Solar panels?
-
So the other day I was reading some technical article as a result of googling... :doh: as a result of using google search. Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200. Anyone in CP actually do this? I don't mean heat water. The electricity goes into batteries where a power inverter converts it to 120V (here in the US).
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
-
So the other day I was reading some technical article as a result of googling... :doh: as a result of using google search. Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200. Anyone in CP actually do this? I don't mean heat water. The electricity goes into batteries where a power inverter converts it to 120V (here in the US).
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
I have spent a lot of time researching this last year (trying to build something with enough power to supply my PC 24/7) and I have come to the conclusion that unless you live in California where electricity costs > 4 times what it does in most places and also get a government subsidy you will most likely spend more money for the solar panels and equipment than it will generate in its entire 20 year lifespan. One reason for this is the panels are rated for maximum output and this will only happen when the sun is directly lined up with the panel and there are no clouds or anything else blocking the light. Also remember that during 1/2 of the hours you get no output, inverter is not 100% efficient, batteries take energy to charge, waste energy on discharge, clouds get in the way of the sun ... Expect to get less than 1/4 of the rated output on average of a panel.
John
modified on Wednesday, April 29, 2009 3:49 PM
-
I have spent a lot of time researching this last year (trying to build something with enough power to supply my PC 24/7) and I have come to the conclusion that unless you live in California where electricity costs > 4 times what it does in most places and also get a government subsidy you will most likely spend more money for the solar panels and equipment than it will generate in its entire 20 year lifespan. One reason for this is the panels are rated for maximum output and this will only happen when the sun is directly lined up with the panel and there are no clouds or anything else blocking the light. Also remember that during 1/2 of the hours you get no output, inverter is not 100% efficient, batteries take energy to charge, waste energy on discharge, clouds get in the way of the sun ... Expect to get less than 1/4 of the rated output on average of a panel.
John
modified on Wednesday, April 29, 2009 3:49 PM
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm an engineer too :). But, the *green* books are so persuasive. Besides, the "let's cool the neighborhood" is rapidly approaching. :)
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
-
So the other day I was reading some technical article as a result of googling... :doh: as a result of using google search. Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200. Anyone in CP actually do this? I don't mean heat water. The electricity goes into batteries where a power inverter converts it to 120V (here in the US).
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
I am posting this reply from a solar energy powered home. [Edit: To be clear my house is powered by commercial solar panels, not my little toy I mention below] I haven't built my own panels but I've built my own small parabolic solar collector that pushes a tiny little stirling engine. Sucker gets hot and loud.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
-
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm an engineer too :). But, the *green* books are so persuasive. Besides, the "let's cool the neighborhood" is rapidly approaching. :)
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
I am not saying that this would not be a cool hobby/project for me to tackle though. I have degrees in EE and CS although I do 98% of my work in CS. For a while back I was in charge of maintenance of 4 laser film digitizers that had me using an oscilloscope to calibrate the dynamic range of the device, replacing components when they died, working with 1800V DC power supplies... but the last time I fired one of these up was 3 or so years ago.. Now only if I had some free time and got the SO to allow me to attach panels to the new roof she just paid for.. Wouldn't be an easy sell.
John
modified on Wednesday, April 29, 2009 4:35 PM
-
I am posting this reply from a solar energy powered home. [Edit: To be clear my house is powered by commercial solar panels, not my little toy I mention below] I haven't built my own panels but I've built my own small parabolic solar collector that pushes a tiny little stirling engine. Sucker gets hot and loud.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
-
So the other day I was reading some technical article as a result of googling... :doh: as a result of using google search. Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200. Anyone in CP actually do this? I don't mean heat water. The electricity goes into batteries where a power inverter converts it to 120V (here in the US).
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
I know the water heating variety work well, even at temperate latitudes[^] - my grandad fitted that sort of panels in the 1970s and they provided him (still provide my nan) with hot water for a lot of the year. At times, the water is almost boiling as it comes out. Anyway - water heating may be a more reliable way of using solar power than electricity.
