Solar System Install and Performance

mareshow said:

Interesting, what's your total system size? And do you know your type of panels?

I'm asking because I'm monitoring production of our clients through our app and I want to be able to compare apple to apples

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Iron Horse Racing said:

Seems to be working for you....

We've had three quotes to install solar at our farm....so far I can't justiy the costs...

We have a 2000 sq' bilevel built in the late 70's, windows, doors have been upgraded, attic insulation inspected, some wall insulation is suspect, furnaces in the house both replaced, hot water on demand, and led bulbs...

But we have two water pumps, one drilled well so pump is in ground, the second is a bored well so the pump is above ground in a small garage (its gas furnace heated), that well feeds the three auto waters for the live stock and the shop, the shop/ garage has three gas furnaces and the auto waters are electrically heated, we also do a far bit of welding in the shop....all the lights in the shop's are LED...

Needless to say we consume a far bit of electricity....

On the side of the shop is a 10' x 40' long greenhouse that the windows / roof face south, so we have a great location for the panels.

The quotes we received were for on grid systems with battery storage, they ranged from $21,000 to $30,000, they all seemed to be calculating the return around 12 years, based on 70% efficiency, (I'm skeptical they can maintain that level, month over month, year over year) but they did not include the costs of replacing the batteries at 5-7 years and the life cycle of the panels, which they indicated were 20 - 25 years...

I'm hoping they make some serious strides to the tech and the cost sides, as for now, we can't afford..

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Iron Horse Racing said:

Seems to be working for you....

We've had three quotes to install solar at our farm....so far I can't justiy the costs...

We have a 2000 sq' bilevel built in the late 70's, windows, doors have been upgraded, attic insulation inspected, some wall insulation is suspect, furnaces in the house both replaced, hot water on demand, and led bulbs...

But we have two water pumps, one drilled well so pump is in ground, the second is a bored well so the pump is above ground in a small garage (its gas furnace heated), that well feeds the three auto waters for the live stock and the shop, the shop/ garage has three gas furnaces and the auto waters are electrically heated, we also do a far bit of welding in the shop....all the lights in the shop's are LED...

Needless to say we consume a far bit of electricity....

On the side of the shop is a 10' x 40' long greenhouse that the windows / roof face south, so we have a great location for the panels.

The quotes we received were for on grid systems with battery storage, they ranged from $21,000 to $30,000, they all seemed to be calculating the return around 12 years, based on 70% efficiency, (I'm skeptical they can maintain that level, month over month, year over year) but they did not include the costs of replacing the batteries at 5-7 years and the life cycle of the panels, which they indicated were 20 - 25 years...

I'm hoping they make some serious strides to the tech and the cost sides, as for now, we can't afford..

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jhurkot said:

I'd be curious to know why they were trying to sell you on a battery for a grid tie system.

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ABMax24 said:

Here's another update.

We have finally hit the point where we are producing more power than we are using. The longer days and the higher angle of the sun in the sky is making a huge difference in power output. We even managed to make more power this month than we used, and have produced more than we have used everyday since the 12th.


Here is our power generation vs usage for the month.

View attachment 216648

Here is our overall solar saving for the month, showing we generated more than we used.

View attachment 216649

Here is what our power curve looks like on a sunny day, there are a few dips from some high level cloud.

View attachment 216650


Here is an example of why we tried so hard to get away from any electric heating appliance. The peaks of high consumption around 2pm are from the electric heating element in our dishwasher. The huge peaks around 6pm are from our electric deep-fryer. Both these appliances only pull about 1500 watts, an electric stove or dryer could easily pull 4 times this amount, being the reason ours are fueled by natural gas. This is the exact reason why places like California are running into issues with solar power, the output of solar sharply drops about the same time as people come home cook supper or do laundry inducing these large peak loads. This necessitates large natural gas peaker plants to compensate for the sudden increase in load and loss of solar generation.

View attachment 216651

Here is a good example of performance on a cloudy day. Today it was quite cloudy here for the morning and even managed to snow a bit. Even with all that we still generated 8kwh today, our best day yet is 13.3kwh, so still over half of what is expected on a perfect day. I'm quite impressed with this output considering how dark the sky was this morning.

View attachment 216652

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papajake said:

That’s the same when we dry camp we setup a outdoor shower if 2 people shower the battery is almost dead we will run the generator now don’t know why the pump takes so much power

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papajake said:

That’s the same when we dry camp we setup a outdoor shower if 2 people shower the battery is almost dead we will run the generator now don’t know why the pump takes so much power

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rsaint said:

So to save that much you are getting 1.41 per kw or am I missing something.

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team dirt said:

With some inverters you can put charge block times in so you only pull from the grid and charge batteries when demand prices are at the lowest. During hi demand prices you pull from your batteries. This is probably the smartest way to utilize a grid tie system but batteries are very costly and life is at best 10 years. In actual reality of trying to run your farm good luck. My cabin is totally off grid and when my water pump kicks in I get one run cycle on it and system is dead. Water is my biggest killer. I have 1800 watts of panel and 8 250amp hr 6v batteries on a 3000w xantrex inverter. I must run my generator when showering or using lots of water. I installed 2 20 gallon draw down pressure tanks so when my pump starts it runs for about 5min to replenish water system as the starting of the pump is the killer to the system.

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