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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : H/W system with 6,6 kW solar PV in WA, do I need a solar H/W panel?

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Davo99
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Joined: 03/06/2019
Location: Australia
Posts: 1577
Posted: 11:08am 09 Oct 2019
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  Andrew_G said  Davo,
Interesting comments - they certainly cut across "learned" and "current" "wisdom".


Often the case with me. I don't go much for the parroted mantra's and ways of thinking without doing as much research as I can and thinking things through.
I often find that someone with vested interests states and repeats something that may be bending or frugal with the truth or reality but they say it enough and everyone takes it as fact without ever questioning a thing or thinking through how it applies to THEM.


  Quote  I'm not saying you are wrong - and I'm perfectly happy to question the newest bright idea, particularly before I pay hard earned $$ for it.


I think right or wrong in many cases and such as this is relative. I well may be wrong in what applies to you but right in what I am saying in my situation. I mainly just try to cast doubts in peoples mind so they are a bit wary and do some more digging. That way they don't blindly accept things and when they make a decision it's  as wise a choice as they can make.

You have to weight up YOUR situation. There are load of factors that only you know that are all influential. What's best for you may not be for me and vice versa.
I'd say look at your current bills and try to gauge how your costs would be when applied to different tech.  What is the cost of a resistance heater going to be all up over 5 or 10 years over a heat pump for instance?

This will depend on a load of factors, your power cost, number of people in the house, how often are you home as against travelling, what solar will you have available and what is the likely consumption going to be and when and so it goes.

  Quote   Can you possibly check with your "mate" whether he is not convinced about heat pumps:
a) For pools only, or
b) for HWS too?


Ha! Saw him today and can answer that!
Mentioned he was fitting out his new Plant room/ Pool house. Said he was going to install the new heat pump ( hot water) he had been sitting round for 18 months.
I said how come you haven't got to it before? Said he thought he'd be better off with the old one but he had done a deal with the manufacturer to get a load of spares for nothing to fit it to put away for the thing just in case.
He's going to give it a go but isn't confident and isn't going to uninstall the old heater, just put them together so he can select whichever one.

  Quote  Most of the "good news stories" I see are about heat pumps for HWSs and hydronic heating (not pools).


I always like to get a time line on any account.  If something was no good 15 years ago, don'[t mean it's no good now. By the same token, if someone only had something 3 months and says it's been great and no problems, well you wouldn't expect there to be would you?

I also like to consider the save face factor. I have personally known a number of people that have bought piles of garbage but won't admit that's what they are because to admit they are wrong would be embarrassing.  Then there is also the recommendation by those in the game whom will sing the praises of whatever puts the most $$ in their pockets.

  Quote  I pressed my "pool man" about why he was suggesting gas heating rather than a heat pump for the pool.
  Quote  

I don't know a lot about the details but I do know this. A 100Kw gas heater is a small, fairly compact thing and nothing special in output. a 100Kw heat pump is a serious commercial bit of gear.  A gas heater is not cheap.  A heat pump is far less " Cheap".  gas heaters are also quite efficient but there is no multiplication factor like electricity.
Comparing the cost of a KW of heat input from electricity and gas may be telling.

I was recently looking at diesel fired space heaters. They are MUCH cheaper to run for a similar output than electricity.  Kw of power here is .30C. Litre of diesel, say $1.30.  10 Kwh worth of heat in a litre of diesel though so on direct heating, cheaper. reverse Cycle is more efficient but not when it gets real cold.

  Quote   He also pointed out that heat pumps are less effective in cold weather.


Valid point but how likely are you to be swimming when it's near freezing?
If you are an all year rounder, may be significant. If it's on the lead up and trail of summer when it's say 15-20 ambient, the the heat pump will have plenty of temperature in the air to work with.


  Quote  You are saying go electric heating element off PV  . . .)

Andrew


For hot water, yes, for Pool.... Again, weight it up mate. Check warranties carefully for a heat pump. What is included ( parts and Labour, pro rata, replacement ?) and compare the purchase and running costs over a period and see how they come out.

