Has the sun set on solar power?


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Mid winter here,but outside its brilliant . Beautiful sunshine to top up my solar input and should reach 20C.Anyone Know the best (and cheapest )way of adding more panels (using the same inverter)

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They are never a bad idea, but often times the hype is misleading, most quote maximums under perfect conditions, averages are somewhat different. The peak output is between 10am and 3pm, trees, r

Solar modules and roof mounts arrive this week, so as soon as it cools down a tad, I'll be on the roof with tape measure and chalk line, drill and impact wrench installing the mounts.

I have a solar powered calculator which my father gave me around 25 years ago & it still works even in doors in a bright light.

My advice would be contact the company who installed your system and see what they say, my guess would be a second inverter would be needed, plus control gear, OR a new inverter capable of taking more solar modules.

I don't know if you're subject to blackouts, but you can get On/Off grid systems with a battery backup, should the mains fail for any reason, the inverter will drop off the utilities line and feed the house automatically.... When power is restored, the system reverts back to "exporting" power, charging your batteries and powering your house.

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  • 7 months later...

I would agree that the cost of solar devices hasn't dropped very significantly over the years. I believe that the majority of people believed that it would drop more than it has, and that has not become a reality. There have been various other options such as wind that have made a difference I believe. Overall I feel that the major shift will occur when more people begin to invest into the technology and have it installed on an individual level. When everyone has the desire to replace their current energy supply with renewable energy things will make a major shift and power will become much more affordable for everyone. We need to reach a climax point, however, that has most of society moving toward alternative solutions.

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I have the free panels so all I get is free electric during daylight hours and no feed in tariff. The owners of the panels get that. I have quite a large (for a semi-detached bungalow) roof area that points due south with 12 panels at 210 watts each. When the sun is shining there is no way that I can use all the electricity they produce. Not so good when the sun isn't shining but hey what they do make is still free! I would not be without them and if I move house one criteria will be a south facing unobstructed roof area. Last summers electricity payments were £7 per month and that built up a small excess.

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As regards of costs on solar panels, they HAVE dropped in price since I did my first solar survey around 35 years back. Back then you couldn't get the large power modules available today, and what were around cost over a thousand bucks per panel.. I proposed a very modest 2Kw set up for my cousin that would have cost well over $A35, 000!!! And the inverter would have been square wave output back then, not the pure sine wave output we have now. Batteries would have cost double what they cost today.

This was an off grid system as he didn't have electricity to his potential house site.

I advised go for grid, would be cheaper in the long run, he went that route.

My 8Kw off grid system will cost somewhere around $US15,000 when complete, it uses two 4Kw pure sine wave inverters..I'm also looking for an on grid system for my workshop, reason I choose that one is I have a lot of woodworking machinery with up to 5HP motors and I have a large compressor too.

Now!! Actual cost per unit, will be higher than buying power, but living in a rural community, it will be worth it, as we can get long weather realted power outages during the winter months, fair enough, they don't happen too often, but after being without power for a week, I know what it's like living in the dark ages..

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Well the order goes in over the weekend/beginning of next week for 20 by 295 Watt panels and roof mounting hardware. I had a change of mind from making mounting frames and mounting them on steerable mounts to fixed roof mounts, be quicker in the longrun.

So once it starts cooling off, will be installing the roof mount system, then the panels and then complete the final wiring and switch over to off grid solar.

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Solar modules and roof mounts arrive this week, so as soon as it cools down a tad, I'll be on the roof with tape measure and chalk line, drill and impact wrench installing the mounts.

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And the inverter would have been square wave output back then, not the pure sine wave output we have now. Batteries would have cost double what they cost today.

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I wonder how most modern gubbins in the average house would cope with square wave electricity? I'm thinking incandescent light bulbs & electric fires would be OK but not much else. Owt with a transformer would make a buzzing noise & probably overheat..

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Military used square wave output "inverters" many years back pre solid state... Think back to high voltage power supplies for the B+ circuits of radio's on tanks and field radio equipment. They used elec magnetic vibrators on the primary winding of a transformer, produced a crude square wave.

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Remember the 432 (armoured personal carrier) radios used to buzz & the buzz tone changed when you pressed the transmit button. If the battery voltage got too low it wouldn't transmit, this always happened half way through a fire mission, then it would be panic stations to get the 432's engine started to get the battery charging. Good job it had a separate battery to start the engine...

