Solar Power Questions

[zedd2006]

Does anyone have any experience with solar power? Im considering set up the house i buy with solar power, but im not quite sure how and where to go to find out about cost, setup, and how to do everything else. Any advice?

[HayZee518]

find out which roofing areas are more/less in constant sun during the day. solar power is basically d.c. which is fed into a bank of deep cycle batteries for "storage." car batteries and truck batteries are not meant for this, so your cost will go way up! so you got this dc power available. you could choose to using dc equipment throughout your house -or- take the dc and convert it back into ac power through an inverter. Now here you've got to be picky. some appliances don't like inverted power because you aren't getting the true rms power. this type of inverter produces a square wave output and while it may work in a transformer, you are losing about one-half of the sine wave. the inverter chops off about half of the sine wave. true ac power is a smooth up and down and up cycle through 360 degrees. square wave is just that the power goes from zero to about half positve, then across, then down to 180 degrees, goes below zero to about half then across and then back up to zero completing a 360 degree cycle. the squared off corners of the sine wave is why they call it square wave.
The old cars with radios had a thing called a vibrator which took the dc and chopped it through a vibrating relay producing a square wave which the radio's transformer could use to produce the high "plate" voltages of its tubes. somewhere in the vicinity of 180 volts positive.

[zedd2006]

I did a quick search and found out that there is 2 different types of solar power, off grid and grid tied (on grid i guess you could say) they didn;t quie pu it plain and simple but from what i gather the grid tied system actually feeds the grid as well as supply power to you house, whatever power your not using someone else is basically, and what ever power you go over you get charged for by the power company. Now, does the power comply pay you for the power your providing them or is it just deducted from the power you may or may not use?

As far as installation goes, lets say the house i buy is facing west to east, the sites were saying the solar panels have to be facing the south, so instead of mounting the solar panels on the roof i would then have to mount them on a pole in the yard so they are facing south?

[HayZee518]

well, the sun moves east to south to west. so I guess a southern exposure is the MOST sun you'll get during the day. OFF GRID your house is independent of the power co's lines - i.e. self sufficient. ON GRID your system is connected to the power co's lines and back feeds into their lines. You are then called an IPP [independent power producer] for an on grid system there is usually seperate metering so the meter actually measures what power is going back into the system. I run a hydro electric generator for a guy that is in Canton NY. He is always connected into the 4160 high line and as long as the generator is moving, it produces power into the grid. when there's little or no water, the unit is moving in the same rotational direction but is consuming power and the generator is acting like a motor. Solar would be providing power to the grid but in a miniscule amount, I don't know if you could actually meter what is fed back to them. This hydro that feeds power back into the lines, the power co buys from the ipp at .03556 cents per kilowatt. I looked at my bill. They're selling me the power at .047 cents per kilowatt. That how they make money buy cheap and sell high.

[pushkins]

Solar panels need to face south, to power a hole house you won't be mounting anything on a pole. The average home will need around 300 square feet of panels, even for a grid tied system.
The best place I've found so far for solar equipment is:
Solar Direct - pool heating, water heating, solar electricity, solar pool heaters, solar water heaters, solar photovoltaic electric, solar space heating, solar lighting, wind power, energy efficient products, solar radiant heating, solar pool heat, s.

Most kits can be bought with hardware that enables you to position them on a west facing roof but have the panels facing south, most definitely not the prettiest option but one that will work.
On the above web site you will need to take a few minutes to work out your electrical consumption needs to size a panel system (3.5 - 4.5 KW system is about normal for whole house scenario).

Most ( you will need to call your local electrical provider) electrical providers will actually buy from you any unused solar power. When you are tied to the grid any power not consumed by your home feeds into the grid, your meter will actually run backwards hence giving you a credit. Now since most of us work during most of the sunshine part of the day we are not at home to consume the electricity being supplied and as this is also "peak" consumption time for power companies you get a bigger credit, (on peak....off peak).

Don't forget also the Fed./State government is still offering the tax rebate (up to 30%).

[jackmcmanus21]

so you can make money by using solar power?

[davidg73]

so you can make money by using solar power?

if you size teh system larger than your needs, the POCO has to pay you for the power you give them. problem with that is you will never recoup your money USUALLY. for my house, with 2 HVAC systems, a solar system JUST to provide 100% of the power i need with NO batteries for night time power it would cost close to 100k for the system! we use between 2500 and 4500kwh a MONTH depending on time of year.

if you use less than average power per month, then a smaller system could generate enough excess to get you a check back each month. add that to the savings from not having to pay for electricity and it may equal up to the loan note it took to buy the system. in 15 years when you pay off the loan, it is time to replace all the panels.

once they get solar a little more efficient and affordable, i WILL put it in. til then, i will live with commercial power.

[Mattie03]

Solar power works only when there is sun and even if you have a storage of that solar energy it wont be enough to last through the night especially if you got a lot of electricity consuming appliances. It's better to stick with the commercial power.

[davidg73]

Solar power works only when there is sun and even if you have a storage of that solar energy it wont be enough to last through the night especially if you got a lot of electricity consuming appliances. It's better to stick with the commercial power.

that is why if you want to be off grid you get large battery banks. and anyone who tries to run solar/wind/etc power must find and use low power appliances and get rid of all phantom loads. if i sized a panel array JUST to provide 50% of the power required to run my house as it is the cost would be over 120k! and that is for 50% of the CURRENT REQUIRED POWER. now if i were to go solar i would need to change out some of my lighting to solar tube lights, change my stove to gas, WH to gas, and many other things. then i could maybe put in a system that would cost 50k and provide enough juice during the day when we are not home to offset any use we have.

[douglaslais]

solar power

It usually takes a minimum of 15 years to pay off the investment for solar electric. The solar industry recommends solar domestic water heating as the most economical solar investment. Payback can be as little as 3 years. If you do go solar electric, then you can get the most for your dollar by reducing the electric load of your house. It'll cost you big bucks for every KW you need to generate, so it's best to eliminate those extra KW before you purchase your system.

[HayZee518]

solar power whether active or passive costs big bucks. the storage batteries are not just automotive batteries but deep cycle EXIDE power house sized batteries. for 120 volts dc you'd need 60 2 volt jars. these are lead acid cells. each one weighs about 60 pounds including the plates and acid. active dc feeds directly into the grid through an inverter [needed to change the dc to ac] passive uses storage batteries through an inverter for the load and the conection to the grid.