Perhaps look at other angles. If you are potentially running all this electric you are going to have 3 phase. That presents the possibility of having a 10 Kw system and still getting some FIT. What about the cheap resistance hot water heater and spend the savings over a heat pump on a bigger solar system? That way you can cut your power bills down in other areas and even if the resistance is more energy hungry than the pump, you are covered and when the water is hot, the power can be driving the pool pump and the AC together ....

I'm all electric and people often gasp when I tell them my consumption. They forget they are cooking with gas and heating with that or wood so have multiple energy inputs which they tend to forget about but think my single consumption is high.

I have a gas spa heater I'm converting to oil fired.
Did one at my last house and could bring my 70K L pool up 30oC in under 15 hours. :0)
Best thing was, it cost me nothing.  Barrel and a bit of free Veg oil I picked up from restaurants.

Now I'm working on a 100Kw heater I'll run at about 10 to heat the house next winter as even my 20+Kw of panels wasn't enough to run the reverse cycle heating, the hot water and the rest of the loads.  Taking away the heating will put me in the black.

You are going to have a very power hungry house either way so I would be putting up the max panels you can.
 
BrianP
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Joined: 30/03/2017
Location: Australia
Posts: 292
Posted: 09:55pm 09 Oct 2019
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Davo99 said:
"I do remember him telling me there was one, can't remember what it was but I think it had something to do with the hotter  temps of the water with the compressors anyway."

That may a lot of sense. If you think about it, the compressor heat exchanger would have to run a LOT hotter & therefor higher pressure to transfer the heat to the water. Much higher than for aircon use. May be testing the state of the art of compressors.

"You are going to have a very power hungry house either way so I would be putting up the max panels you can"

You are, & you need to. With all our electronics & "stuff" these days we are a very energy hungry civilisation, especially compared to our cave man ancestors. Mind you, Mr. Cave Man did have a very inefficient fireplace / heater...

"Taking away the heating will put me in the black"

What about an extra thick pair of woollie socks to compensate?

B
 
Rudge
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Joined: 11/09/2019
Location: Australia
Posts: 9
Posted: 05:38am 10 Oct 2019
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Davo99 said
"I know you can get 3 phase meters that have 3 CT's to go on every phase and will record and show the numbers for each phase like above and have wi fi or networked monitoring.
Last time I looked they were about $120 from memory."

Did you recall the source of these, I'm still looking.
Thanks

R
 
domwild
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Joined: 16/12/2005
Location: Australia
Posts: 873
Posted: 11:17pm 10 Oct 2019
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  Rudge said  Sorry.  I should have said my 'Inverter Monitoring Software' which displays the Solar Power and Exported Power.  Here is a screenshot.  


The H/W cut-in can be clearly seen, usually for an hour or so each morning and a couple of blips later in the day.
Cheers




Great graph! Thanks and thanks for all the help from this Forum. This could spell bad news for us all:

"Dynamic load balancing inverters". Read on the net the suggestion to introduce that feature as the grid gets overloaded in some states and wholesale prices become negative, etc. So the inverter has to listen to the web at all times and possibly drop the export or lower it. Cannot remember any more which state is proposing that?

Inverters listening to the web are nothing new. A local has come up with a system, which listens to the wholesale price to advise on exporting plus also reads the weather forecast to make sure enough power is in the batteries for a rainy day! But a rich rellie tells me that system does not work with the Tesla Powerbank and even for him batteries are still too dear.

But let's hope we do not have to replace our existing inverters, which switch off anyway if the voltage is over 256VAC.
Taxation as a means of achieving prosperity is like a man standing inside a bucket trying to lift himself up.

Winston Churchill
 
Davo99
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Location: Australia
Posts: 1577
Posted: 01:51am 11 Oct 2019
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  BrianP said  Davo99 said: With all our electronics & "stuff" these days we are a very energy hungry civilisation,


I always despair and laugh often how so many people spend their life stressing about the state of charge of their devices especially phones.
My daughter has a 20 Ah battery pack for her phone. Yes, she did buy it primarily for travelling but the thing still gets a good workout at home.

I am amazed at some peoples power bills though. Sure they may have a gas stove and sometimes all electric but I can't figure how they have such LOW bills.
Power is not cheap at all these days and even taking into consideration other energy sources or solar, they just seem to have such low bills I can't figure it out.