-
details sir
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
charlieg wrote:
details sir
? The stirling engine or the panels? :) Long before we went to solar we installed radiant barrier and maxed out the insulation in the attic. When our house was built in 2000 we also installed extra insulation in every interior wall of the house and went with sprayed foam insulation for the exterior facing walls. I had the panels installed in the end of the summer last year by a local company that was going out of business. Got a great deal. We had the inverter installed in our garage and it's tied into to grid so we sell power back to the utility when the batteries are charged during the day. We purchased a system that would handle a load of 1,800 - 2,000 kwh. (ie closer to 3500kwh). We didn't opt to go with enough batteries to handle all of our nightime needs during the summer so we do get an occasional bill for a few bucks. But, I can always add more batteries. As far as the plans for my solar collector goes, I am hoping to either heat gas to use a heat difference engine to power my tool shed.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
-
charlieg wrote:
details sir
? The stirling engine or the panels? :) Long before we went to solar we installed radiant barrier and maxed out the insulation in the attic. When our house was built in 2000 we also installed extra insulation in every interior wall of the house and went with sprayed foam insulation for the exterior facing walls. I had the panels installed in the end of the summer last year by a local company that was going out of business. Got a great deal. We had the inverter installed in our garage and it's tied into to grid so we sell power back to the utility when the batteries are charged during the day. We purchased a system that would handle a load of 1,800 - 2,000 kwh. (ie closer to 3500kwh). We didn't opt to go with enough batteries to handle all of our nightime needs during the summer so we do get an occasional bill for a few bucks. But, I can always add more batteries. As far as the plans for my solar collector goes, I am hoping to either heat gas to use a heat difference engine to power my tool shed.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
Chris Austin wrote:
We purchased a system that would handle a load of 1,800 - 2,000 kwh. (ie closer to 3500kwh).
How's that work?
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains. -- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
-
So the other day I was reading some technical article as a result of googling... :doh: as a result of using google search. Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200. Anyone in CP actually do this? I don't mean heat water. The electricity goes into batteries where a power inverter converts it to 120V (here in the US).
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
charlieg wrote:
Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200.
Got a link?
charlieg wrote:
Anyone in CP actually do this?
Never made a solar panel, but I bought a 120W panel (around $600), charger system, batteries (1KWh), meters, switches, and an inverter a couple years back and am able to pretty much run a couple laptops and external monitors "off the grid" most of the time. Most of the time meaning, I set the system to turn off the monitors after 2 minutes of inactivity, and I power down the whole computer after 10 or so minutes. Otherwise, not much gets into the batteries. :) It's a fun "hobby", but there's no way I'm going to recoup the close to $1500 I spent (batteries were really expensive). Marc
-
I have spent a lot of time researching this last year (trying to build something with enough power to supply my PC 24/7) and I have come to the conclusion that unless you live in California where electricity costs > 4 times what it does in most places and also get a government subsidy you will most likely spend more money for the solar panels and equipment than it will generate in its entire 20 year lifespan. One reason for this is the panels are rated for maximum output and this will only happen when the sun is directly lined up with the panel and there are no clouds or anything else blocking the light. Also remember that during 1/2 of the hours you get no output, inverter is not 100% efficient, batteries take energy to charge, waste energy on discharge, clouds get in the way of the sun ... Expect to get less than 1/4 of the rated output on average of a panel.
John
modified on Wednesday, April 29, 2009 3:49 PM
John M. Drescher wrote:
I have come to the conclusion that unless you live in California...
I live in the Central Valley in California and I've been saying this for years. There's *so much* free energy just falling from the sky it's almost obscene not to try and use it for *something*. Heck, even if it only works for half the year and only during the day, you can still power your A/C with it for the entire summer. This alone would take an enormous load off the grid. In a place like California, I almost think it should be mandatory to build all new homes with solar panels and offer *huge* incentives to people to upgrade their existing homes.
The StartPage Randomizer - The Windows Cheerleader - Twitter
-
Chris Austin wrote:
We purchased a system that would handle a load of 1,800 - 2,000 kwh. (ie closer to 3500kwh).
How's that work?
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains. -- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
dan neely wrote:
How's that work?
Not sure what you mean but, we looked at our average monthly usage (kwh) and wanted the system to supply most of it. Since solar intensity is interment we hedged upward and purchased more square feet of panels to try and have a reliable output that is close to our needs. Depending on the load our home is using the inverter and controller will route power to where it is needed. If it is producing more power than we are using it charges the batteries. And, when the batteries are charged and the panels are producing more power that we are currently using it is "pumped" into the grid and the utility credits that to us at some percentage of the market rate; I forget how it is figured.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
-
charlieg wrote:
Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200.
Got a link?
charlieg wrote:
Anyone in CP actually do this?
Never made a solar panel, but I bought a 120W panel (around $600), charger system, batteries (1KWh), meters, switches, and an inverter a couple years back and am able to pretty much run a couple laptops and external monitors "off the grid" most of the time. Most of the time meaning, I set the system to turn off the monitors after 2 minutes of inactivity, and I power down the whole computer after 10 or so minutes. Otherwise, not much gets into the batteries. :) It's a fun "hobby", but there's no way I'm going to recoup the close to $1500 I spent (batteries were really expensive). Marc
Marc Clifton wrote:
It's a fun "hobby", but there's no way I'm going to recoup the close to $1500 I spent (batteries were really expensive).