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  • 2 months later...

I have a solar powered torch. Dead loss when it's dark and there ain't no sun.

Alison

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Colly0410 #37

I remember the FV432 very well, used to work on them when I was at COD Chilwell. They had a Rolls Royce K60 multi-fuel engine so almost never failing to proceed.

It is a day to be noted here in South Australia as we have shut down our last coal fired power station. Watch this space for the power outages next summer when the wind powered generators cannot support the demand and we have to use power supplied via an interconnector from Victoria which ironically generates most of its power from brown coal and they do not have enough spare capacity to supply SA.

Bet my spherical objects that the only thing that will be guaranteed will be that our power costs will increase.

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After urging everyone to install solar panels on their roofs and government even providing subsidies and at first generous feed in tariffs the Australian Energy Market Commission has no announced that it may be charging consumers who feed in energy to the grid. The proposal is to charge consumers who feed energy back into the grid at times when it is not needed as it could destabilise the network. The estimated yearly cost to users could be AU$70 per year. It also hopes that more people will take up batteries to store excess power. About 20% of homes in Australia have solar power and the commission claims that the grid was designed for large power generators to supply power to many millions of individual consumers, not for millions of consumers to be supplying power to the grid. A statement of the bleeding obvious and yet another way to price gouge customers.

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Have a look at the actuarial tables and see how long you can expect to live for at your particular age. Will you recover your investment and start to come into profit during your remaining years? I've known a few people in our village who embraced the idea of solar energy when it became readily available but never lived long enough to benefit financially.

The only person I know who's doing OK financially out of solar panels on his UK house lives for most of the year in Spain. He only comes to the UK when it's too hot to be over there.

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They are never a bad idea, but often times the hype is misleading, most quote maximums under perfect conditions, averages are somewhat different.

The peak output is between 10am and 3pm, trees, rain, snow, clouds and dirt especially, all serve to reduce the output. The efficiency of the panels will degrade over time, how long depends on the type of cell, and they will need replacing at some point. The inverters also have a finite life span.

It's not easy to calculate and only you can say if the cost/benefit analysis works to give a positive payback

The feed in tariff ended some time ago (2019?)

 

I suspect most users charge electric cars overnight when electricity is cheaper and solar panels are little more than ornamental.

 

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We had solar panels installed when the FIT was around 50p/kWh so on average we receive over £1000 from HMG annually.  The cost when fitted was about £6000 but this should now be much lower as the price of the panels has come down.  Even with these lower prices, I doubt they will pay for themselves, even if electricity prices continue to rise.

 

We also have an electric car (Fiat 500e 24kw) and generally charge it overnight but if the forecast is looking good then it can be cheaper to charge during the day if the sun is going to be out.  This only works if you can limit the charge rate to suit the solar panel output.  Our panels have a max output of 2.4kw and using a charger that plugs into a three pin domestic socket (max charge rate 10amps), as long as the panels are giving out at least 1300watts, it works out cheaper than the economy night time tariff. Of course it will be a slow charge compared to the standard 7kw.

 

There are some smart charging points that can be linked to solar panels and whenever there is any spare power it can be diverted to the car rather than exporting to the grid.  There are also home battery storage systems being promoted to try and get you to spend even more money - it's a bit of a minefield really!

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We’ve had 8 solar panels on our roof for about 6 years.  They work very well and sometimes I can have tne dishwasher, tne washing machine and the kettle on and tne smart meter shows we are using zero mains electricity.  We get between £3-400 a year back for surplus energy sent to the main supplier.

i don’t care if we don’t get the original £5000? back before we die because I feel good that we are using quite a bit of renewable energy!

(it’s not all about money :) )

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It appears that the payback time for solar panels is between 12 and 26 years. That's a pretty wide and vague span on which to base any calculations! It's akin to trees which you plant for the next generation. However, unlike trees which thrive for many years before they die, the panels, as Brew says, will degrade in efficiency.

I have considered them as I've plenty of room to mount them at ground level and out of my view. They would be easy to keep clean but also easy to be stolen! The older I get the more the idea fades. I think I've passed the optimum age for an installation. You could install them out of altruism of course!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Paradiddle raised a point I forgot to mention. The car charger needs to be of the 'smart' variety and able to distinguish between mains and solar power. The biggest domestic system you can have without permission from your DNO is 16A (just under 4kW) so it's a slow charge only on solar.

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