I get asked by people a lot now about solar and first think I ask is how much are your average bills. Often I say to them, I wouldn't worry about it if I were you, it's going to take you forever to get the investment back with what you are paying.

Like when it comes to batteries, many people have difficulty getting their head round the fact that often the cheapest option is to do nothing and just keep paying the bill.  :0)


  Quote  
What about an extra thick pair of woollie socks to compensate?

B


That sort of thinking is a pet hate of mine! :0)

I wear woolly socks most of the year. Need the cushioning for my feet as well as the warmth in winter.  I also wear beanies or balaclavas in winter a lot because the hollow bit on the top gets cold too.

My wife complains I look like I'm going on a polar expedition when I come to bed in winter now.
I'm over being frugal or trying to save the planet or whatever. I'm getting older and Grumpier all the time and just want to be somewhat comfortable.
I'm willing to invest to do that be it in panels or oil fired heaters or whatever.

At least in summer I don't have to worry so much. Plenty of solar to run the big AC flat out and not have to worry.  That really gives me a lot of "mental" comfort knowing I can enjoy a luxury and not have to worry about what would be the huge cost.
My solar proclivity/ obsession has paid off VERY well for us.

I can ring the wife and say bring home money and I get the 3rd degree. If I say it's for anything solar related, not a problem in the world.  She talks to people at work and around and has figured for herself how much it saves us and what a fantastic investment it has been.

Plus it keeps me out her hair and gives me an interest.
 
Paul_L
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Joined: 03/03/2016
Location: United States
Posts: 769
Posted: 02:54am 11 Oct 2019
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I got interested in electronics 65 years ago because I was a pretty good guitarist and I wanted to make better recordings. I played around with broadcast transmitters, then recording studios and then big aircraft. Ever since I seem to be involved in thermodynamics. A 747 aircraft loaded with 480 people moving over the ground at 650 mph at 35000 feet altitude with an outside air pressure of 0.05 atmospheres overheats. You have to continuously pump heat out of the aircraft at a continuous rate of about 3800 btu/hr/person or about 2Mbtu or about 586 KW. Boeing uses air cycle heat pumps powered by bleed air from the engines.

Heat always flows "downhill" from a higher temperature (think high density) to a lower temperature. Heat pumps pump heat "uphill" from a lower temperature to a high temperature. Resistance heaters change electrical energy into heat energy and transfer the heat to air or pots and pans at almost perfect efficiency. Combustion heaters change potential chemical energy into heat energy at perfect efficiency but only transfer 20% to 40% of that energy to air or pots and pans, sending the majority of the energy up the chimney as gaseous combustion products. Condensing boilers recapture the entropy of vaporization of the combustion product gases by condensing them to a liquid and transfer 30% to 45% of the combustion energy to air or pots and pans.

My house 75 miles north of New York City is a one level "ranch" house with a furnished area of about 3200 sq. ft. (298 sq M). It's pretty well insulated and requires a continuos input of 68000 btu (19,900 W) to maintain an inside temperature of 75°F (24°C) when the outside temperature is 0°F (-17.8°C), our coldest overnight temperatures in January.

68000 btu can be provided by burning 0.615 gallons of #2 oil (138000 btu/gallon) at an efficiency of 80%. At a current cost of $2.10 / gallon delivered in 300 gallon lots that would cost $1.30 per hour.

Or it can be provided by burning 68.8 cu ft of natural gas (1040 btu/cu ft) at an efficiency of 95% in a condensing boiler. At a current cost of $0.015 / cu ft that would cost $1.03 per hour.

Or it can be provided by a resistance heater consuming 19.9 KW at 100% efficiency. At a current cost of $0.22 / KWH that would cost $4.38 per hour.

Or it can be provided by a modern variable speed modular air to air heat pump consuming 6630 W which represent a "Coefficient of Performance" of 3.0. At a current cost of $0.22 / KWH that would cost $1.46 per hour.

In 2012 I started up my geothermal water to water heat pump. It will easily pump 68000 btus of heat out of pipes burried 2 meters deep in the back yard where the ground temperature is above 41°F (+5°C) while consuming 3940 W (including all the auxiliary pumps) which represent a "Coefficient of Performance" of 5.05. At a current cost of $0.22 / KWH that would cost $0.867 per hour.