Yeah. We may see some of the money back we spent if we sell the house but we did it because we were pissed off at the power companies.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
-
So the other day I was reading some technical article as a result of googling... :doh: as a result of using google search. Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200. Anyone in CP actually do this? I don't mean heat water. The electricity goes into batteries where a power inverter converts it to 120V (here in the US).
Charlie Gilley Will program for food... Hurtling toward a government of the stupid, by the stupid, for the stupid we go. —Michelle Malkin This crap sandwich is all yours.... 2009 "Stimulus Bill"
I saw the same ad pop up not only on Google but MySpace, as well. So I followed it and read the sales pitch. They're selling a book telling you how to scavenge other peoples' throwaways to get parts to make a solar generator that will be dodgy at best, dangerous at worst. The only way you're going to get serious amounts of solar generated electricity for $200 is to steal the panels from emergency phones along the Interstate and stage a late night raid on an auto parts shop that has a bunch of good batteries in the back room. Don't forget to steal the acid, too - those things usually ship dry, and it's expensive stuff.
"A Journey of a Thousand Rest Stops Begins with a Single Movement"
-
dan neely wrote:
How's that work?
Not sure what you mean but, we looked at our average monthly usage (kwh) and wanted the system to supply most of it. Since solar intensity is interment we hedged upward and purchased more square feet of panels to try and have a reliable output that is close to our needs. Depending on the load our home is using the inverter and controller will route power to where it is needed. If it is producing more power than we are using it charges the batteries. And, when the batteries are charged and the panels are producing more power that we are currently using it is "pumped" into the grid and the utility credits that to us at some percentage of the market rate; I forget how it is figured.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
Ok. I think I see now, i read your original post as saying that you were using an 1.8-2mwh system to provide 3.5mwh of power.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains. -- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
-
John M. Drescher wrote:
I have come to the conclusion that unless you live in California...
I live in the Central Valley in California and I've been saying this for years. There's *so much* free energy just falling from the sky it's almost obscene not to try and use it for *something*. Heck, even if it only works for half the year and only during the day, you can still power your A/C with it for the entire summer. This alone would take an enormous load off the grid. In a place like California, I almost think it should be mandatory to build all new homes with solar panels and offer *huge* incentives to people to upgrade their existing homes.
The StartPage Randomizer - The Windows Cheerleader - Twitter
I think in Oregon a company is developing roof shingles that are pv panels. Brilliant idea.
Sovereign ingredient for a happy marriage: Pay cash or do without. Interest charges not only eat up a household budget; awareness of debt eats up domestic felicity. --Lazarus Long Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece. --Ralph Charell
-
Ok. I think I see now, i read your original post as saying that you were using an 1.8-2mwh system to provide 3.5mwh of power.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains. -- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
Sorry about that. I should have not assumed that everyone would understand that we hedged upward.
-
charlieg wrote:
Up popped an article about building your own solar panels for $200.
Got a link?
charlieg wrote:
Anyone in CP actually do this?
Never made a solar panel, but I bought a 120W panel (around $600), charger system, batteries (1KWh), meters, switches, and an inverter a couple years back and am able to pretty much run a couple laptops and external monitors "off the grid" most of the time. Most of the time meaning, I set the system to turn off the monitors after 2 minutes of inactivity, and I power down the whole computer after 10 or so minutes. Otherwise, not much gets into the batteries. :) It's a fun "hobby", but there's no way I'm going to recoup the close to $1500 I spent (batteries were really expensive). Marc
Marc Clifton wrote:
batteries were really expensive
Here in Ireland you don't really need batteries because you can just feed the power back into the main grid. We get paid back if our meter is wound back below zero instead of us paying at all.We have a wind turbine though(5kw) so it's capable of doing that. :-D This doesn't make your house independent though because it has to shut off when the grid cuts off because of regulations. :sigh:
-
Marc Clifton wrote:
batteries were really expensive
Here in Ireland you don't really need batteries because you can just feed the power back into the main grid. We get paid back if our meter is wound back below zero instead of us paying at all.We have a wind turbine though(5kw) so it's capable of doing that. :-D This doesn't make your house independent though because it has to shut off when the grid cuts off because of regulations. :sigh:
buachaill cliste wrote:
This doesn't make your house independent though because it has to shut off when the grid cuts off because of regulations
Even out in the sticks?
-
buachaill cliste wrote:
This doesn't make your house independent though because it has to shut off when the grid cuts off because of regulations
Even out in the sticks?
Well if you're connected to the grid yeah,because if you leave it pumping into the grid when it's supposed to be off then you'll have some fried electrician. But if you're that far out in the sticks you'll need alot of batteries :-D