask him, but I counted 28 panels on his roof and they look to be approximately 4'x3' panels |
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I harvested 6.4 Kilowatt hours yesterday. That will indeed run the bleeding fuck out of a small drill motor. 3 days this year have taken in over 9 kilowatt hours of solar power. What I need now are some more batteries to store the excess energy. That's pretty good. The panels I mentioned were rated at a total of 1.5 kW or so. Optimism without knowledge. |
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I harvested 6.4 Kilowatt hours yesterday. That will indeed run the bleeding fuck out of a small drill motor. 3 days this year have taken in over 9 kilowatt hours of solar power. What I need now are some more batteries to store the excess energy. How much would 9 kilowatts run? |
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The excess gets sold back to the POCO at a reduced (compared to what you pay) rate. Yes, it helps the POCO, but not much at all. It probably helps them more in the form of government tax breaks/grants of some kind.
As far as monthly utility bills go, when solar panels are installed correctly in accordance to sun angles, the bill it's self is minimal if not NON-EXISTENT (minus fee's that you pay anyway). Unfortunately, over the life of the solar panel, at 10-15 years, they will never pay for themselves. So while it might seem like a good upfront investment, in the end it doesn't pay. If someone wants the green feeling, it's a cool option to have though. |
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How much would 9 kilowatts run? http://www.energysavers.gov/your_home/appliances/index.cfm/mytopic=10040 scroll down the page |
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I harvested 6.4 Kilowatt hours yesterday. That will indeed run the bleeding fuck out of a small drill motor. 3 days this year have taken in over 9 kilowatt hours of solar power. What I need now are some more batteries to store the excess energy. How much would 9 kilowatts run? It'd run ya about $1.08 around here... |
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Harbor freight has a deal going right now on solar panels....http://www.harborfreight.com/45-watt-solar-panel-kit-90599.html
However they only put out 45 watts.... How much am I looking at for a setup that can actually charge enough batteries to run my house? |
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Quoted: Harbor freight has a deal going right now on solar panels....http://www.harborfreight.com/45-watt-solar-panel-kit-90599.html However they only put out 45 watts.... How much am I looking at for a setup that can actually charge enough batteries to run my house? What's your average monthly power consumption? Most likely, in the tens of thousands of dollars by the time you buy panels, wiring, batteries, a suitable inverter, and a suitable charge controller. Right now, it's really only a viable option if you can't hook up to the grid, or if you consume small amounts of electricity. |
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What's your average monthly power consumption? Most likely, in the tens of thousands of dollars by the time you buy panels, wiring, batteries, a suitable inverter, and a suitable charge controller. Right now, it's really only a viable option if you can't hook up to the grid, or if you consume small amounts of electricity. And quality batteries aren't cheap and must be replaced when they fail or reach end of life. Most average homes could power themselves for quite some time on the grid for what a set of batteries cost. One day i hope the power output makes solar a viable choice but it will never make sense for all areas. |
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Quoted: I harvested 6.4 Kilowatt hours yesterday. That will indeed run the bleeding fuck out of a small drill motor. 3 days this year have taken in over 9 kilowatt hours of solar power. What I need now are some more batteries to store the excess energy. This. I don't think your neighbor will be able to retire off his excess power. Not going to be enough excess to jumpstart a hybrid...  |
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What's your average monthly power consumption? Most likely, in the tens of thousands of dollars by the time you buy panels, wiring, batteries, a suitable inverter, and a suitable charge controller. Right now, it's really only a viable option if you can't hook up to the grid, or if you consume small amounts of electricity. And quality batteries aren't cheap and must be replaced when they fail or reach end of life. Most average homes could power themselves for quite some time on the grid for what a set of batteries cost. That's one reason why batteryless grid-intertied solar systems are so popular - No batteries to buy or replace every few years. Of course the down side is that during a utility power failure, batteryless systems are useless - They don't store any power, and can't produce power without a live connection to the electrical grid. Probably the ideal arrangement is a full-sized grid-intertied system. along with a small set of batteries and inverter. This approach minimizes battery expenses, while still providing some AC power during a utility blackout. |
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PA? PA has some of the worst solar resources in the country. It won't be a pretty ROI.
http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/map_pv_national_lo-res.jpg |
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I harvested 6.4 Kilowatt hours yesterday. That will indeed run the bleeding fuck out of a small drill motor. 3 days this year have taken in over 9 kilowatt hours of solar power. What I need now are some more batteries to store the excess energy. 9... That is what? a buck? of electricity... |
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Depends on the power company.