Heat pump energy consumption is almost directly proportional to the temperature difference, (the height of the hill it is pumping the heat over), between the source and the destination.

Here at my location if you pump heat out of my house at 75°F (23.9°C) into outside air at 95°F (35°C) the heat pump does more work than it would pumping out of my house at 75°F (23.9°C) into the ground 2 M deep at 61°F (16.1°C). In the summer the air to air heat pump is pumping heat uphill while the air to ground heat pump is actually pumping heat downhill. The air to air heat pump faces a higher hill and works harder.

If you pump heat into my house at 75°F (23.9°C) from outside air at 0°F (-17.8°C) the heat pump does more work than it would pumping out into myhouse at 75°F (23.9°C) into the ground 2 M deep at 41°F (5°C). Both the air to air heat pump and the air to ground heat pumps are pumping heat uphill, but the air to air heat pump faces a higher hill and works harder.

In summary I can heat my house during the coldest winter night for $1.30 / hr using oil, $1.03 / hr using natural gas, $4.38 / hr using resistance heaters, $1.46 / hr using an air to air heat pump, or $0.867 / hr using my geothermal heat pump.

It cost me about $70,000 back in 2011 to dig a 100' x 60' x 7' deep (30M x 18M x 2.13M deep) hole in my yard and bury 6000' (1829M) of 3/4" HDPE pipe plus 600' (183M) of 2" HDPE pipe. Then in 2012 my Uncle Sam permitted me to deduct $34,300, or 49% of the cost, from my income tax bill for installing a geothermal heat pump with a verified COP above 5. Since then it has been saving me from spending about $14,000 per year for #2 fuel oil, and the overall electric bill is still about $5,500 per year. The electric bill did not increase because in the summer the geothermal heat pump uses only about 20% of the power the old, inefficient, 1975 air conditioners used.

Concerning the heat pump machinery itself, I specified the entire system myself, selecting the individual Copeland Orbital Spiral compressor, the Sporlan expansion valve, the two freon to water heat exchangers, the muffler and accumulator, and all of the water pumps. Up at the beginning I told you that I keep getting involved in thermodynamics. The original 7 ton freon compressor burned out in 2017 because the slob who soldered it together didn't flush the flux out before charging the system. I substituted a 6 ton compressor (the first one was a little oversized by the stupid Polack engineer who specified it) and carefully flushed the flux out of the system.

If I had to do it again I definitely would, even without the tax break from Uncle Sam!

Uncle Sam sometimes can be a big help. This is a map showing thermoclines of the average deep ground temperature (in °F of course) everywhere. At a depth of 2 M the temperature will vary plus and minus 10°F from these average temperatures, +10° about September 15, -10° about March 15. I don't know if the Australian governemnt provides anything like this. (My house sits down there in that sharp corner of New York 4 miles from the giant IBM microprocessor fab, just about on top of the 52°F thermocline, so my annual deep ground variation is from 42°F to 62°F.)



I know very little about the annual seasonal air temperature variations or the annual seasonal variations of deep ground temperature you guys down under experience. Nor do I know how much cloud cover you have. (I seem to dimly remember that it was intensely sunny when I rode a train from Sydney to Perth back in 1949.) I therefore can't comment much about your attempts to collect solar energy.

I can stress that you should try to pick the lowest hill if you're going to try to pump heat up a hill. If anyone wants to really analyze heat flow in his house I'll be glad to assist if I can. Be forewarned that I will probably tell you a lot of Polack jokes at the same time.

The one thing I haven't mentioned yet is real estate values. Where I am a house with a geothermal heating system  commands a much higher price when it goes on the market. We are probably way too old to think about moving, but my heirs will have an easy time selling this house the way it is equipped.

I am currently attempting to put together an intelligent controller for this complicated heating / cooling system with the MOST able assistance of Lance Benson, alias lizby, on this forum. THANKS LANCE!!! We have to continuously remind ourselves that the next owner of this house will inherit our nightmare and we should make an effort to make it understandable. Our mess is approaching the physical construction phase. Before we cast it in stone we will be posting a description of it and the code we have written for your comments. That will tell us how screwed up we really are.

