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Building my own solar power system

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Re: Building my own solar power system

#71

Post by apexalpha »

isoprophlex wrote: post #66
pjc50 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Subsidy causing high prices? You're going to have to explain that.

- Subsidy starts: prices drop. - Greed kicks in because capitalism: prices rise again, maybe not back to pre-subsidy levels, but they rise. - Subsidy gets axed: prices rise to above pre-subsidy levels. (Note: I'm personally entirely pro "subsidize things you want more of". But that requires a stable, trustworthy government that plans on longer timescales.)

Sounds like a situation where there's not enough competition.

the Netherlands had a net-metering subsidiy + good competition + frictionless install and as a result we have 3,5 solar panels per person installed.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#72

Post by pjc50 »

calgoo wrote: post #47
looofooo0 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well problem in the UK is that in summer there is like a magnitude more power from PV then in winter.

I personally feel there should be more allowance for small personal wind generators in sub-urban areas. That would offset a bit at least in winter for places like the UK. Not sure what the actual laws are, but I can assume councils wont be too happy about someone putting one up on their home.

Uneconomical and the sort of thing that really annoys the neighbors. We only just got onshore wind unbanned entirely, and Reform are heavily against permitting renewables at all.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#73

Post by elmolino89 »

meitham wrote: post #60

forget the technology, what is that gorgeous snake-like plant in the picture by the blue stairs? I need that

Not sure if the identification by the PlantNet is the correct one, but you may check [1]Asparagus aethiopicus

1 https://www.backyardboss.net/asparagus-fern-guide/

Re: Building my own solar power system

#74

Post by Dylan16807 »

kleiba wrote: post #54
delamon wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pump it to the storage. Building something like https://www.energyvault.com/products/g-vault-gravity-energy-... is impossible for a home owner. But the country scale energy provider can build such thing.

Great idea, but that also comes at an additional cost - who would you recommend should pay for that cost?

Storage comes at a cost, but storing cheap/free power offsets even bigger generation costs. So the power company should pay to build storage.

There's a point where the grid has so much solar power that we need to start shedding production as a general rule and not just as an intermittent temporary measure, but I don't think we're anywhere near that point.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#75

Post by BrtByte »

bloodyplonker22 wrote: post #61

Guy claims he's tired of paying for electricity because of the "ludacris" (sic) costs so he's going to "DIY". Yet, first thing he does is pay a guy to do it.

Yeah but come on, there's a big difference between paying someone to design plans vs handing over the whole project to a solar installer

Re: Building my own solar power system

#77

Post by BrtByte »

sneak wrote: post #7

It’s a true shame that the public utility commission is so corrupt that we lose the obvious economies of scale from grid-scale installations of same in favor of expensive rent seeking by a state-sanctioned monopoly. I also have 60kWh of batteries in my kitchen, but for the average person who doesn’t want to deal with this stuff, having to admin part of the power grid is a tragic waste. If the PUC and power company we…

The fact that so many people are turning their homes into mini power plants is less a triumph of individualism and more a symptom of a broken system

Re: Building my own solar power system

#78

Post by miniwark »

brnt wrote: post #6

And over here in NL we're going to be _charged_ when returning power to the grid in 1.5 yr... I'll be running my airco to burn off those kWh's :P

Don't you have energy cooperatives to avoid this in the Netherlands ? According to rescoop.eu i did find hetcooperatie.nl, energiesamen.nu & lochemenergie.org.

Even if you are instead in Newfoundland, maybe ask cecooperative.ca if there us a project to create one in your province.

Re: Building my own solar power system

#79

Post by pingou »

cyri wrote: post #63

I did build my own solar system too. In Switzerland. Took me 1-2 month planning and then 3 month building it alone nearly each day. Sept 2023 til Xmas 2023. Got all the hardware from a PV dealer friend on his purchase price level. Even 24 panels I have put myself alone onto the roof. With two persons it was a bit better. I've got: 420w x 71 Trina solar panels and two SolarEdge inverters. SE10K Hybrid and a SE17k. Als…

What do you do with that much electricity? Was it necessary to over-dimension for winter?

Re: Building my own solar power system

#80

Post by pjc50 »

alex-moon wrote: post #10

Having done some work around net zero policy I am increasingly convinced that this is the way forward, and indeed that this will be the way things are done normally maybe 10-20 years from now. The concept is called "distributed generation" and in UK each distribution network keeps an "embedded capacity register" which is basically all the distributed energy resources that are connected to the grid at distribution lev…

One of those areas where policy action is desperately needed but no attention is paid due to media dysfunction. I think the UK would benefit from region-specific pricing, to move the datacenters closer to generation rather than urban environments. It would also encourage more embedded generation in expensive areas.
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