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Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

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Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#221

Post by bawolff »

happymellon wrote: post #39
cinntaile wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the case everywhere in the world, it's not a tech issue. The tech exists.

Not always, sometimes its logistics, sometimes outside forces which create time pressures. Not everything can be solved by money, sometimes its a mythical man month/9 women can't produce a baby in 1 month issue. However in this scenario, its pure neglect which is causing power issues.

> Not everything can be solved by money, sometimes its a mythical man month/9 women can't produce a baby in 1 month issue.

I mean, its not like they just discovered electricity. Sure sometimes things take time, but that is still a money issue because it means there was insufficient budget for maintainance and future capacity planning

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#222

Post by derbaum »

nandomrumber wrote: post #217
eldaisfish wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it is actually simpler. The inverter stops power flow if it does not detect a grid voltage. The actual power coming from a balcony setup is tiny, a thousand watts ballpark. The typical house will consume the vast majority of that capacity. Even if some flows back to the grid, it will likely be consumed by losses in the transformer and wires.

You’d be surprised how few watts a fridge and a TV draw, 500 watts combined, and that’s only while the compressor in the fridge is running. Don’t open the fridge very often, or keep a lot of thermal mass in the form of filled water bottles in there, and the compressor in a fridge will spend most its time not running.

Now I'm curious... Is your last suggestion correct? Wouldn't the time to cool down between pause intervals be proportionally longer due to the higher thermal mass and cancel out any savings gained by the long pause? Maybe the overall energy draw is even higher because the heat losses are higher when you spend a longer time with a high dT.

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#223

Post by chilldsgn »

happymellon wrote: post #28
chilldsgn wrote: post #27

I don't know much about electrical grids, but I'm wondering if something like this concept could help South Africa with its endlessly struggling electrical grid problems. My city constantly has power outages and the majority of people cannot afford installing solar into their homes.

From what I understand, South Africa's electrical problems have been long term political.

Yup, it is deeply political, and I think ordinary citizens such as myself don't even understand how deep the corruption goes.

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#224

Post by chilldsgn »

miningape wrote: post #44
chilldsgn wrote: post #27

I don't know much about electrical grids, but I'm wondering if something like this concept could help South Africa with its endlessly struggling electrical grid problems. My city constantly has power outages and the majority of people cannot afford installing solar into their homes.

Eskom is already trying to take people to court over "non-compliant" solar panel installations [1]. I wouldn't hold my breath. Like most things in ANC South Africa this is a political issue where Eskom wants to get their cut for providing a non-existent service - and then funnel that money back to their friends and family for their non-existent services. [1] https://www.ecr.co.za/shows/stacey-jsbu/eskom-cracks-down-n…

Yup... It's about feeding the greedy fat cats at the top.

A simple solution like "just install solar" isn't going to solve the problems necessarily, because it originates from greed, mismanagement, corruption at the core. Solar is more of a downstream solution in my mind (correct me if I'm wrong).

Demand for coal will be reduced, which might most likely lead to massive job losses in not only the coal mining sector, but also logistics, exacerbating the troubling unemployment issues the country also faces. I don't really want to go down THAT rabbit hole :D

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#225

Post by chilldsgn »

cogman10 wrote: post #70
happymellon wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not always, sometimes its logistics, sometimes outside forces which create time pressures. Not everything can be solved by money, sometimes its a mythical man month/9 women can't produce a baby in 1 month issue. However in this scenario, its pure neglect which is causing power issues.

Renewables solve logistics problems. Running a fossil fuel grid requires a bunch of logistics to source, refine, and deliver the fuel. In addition to general equipment upkeep. Renewables only require equipment upkeep.

It's the upkeep problem that is a problem in South Africa. It's like government doesn't understand the concept of "maintenance"

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#226

Post by ethan_smith »

wccrawford wrote: post #94
WillAdams wrote: post #77

Does anyone have a good link/step-by-step for doing some sort of home solar system where: - it's sufficiently small-scale that no building permit is required - it looks nice enough that neighbors won't complain - the wiring is essentially plug-and-play The best approach I've been able to come up with is to purchase a medium size battery pack such as is used for glamping (glamour camping), plug it into the wall and co…

That actually sounds like a pretty good plan. I did something similar with my lawn mower. I bought a battery and a single solar panel from Harbor Freight, along with the controller and wires need to hook it all together. I'd set the panel in the yard when I needed to charge the mower's batteries. The whole thing, including the mower, cost less than half a year's fees from a yard crew, and I ended up saving money over…

For comparing those brands (EcoFlow, Anker, Jackery), you might want to check the wh/$ ratio - it's basically the best way to compare power station value (for newer LFP systems). I went through this same analysis recently - gearscouts.com [1] has a pretty good comparison table that tracks actual street prices vs capacity.