Paul in NY
 
Davo99
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Posted: 07:08am 11 Oct 2019
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Thanks for that very interesting read Paul!

That is one HUGE area you had to dig up. I'm sitting here Visualising it and realising it's 1/4 of my whole block. I can't even begin to think what nearly 2.5Km of PEX or whatever tubing they now use would cost especially in that size.

I have looked at this aspect of things before including increasing my homes efficiency with double glazing and better insulation.  The thing I come back to every time is it's just not worth it for ME.

Solar in most parts of oz is very worthwhile and we also have subsidies that make it a fraction of the price for a homeowner than I believer you pay in the states.
It's common to get 6.6 Kw worth of panels on a 5KW inverter for $4000 here. Given the US. AUD exchange rate, That's about the price of a Bud and a Hotdog in your money .  :0)

At around the Sydney, lower middle latitude of the country, the average solar return is said to be about 5.5x installed capacity.  IE, if you have 5KW of panels, you should expect to average about 25kwh day. That can go to 7 or even 8x in summer under the right conditions and it can also drop to about 3x in winter.
When you go lower the rate decreases and when you go closer to the equator of course that gets better.

Our power prices are higher than yours on average and the highest in the world being  almost triple what you pay in some states that are trying to save the world by running off renewable energy only. Which they don't do but carry the crippling power prices anyway.

The thermodynamic "Bleed" calculation of your house was most interesting but also kind of alarming till one sees the ambient temp you are fighting against. There wouldn't be many places here that get that cold but I liked the calculation in the first place and information it provides to work from.
I reckon my house would be similar at much warmer temps due to the 40 odd single glazed windows in the place alone. In summer, I'd probably have double the heat to pumps out. I'd say we had probably over 10 days here last summer where it was 45C and it can go a week at a time over 40oC. Thankfully the night temos will fall to about 25 which is a nice relief.

For ME, the cheapest solution is to leave the place as is and just use the solar energy I generate, Currently averaging about 70KWh a day and pushing toward 80 on the good days to cool the house. When the winter generation is closer to 30 KWH, I want to go to waste oil burning which of course will be about as near free as one can get.
I calculate that about 2000L should get me through a winter hear with a good safety margin.

One thing I have also been looking at is a 5 Kw Diesel heater. Even at our prices of about $1,30 per litre for diesel, still is cheaper than the power I'd have to buy over winter.

I have also concluded that spending money to make the place more efficient would not be returned.  We have not been here long and looked at close to 100 homes and heating and cooling is paid no more attention that a home has it. There is ZERO value in the efficiency of a home with it's insulation or thermal management.  Homes are so expensive here just putting a roof, any roof over your head is the first and final goal.  How efficient it is, does not even come into it.

The design and styling of a lot of places just makes them nightmares. We have certain conditions that have to be met such as having some ( tiny) water storage, the efficiency of a air conditioner, having solar and some other things to meet a certain points criteria but that's only for the items rather than the home. You could have something that heats up like a greenhouse in summer but because you have an efficient ( being reasonably up to date)  AC, that's OK. Irrelevant to the fact the thing will need to chew 40KWH a day to keep this Place liveable in summer.

You may also have a modern, cleaning burning Combustion heater but again the fact it's going to go through 10 ton of wood over winter to stop icicles forming on the ceiling inside is irrelevant.

It's unfortunate but the way a lot of new homes are being built here, especially those for first home Buyers, It's going to be warmer and cooler for many people to just be outside. :0(
 
Davo99
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Posted: 07:54am 11 Oct 2019
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  domwild said  
  Rudge said  

"Dynamic load balancing inverters". Read on the net the suggestion to introduce that feature as the grid gets overloaded in some states and wholesale prices become negative, etc.


I really find this to be an insult to ones Intelligence and just more extortion by the power cos.  all they are wanting to do is protect their Profits. The whole power grid in oz is both a complete mess and a total farce.
There should be no blighting of the landscape with solar and wind farms till all the viable rooftops where the power is needed are filled.

