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Building my own solar power system

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Re: Building my own solar power system

#141

Post by ta1243 »

pjc50 wrote: post #128
ta1243 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Politics however them collides, with "postcode lottery" headlines Democracy really limits governments

Yeah. It would be more accurate to say that newspapers hate local government as a concept, but a lot of the public are happy to go along with that and get peeved about any difference which is pointed out to them. (nobody ever describes house prices as a "postcode lottery"!)

Talk radio and TV are just as bad, as are the opposition. If Tories proposed it, Labour would be up in arms about postcode lottery. If Labour proposed it, exactly the same from the other side.

Doesn't matter how sensible it is, the other side will use it to score points. I can't believe for a second that Liberal Democrats think that James Dyson or Andrew Lloyd Webber should be able to avoid inheritance tax by buying tens of millions of pounds of farmland, but it's politically beneficial for them to do so.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#143

Post by ta1243 »

robertlagrant wrote: post #119
ta1243 wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That applies with inelastic goods - land for example - where supply can't increase Assuming the base cost is 8k Supplier A and Supplier B charge 15k and have 100 customers between them, making 350k each Supplier B decides to undercut Supplier A, and charge 14k, and get all the customers, making 600k profit Customer might be willing to pay 10k, but if there's two identical quotes, one for 10k and one for 9k they'll go…

> Customer might be willing to pay 10k, but if there's two identical quotes, one for 10k and one for 9k they'll go for the 9k But you see the point. There's a comfortable cushion where everyone can make more money off the taxpayer and have an easier time of it. Spend a bit of it on better marketing to elevate yourself and justify the higher price in people's minds.

Only if you believe that the invisible hand of the market doesn't work

Re: Building my own solar power system

#144

Post by K0balt »

I’ve been running a solar microgrid on my coffee farm for the last 7years. We started with a few golf cart batteries and 4 panels, these days we’re powering 4 houses, 7 cabins, water extraction, treatment, and RO processing, campus-wide fiber network and switches, path lighting, security systems, and a small server rack.

We’re running 6 inverters on our primary system in a three phase configuration, 35kw of panels and 160kwh of lithium iron batteries. About to add an additional 20kw of panels and a test bank of LiTo cells.

Our panels are a distributed set of rooftop mounted panels on various buildings, which also serves to shade the rooftops reducing cooling loads.

We still have to run a generator to supplement charging on dark overcast days, but it’s typically about 100 hours a year. Hooping to get that running on biomass eventually.

It’s strange to me that people in rural areas pay for electricity. It makes no economic sense, at least here in the Caribbean.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#145

Post by account-5 »

K0balt wrote: post #144

I’ve been running a solar microgrid on my coffee farm for the last 7years. We started with a few golf cart batteries and 4 panels, these days we’re powering 4 houses, 7 cabins, water extraction, treatment, and RO processing, campus-wide fiber network and switches, path lighting, security systems, and a small server rack. We’re running 6 inverters on our primary system in a three phase configuration, 35kw of panels an…

Would imagine it's the initial cost of seeing all that up, and then the cost of maintenance. For me personally, where do you even start?

Re: Building my own solar power system

#146

Post by jedahan »

K0balt wrote: post #144

I’ve been running a solar microgrid on my coffee farm for the last 7years. We started with a few golf cart batteries and 4 panels, these days we’re powering 4 houses, 7 cabins, water extraction, treatment, and RO processing, campus-wide fiber network and switches, path lighting, security systems, and a small server rack. We’re running 6 inverters on our primary system in a three phase configuration, 35kw of panels an…

Would love a write up or links to resources for water extraction and treatment if you’d oblige.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#147

Post by ty6853 »

pjc50 wrote: post #62
apexalpha wrote: post #44

> I found three companies and gave them my PG&E usage for the past year (about 16,000 kwh) and got three quotes ranging from ~45 — 55k. Wow these rates are crazy. A 10kW setup costs you maybe €10.000 all-in here in the Netherlands. What's going on with these rates? Do they already include the ridiculous tarrifs? A new battery setup for a 20kWh LFP battery + 10 kW inverter + installation is €7000 now. And dropping, fa…

Crazy stuff. Ten years ago I paid £5.5k GBP for a 3.7kW system. Since then I would expect the labour component to have gone up but the panels to have come down. I guess the skilled labour shortage in the US is having a very real effect on prices. Under the subsidy rules for feed-in-tariffs at the time, that had to be done with an MCS approved installer. All work in England would require an approved "Part P" signoff a…

There's not a shortage of skilled labor so much in US as there is a shortage of people able to go through the racketeering process of getting a contractor license, which also requires being a half-slave to someone with a license for a number of years. It's straight up mercantilist style shake-down to benefit prior entrants. It is easier in US to become an electrical engineer than it is to become a guy who adds a new outlet to a room addition, but that has nothing to do with skill.

In fact when I was first hired as an engineer, it was actually someone that wanted an electrician but hired EEs instead because they are cheaper and more readily available.

One of the worst is something like installing HVAC stuff. I got an EPA refrigerant license in 2 days of studying and then did my own myself. If I wanted to install it for a profit for someone else, I would have to spend 4 years working for someone else with a license first to get the contractor license! The end result is it legitimately cost like $700 to have a single capacitor replaced on an air conditioner, and in places like Florida if you do it for someone else without years of 'training' you're now a felon.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#148

Post by K0balt »

account-5 wrote: post #145
K0balt wrote: post #144

I’ve been running a solar microgrid on my coffee farm for the last 7years. We started with a few golf cart batteries and 4 panels, these days we’re powering 4 houses, 7 cabins, water extraction, treatment, and RO processing, campus-wide fiber network and switches, path lighting, security systems, and a small server rack. We’re running 6 inverters on our primary system in a three phase configuration, 35kw of panels an…

Would imagine it's the initial cost of seeing all that up, and then the cost of maintenance. For me personally, where do you even start?

It grew organically so there was never a huge cost Really, except when we decided to build a building for The power plant because it was getting out of hand. It’s been a few thousand dollars a year in growth as we add batteries and panels. Also a bit of labor for installation of course, but we handle that in house.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#149

Post by lazide »

kragen wrote: post #137
detaro wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wind generators really scale with size though. Small ones rarely make sense

If the objective is to reduce the number of hours you're not self-sufficient for a given battery size, or reduce the size of your expensive batteries, even a couple hundred watts could make sense. https://www.amazon.com/NINILADY-Vertical-Generator-Controlle... is a 600-watt-peak wind generator, designed for 11m/s winds, for sale in the US for US$300, presumably much cheaper in countries that aren't descending into kl…

The issue is the payback is not worth the hate from your neighbors and capital cost. at least solar panels are quiet.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#150

Post by Aurornis »

K0balt wrote: post #144

I’ve been running a solar microgrid on my coffee farm for the last 7years. We started with a few golf cart batteries and 4 panels, these days we’re powering 4 houses, 7 cabins, water extraction, treatment, and RO processing, campus-wide fiber network and switches, path lighting, security systems, and a small server rack. We’re running 6 inverters on our primary system in a three phase configuration, 35kw of panels an…

> It’s strange to me that people in rural areas pay for electricity. It makes no economic sense, at least here in the Caribbean.

This comment was very confusing until I read the second sentence. Electricity prices in the Caribbean are very high, and I can only imagine that rural areas are even worse.

Where I’m at in the United States a typical electric rate is around $0.10/kWh. Paying that nominal amount and avoiding the need to service additional equipment and deal with backup generators is an easy decision.

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