My stepfather has a solar power setup on his house in California. He got major tax breaks, etc. His meter pretty much goes backwards and the power company buys the power back. He put up the system because it's sunny more often than not where he lives and in the event of blackouts(which still do happen BTW), he has power. |
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Quoted: What is the output of the panels? The church camp where my daughter goes installed a couple of panels. The caretaker was really proud of them, he even had them mostly pointing into the Southern sky. I pointed out that they would power a small drill motor.  |
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I harvested 6.4 Kilowatt hours yesterday. That will indeed run the bleeding fuck out of a small drill motor. 3 days this year have taken in over 9 kilowatt hours of solar power. What I need now are some more batteries to store the excess energy. 9... That is what? a buck? of electricity... Since Fullpower lives in AK, that's probably a lot more than a dollar's worth of electricity. |
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I just got mine running on Friday afternoon. I got a relatively small system, 1.5 KW, because I live alone and don't have any really power-hungry appliances (no AC, gas range and furnace). My power company lets customers run their meters down to net zero to get your bill down to the minimum $5 charge. Beyond that the returns diminish. If they paid full price for surplus, I could have gone with a larger array. (I sized my inverter so that the array could be expanded without replacing the inverter.) I expect to hit break-even in about 7-8 years, assuming about 6% average annual rate increases. The power company could mess me up by reducing rates, but even a five-year-old I recently spoke with laughed at that idea.  |
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Just like shared computing is the way to process an abnormally large amount of data, the same thing applies to our power gird.
The more people putting back into the system or reducing the load the better for everyone assuming the utility is on board and doesn't pass that loss of revenue off to everyone else. |
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What's your average monthly power consumption? Most likely, in the tens of thousands of dollars by the time you buy panels, wiring, batteries, a suitable inverter, and a suitable charge controller. Right now, it's really only a viable option if you can't hook up to the grid, or if you consume small amounts of electricity. And quality batteries aren't cheap and must be replaced when they fail or reach end of life. Most average homes could power themselves for quite some time on the grid for what a set of batteries cost. That's one reason why batteryless grid-intertied solar systems are so popular - No batteries to buy or replace every few years. Of course the down side is that during a utility power failure, batteryless systems are useless - They don't store any power, and can't produce power without a live connection to the electrical grid. Probably the ideal arrangement is a full-sized grid-intertied system. along with a small set of batteries and inverter. This approach minimizes battery expenses, while still providing some AC power during a utility blackout. Problem being that if there were ever enough grid intertied systems to make a real difference in the use of power plant derived electricity then power plant electricity generation would become prohibitively expensive and extremely unreliable due to the constant fluxuation of demand. |
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no. we are required by law to pay 6 times as much for "home owner" produced power compared to what we sell it for.