The idea of certain parts of the grid or even suburbs becoming over loaded with solar is also rubbish. investment in upgrading transformers to handle the feedback is all that is required. You don't even need to change the wires because the allocation of consumption for every home is higher than most places are capable of pushing back and it's never far to a business, factory, shopping centre, school, water or sewage treatment plant, Railway or hospital that would would suck all the power that could be generated for miles around.

They will cut the amount of power the private citizen can feed back but god forbid ( or a higher authority, the power companies forbid) that one of the stupid wind or solar farm cut back when they are the biggest waste of money and blight on the environment of all.

They will be bitching and complaining when people go off grid and trying to bring in laws like if the power goes past your home you have to pay them for that.
I guess $2.1 BILLION PROFIT  just isnt enough for the money hungry power cos in Oz.


  Quote  
So the inverter has to listen to the web at all times and possibly drop the export or lower it. Cannot remember any more which state is proposing that?


The good news seems to be there is no news on this. Everything I could find in a quick search went back to at least 2017 as an early proposal and it seemed to be for larger, >30 Kw systems.
Doesen't look like there is much on the horizon with it atm.

  Quote  Inverters listening to the web are nothing new. A local has come up with a system, which listens to the wholesale price to advise on exporting plus also reads the weather forecast to make sure enough power is in the batteries for a rainy day!


Integrated to other smart and web connected appliances such as your TV, the implications for the invasion of privacy especially  with marketing interests in mind is frightening.

The powers that be are certainly hell bent on the globull big brother model of domination of the people that's for sure.
 
lizby
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Posted: 10:57pm 11 Oct 2019
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  Davo99 said  It's common to get 6.6 Kw worth of panels on a 5KW inverter for $4000 here.

If you could get that for anything close to $4000 in the U.S., you'd probably have millions of takers. I'm envious of what OZ folks say they pay for panels.

Chart in the following PDF shows 6.2kW residential rooftop systems in the U.S. in 2018 averaging $2.70 a kW--$16,740 for the 6.2kW install. (But I'm not sure what the "Soft Costs" are making up more than half the cost of residential systems, since there's no cost of land as with commercial solar farms.)

Chart

On the other hand, I live in Nova Scotia in the summer (just shy of 45 degrees North), and use a single small window AC unit maybe 14-21 days total (after 12 years of doing without AC). I just got my 60-day electric bill, and we used 17.9kWh per day, at a cost of $.15 (Canadian) per kWh, or about $2.70 per day. We have electric hot water and an electric stove (though we mostly use the gas grill in the summer). Hardly worth it to install any PV at any price, and of course in the winter, when you'd really need it, you wouldn't get very much out of it.
Edited 2019-10-12 09:32 by lizby
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Davo99
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Posted: 09:44pm 12 Oct 2019
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  lizby said  
If you could get that for anything close to $4000 in the U.S., you'd probably have millions of takers.


Yes I have seen what people in the states pay for panels and although subsidised here, even without those subsidy's it still does not add up.
I have also seen what the Tesla tile roofs work out at being about $60K Up. definitely for those with too man dollars and too little sense.

  Quote  I'm envious of what OZ folks say they pay for panels.


I'm envious of what you guys pay for about everything else and how easily and readily available things are there that you can't get hold of here and if you can, they are unaffordable anyway.

in 2018 averaging $2.70 a kW--$16,740 for the 6.2kW install.
  Quote  

You threw me there. You left out a couple of zeros. That's $2700 a kw I'm sorry to say. Wow.  I buy used panels and set my max spend at $100 KW and more often than not, I get them cheaper than that. Best I ever did was $15 Kw for 24 190W panels. They work fine, good brand, perfect condition, I did get a bit lucky but one can always pick up the lower wattage panels cheaper. I have bought a load of 250's now I'm just trying to get myself organised with a friend to help me get them off my ground mount and stacked up onto the roof. I have enough to replace all my smaller panels so everything will be 250W.

I just got my 60-day electric bill, and we used 17.9kWh per day, at a cost of $.15 (Canadian) per kWh, or about $2.70 per day.