I've found the sweet spot is usually in the 500-1000Wh range for emergency backup. Enough to run a fridge for 8-12 hours but not so big that the solar panel costs get crazy. The LFP (LiFePO4) models tend to last way longer than the regular lithium ones - worth the extra cost if you're planning to use it regularly.

Your lawn mower experiment sounds like it was a good learning experience! Those small Harbor Freight panels are great for tinkering. I started with something similar before going to a full house system.

[1] https://gearscouts.com/power-stations

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#227

Post by bob1029 »

briHass wrote: post #216
bob1029 wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> motors starting This is a big problem when working with single stage HVAC condensers. These motors can have a LRA rating of well over 100 amps.

The bang-on, bang-off compressors are a dying breed, however. The efficiency and output modulation of the inverter units means even the conventional split systems have been switching over. Likewise, the 'minisplit' (originator of these efficient compressors) definition has expanded to include ducted models, even ducted models with conventional high-cfm blower wheels.

Putting semiconductors in front of a 3+ ton heat pump when you live in a rural area is guaranteed bad times.

Not only can you not find many people who have parts or knowledge on hand, but you also have to deal with the fragility of the system. A single stage compressor is very robust to electrical transients. These units can take direct lightning strikes and continue to function normally. Worst case, you replace a contactor, capacitor and some wire. Every hvac tech on earth has these things in their truck right now.

Efficiency and gently ramping loads are nice, but these things don't matter so much if the system is going to have maintenance issues.

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#228

Post by scraptor »

dylan604 wrote: post #178
chithanh wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not necessary for the majority to install solar. Pakistan had similar problems with rolling blackouts, and mass import of photovoltaic equipment and batteries from China has reduced the load on the grid so that outages no longer occur frequently. In fact the demand has shrunk so much that it jeopardizes financing of coal power companies. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43620309

> In fact the demand has shrunk so much that it jeopardizes financing of coal power companies. That is something that I think would be the impetus needed to motivate reduction in coal power plants. If they become unprofitable to operate, then will the market finally decide to stop using them? Sadly, I could see the current US administration deciding to offer subsidies to keep coal.

Subsidies is too technocratic, trump style is to just order utilities to keep the plants operational at negative profit https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/06/climate/michigan-coal-pla...

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#229

Post by supplied_demand »

miningape wrote: post #84
supplied_demand wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

== Currently, in western countries, socialist policies to import the 3rd world and open borders are directly responsible for the lowering social trust.== I don’t know of any western country with an “open borders” policy, can you provide one? Is there a part of the US’s 250 year history where we weren’t bringing in immigrants from poorer countries to provide cheap labor?

For very specific examples you can look towards the EU's decades long stance on immigration which resulted in the refugee crisis since (and before) 2015, as well as countless integration and immigration issues (cf Sweden, France, Italy, etc.). The socialist and left wing coalition have consistently voted against measures to improve border security and tighten the restrictions for people wanting to enter [1]. As peopl…

I don’t see an Open Borders policy in any of those links. Most of them are about how the countries are tightening their rules for allowing migrants. You cannot tighten rules unless they already exist, they wouldn’t exist if the policy was Open Borders.

Invoking “socialists” over-and-over doesn’t prove anything about Open Borders and kind of undercuts your point. There’s also no mention of right-wing leaders like Ronald Reagan or George Bush. They both pushed policies that increase immigration and asylum seekers.

Re: Puerto Rico's Solar Microgrids Beat Blackout

#230

Post by supplied_demand »

naasking wrote: post #122
supplied_demand wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

== Currently, in western countries, socialist policies to import the 3rd world and open borders are directly responsible for the lowering social trust.== I don’t know of any western country with an “open borders” policy, can you provide one? Is there a part of the US’s 250 year history where we weren’t bringing in immigrants from poorer countries to provide cheap labor?

> Is there a part of the US’s 250 year history where we weren’t bringing in immigrants from poorer countries to provide cheap labor? Pretty sure they're referring to a de facto open border policy, where you basically permit all sorts of illegal immigration and don't really enforce the laws. Accepting immigrants at Ellis island was not illegal immigration, for instance, but crossings at the southern border often have…

== Pretty sure they're referring to a de facto open border policy,==

I’m summary, not open borders. There have been about 20k border patrol agents in the US each year since 2008. Seems like a lot of agents for an open border policy.

https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/border-issues/...

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