so....we as a utility charge ALL customers a "recovery fee" to offset this subsidy. Solar and wind was tried in 70's....technology is better today but green energy is still non-viable and as mythical as a fuckin unicorn. |
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What's your average monthly power consumption? Most likely, in the tens of thousands of dollars by the time you buy panels, wiring, batteries, a suitable inverter, and a suitable charge controller. Right now, it's really only a viable option if you can't hook up to the grid, or if you consume small amounts of electricity. And quality batteries aren't cheap and must be replaced when they fail or reach end of life. Most average homes could power themselves for quite some time on the grid for what a set of batteries cost. That's one reason why batteryless grid-intertied solar systems are so popular - No batteries to buy or replace every few years. Of course the down side is that during a utility power failure, batteryless systems are useless - They don't store any power, and can't produce power without a live connection to the electrical grid. Probably the ideal arrangement is a full-sized grid-intertied system. along with a small set of batteries and inverter. This approach minimizes battery expenses, while still providing some AC power during a utility blackout. Problem being that if there were ever enough grid intertied systems to make a real difference in the use of power plant derived electricity then power plant electricity generation would become prohibitively expensive and extremely unreliable due to the constant fluxuation of demand. Yep. It's hard enough keeping loads balanced when you only have one large power source supplying the grid - Try doing it with several hundred thousand small sources located at random points on the grid - every one of which is producing varying amounts of power! |
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Quoted: no. we are required by law to pay 6 times as much for "home owner" produced power compared to what we sell it for. so....we as a utility charge ALL customers a "recovery fee" to offset this subsidy. Solar and wind was tried in 70's....technology is better today but green energy is still non-viable and as mythical as a fuckin unicorn. Rates are pretty high here in San Diego. My baseline rate is over 7 cents per KWK. From 31-100% over my baseline of 323 KWH per month, I get charged almost 21 cents per KWH. There are even higher tiers for heavy power users. My PV system should keep me completely within baseline, down to zero in most months, and will be a hedge against rate increases that I believe are inevitable as SDG&E dings ratepayers to cover the cost of a new transmission line, maintenance of aging infrastructure, and its share of the San Onofre nuclear plant. |
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How well do solar panels hold up to hail storms? In much of Texas and Oklahoma, you can expect a good storm at least 2-3 times a year. Great question. We only get an occasional falling bullet around here. only occasional? I know you're not in Richmond!
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With a grid tie system and net-metering it can make sense if you have high utility rates.
Here in Oregon they are going full retard and closing a coal plant. At the same time they are adding HUGE amounts of wind power. The BPA (power management operator) is having a hell of a time managing loads with it's array of Dams. |
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Quoted: With a grid tie system and net-metering it can make sense if you have high utility rates. Here in Oregon they are going full retard and closing a coal plant. At the same time they are adding HUGE amounts of wind power. The BPA (power management operator) is having a hell of a time managing loads with it's array of Dams. Thankfully hydro can compensate a lot better than coal. If you have flexibility in permitted flow rates. With grid tie, just think what happens after a hail storm if there is sufficient market penetration. |
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A neighbor just had solar panels installed on his roof. A question, when production of power exceeds demand, the power is diverted into the grid. Does this really benefit the power company, cause after all, they are generating power anyway Yes, when production exceeds demand (i.e. during the day when the sun is shining and the homeowner is at work), the excess power is diverted to the grid. The homeowner is then credited for the excess power produced, and then uses those credits during occasions when demand exceeds supply (i.e. at night when the televisions and the panels aren't producing). These credits roll over month-to-month, and if there's still credits at the end of the year in Pennsylvania the utilities are required to pay somewhat less than the retail rate for the excess generation. Google 'net metering' for more information. From what you're describing, there's a vast gulf of difference in the quality and output of the panels on your neighbor's roof vs. what some are describing in this thread. Those are most likely 200-220W panels, which (if there's 28 of them) makes for about a 6kW system. Fairly typically-sized residential system. Despite the doubters in this thread, this stuff works. Pennsylvania isn't the greatest state for solar these days (in terms of the financial returns), but such systems in many areas can offer very attractive returns, and solid performance and worksmanship guarantees. 
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With grid tie, just think what happens after a hail storm if there is sufficient market penetration. Today's monocrystalline panels from top-tier manufacturers laugh in the face of hail. Not an issue at all. Tested against wind, sandstorms, dust accumulation, tropical storms, etc. I've heard (and completely believe) of testing done with shotguns. I also have the faintest inkling of what some of the panels used in far-off sandy DOD applications can withstand, and it's impressive. Hail might not be an issue, but shade is. Seriously, shade is like solar's kryptonite. Don't let any tree branches grow over the panels, and you'll be fine. 
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