I don't think anyone here pays .15C kwh unless it is off peak for water heating. There may be some loss leader sign up deals going for a limited time but they would screw you royally in other areas to more than make up for it.  I think the price range here is about 23 to 60C kwh.  Our green obsessed states running on the " Cheap" power provided by wind and solar unreliables are the most expensive places.


  Quote   We have electric hot water and an electric stove (though we mostly use the gas grill in the summer). Hardly worth it to install any PV at any price, and of course in the winter, when you'd really need it, you wouldn't get very much out of it.


I Imagine your used panels if at all available which I'm told by a friend in the US are hard to come by would be very exy anyway. If it snows where you are panels could be a dead loss.
That said, I saw a vid where a guy in Canada had his panels mounted vertically to keep the snow off and built snow berms as huge reflectors for his panels. With everything being white anyway, with the cold his panels well outdid their rating.
 
lizby
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Posted: 10:58pm 12 Oct 2019
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  lizby said  in 2018 averaging $2.70 a kW--$16,740 for the 6.2kW install.
  Davo99 said  You threw me there. You left out a couple of zeros. That's $2700 a kw I'm sorry to say. Wow.


Oops. At least I did the math right for the total cost for 6.2kW--$16,740.

  Davo99 said  I'm envious of what you guys pay for about everything else and how easily and readily available things are there that you can't get hold of here and if you can, they are unaffordable anyway.


Often true in the U.S.--rarely so in Canada.

  Davo99 said  If it snows


In Canada? HaHa. I always like to see humor on these tech forums.
Edited 2019-10-13 09:12 by lizby
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BrianP
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Joined: 30/03/2017
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Posted: 11:28pm 12 Oct 2019
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  lizby said  In Canada? HaHa. I always like to see humor on these tech forums.

Increasingly (sadly ) we need more humour to TRY & maintain what's left of our sanity...

B
 
Paul_L
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Posted: 02:13am 13 Oct 2019
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  Davo99 said  If it snows where you are panels could be a dead loss.
That said, I saw a vid where a guy in Canada had his panels mounted vertically to keep the snow off and built snow berms as huge reflectors for his panels. With everything being white anyway, with the cold his panels well outdid their rating.

This google photo is of the Esopus Town Hall about 24 miles northwest from my house.

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8989339,-73.975342,58a,35y,277.75h,74.11t/data=!3m1!1e3

The building is heated and cooled with a deep vertical well geothermal heat pump system, powered by the solar collectors, which can produce about 1,000,000 btu of heat during the coldest days of the year. There is a fairly well insulated concrete block cistern, 20' x 20' x 5' deep in the basement which holds about 15,000 gallons or 120,000 pounds of water. The geothermal system can raise the temperature of the 120,000 pounds of water about 8.33°F in one hour. In 6 hours of sunlight it will raise the temperature of the 120,000 pounds of water about 50°F sotring about 6,000,000 btu*hr of heat which is more than sufficient to heat the building for a 24 hour day. (1 btu*hour of heat will increase the temperature of 1 pound of water 1°F.)

The solar collector array was installed almost 20 years ago. The rows are aligned within a few degrees of north/south. The panels rotate 80° east at dawn and 80° west at sundown. If it snows enough to coat the panels they rotate 120°, upside down, and the snow falls to the ground.

This building purchases electric energy from the grid only for lighting and the police communication equipment. Heating and cooling has been completely derived from the solar panels for 20 years!

Almost 20% of the electricity currently generated in the U. S. comes from hydroelectric, solar, wind or geothermal sources. We have been building hydroelectric dams all over the place for more than a century.

Everyone knows about the Hoover Dam, Niagara Falls, and the Grand Coolee Dam, but almost nobody knows about this 7 MW hydro-electric generator installation on the Wappingers Creek, 7 miles west of my house.

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.5979453,-73.9190846,236a,35y,320h,36.71t/data=!3m1!1e3

It was put into service by Thomas Alva Edison in 1895, 2 years after the first 2.2MW Rankine turbines went into operation (above the falls) for the Niagara Falls & River Railway Company's trolley cars! In Niagara the Schaellkopf Company began generating in 1894, the Cataract Company in 1896. The Wappingers Creek turbines were replaced in 1973.

The U.S. and Canada have had a long standing interest in getting something for nothing. Hydroelectric generation is the easiest way to get something for nothing. I'm patiently waiting for someone to find a way to capture tidal power. Long Island Sound, the Bay of Fundy, and the bays behind the barrier beaches all along the east and gulf coasts are ideal power sources!

Paul in NY
Edited 2019-10-13 12:24 by Paul_L
 
zeitfest
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Joined: 31/07/2019
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Posted: 11:05am 13 Oct 2019
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I can remember seeing an Aus ground temperature map, published by CSIRO. From memory it varied, with the range  decreasing down to about 2 meters down where it becomes pretty constant.
In Coober Pedy of course they solve the air-co problem by moving the whole residence underground - around a steady 23 deg C I think, summer and winter.
 
BrianP
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Posted: 10:18pm 13 Oct 2019
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  Paul_L said  I'm patiently waiting for someone to find a way to capture tidal power. Long Island Sound, the Bay of Fundy, and the bays behind the barrier beaches all along the east and gulf coasts are ideal power sources!Paul in NY

YES!!! Same here (but not so patient)...
 
domwild
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Posted: 10:30pm 13 Oct 2019
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Aluminium is "frozen electricity" and as there are 30' (10m) tides along the Kimberley coast (WA) and there is bauxite, the idea was to have a tidal power station for the smelters.
Taxation as a means of achieving prosperity is like a man standing inside a bucket trying to lift himself up.

Winston Churchill
 
zeitfest
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Posted: 10:52pm 13 Oct 2019
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ah yes - there is the tidal power  the Annapolis Royal Generating Station  

Don't know if it is still running or not. But I suspect the world has enough royals already    
 
Paul_L
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Posted: 01:02am 14 Oct 2019
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The Annapolis Royal tidal power generation station was designed to use only the maximum outgoing tide flow to generate power. That means it only produces power about 30% of the time, every 11 1/2 hours for about 3 hours and 15 minutes.

Tidal flow volume changes, in a roughly sinusoidal pattern, with the rotation of the earth less the retrograde revolution of the moon around the earth. Generating power near the high and low ebb times is impractical since the flow volume is near zero.

A tidal system which uses both the increasing and decreasing tide flows could produce power for about 8 hours out of every 24. It's very difficult to find a location anywhere in the world where this could be implemented efficiently.

Turbines used have to be resistant to fouling from marine growths which requires very wide spacing between the volute and the impeller and therefore deliver very low efficiency, however the volume of water flow is extremely high so the low efficiency can be tolerated.

Locations are restricted to places where there is a large difference between sealevel at low tide versus high tide. That limits choices to the Bay of Fundy, Long Island Sound, and the antipode which is out in the Pacific ocean.

It's a very difficult problem to solve, that's why it hasn't been solved.

Paul in NY
 
BrianP
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Posted: 01:44am 14 Oct 2019
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And wave motion is 24/7...
 
Paul_L
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Posted: 08:05am 14 Oct 2019
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  BrianP said  And wave motion is 24/7...
Yes, Brian, but wave motion is also highly variable due to changing weather.

Dominion power had a pair of articulated barges anchored in the Chesapeake Bay just west of Cape Charles and another pair in the Atlantic east of Virginia Beach. Each pair of barges were hooked together with a horizontal hinge. A pitman arm arrangement cranked a generator through a gearbox and the power output was recorded.

The barges in the bay were becalmed for many weeks at a time producing nothing. The ones in the ocean broke free from their moorings and were swept ashore during a hurricane.

They gave up.

Geothermal power is always there, but it is extremely low density giving very low power production per unit of surface area. It originates in the liquid iron / nickel core of the earth which is kept in its molten state by the continuous fisioning of vast masses of trans-uranic elements.

The earth is constructed like a soccer ball with a diameter of 8000 miles and a solid crust averaging 125 miles thick. High density geothermal heat escapes along the boundaries of tectonic plates -- in the mid ocean rifts and weird places like Yellowstone National Park.

Coralling this heat just before it reaches the surface and detouring through a heating system or an electric generator has absolutely no environmental impact. All that it does is move the point where the heat energy would escape to the atmosphere from somebody's backyard to somebody else's toaster.

Paul in NY
 
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