BBBrown.com
The solar generating system for our home consists of
22 Sanyo HIP200-BA3 200 watt photovolatiac modules,
2 Outback Power Systems GVFX-3648 inverters,
2 Outback Power Systems MX-60 charge controllers, and
8 Concorde PVX-2240T backup batteries. The roof mounted panels consist of two arrays. One 1.6 kw array faces south and the other 2.8 kw array faces west providing a total of 4.4 kw capacity. The batteries can power our emergency circuits for several hours insuring uninterrupted power to our lighting, computers, and refrigerators. For more details of the various components click
here.
The system has been in operation since November 19, 2007. We received the standard, $4 a watt rebate for the installation from the State of Florida under their solar incentive program. This amounted to a check for $17,600. Operational statistics are shown below including near realtime charts and data. More detailed information can be found by exploring the menu on the left.
Vacation Mode, August 18, 2009
We were away from home from August 3rd to August 17th. During that period all electronics were unplugged except for two DVRs and the Acer Aspire One netbook that functions as the server for
BBBrown.mysolarlog.com. Two inefficient non-Energy Star refrigerators were running as well as the pool pump 5 hours a day. The weather was relatively good for solar generation but the ambient temperatures were high, in the 90s. The jump in percentage generated can be clearly seen in this chart which shows daily percent generated since January 1 of this year, 2009.
Weather and NPR, July 16, 2009
Our weather has been unusually hot. High temps daily in the 90s. That is really unusual for us. Even so, our PV system has been cranking out 35 percent and up of our energy. With the AC running constantly that is not too bad. We still have a lot of work to do on conservation. When our major appliances get old enough we will replace them with Energy Star ones. We have two refrigerators and that alone should save us about 10+ KWH per day. It is more cost effective to replace inefficient appliances than it is to add more solar panels.
A couple of days ago while taking Barbara to the dentist I turned on the radio. It happened to be tuned to NPR and the Dian Rehm show. They were talking about solar energy. It was a good show with a great panel made up of:
Rob Lamkin, CEO, Cool Earth Solar
Rhone Resch, president and chief executive officer, Solar Energy Industries Association
Peter Fox-Penner, principal and chairman emeritus, The Brattle Group, an international economic consulting firm,former Department of Energy official, and author of the forthcoming Island Press book "Smart Power"
Alex Daue, Renewable Energy Coordinator with the Wilderness Society.
Something urged me to call in and boy was I shocked when they took my call. I was so surprised that my thoughts were not as organized as I would have liked them to be. I still managed to convey some of our experiences of living in a solar home and got a nice compliment from the panel. You can go to the Diane Rehm Show website and listen if you want. My call came in about two thirds of the way into the show. Click
here to go to the website. The audio links are on the right.
Created on 07/30/2009 04:09 PM by rbrown3rd
Updated on 02/20/2010 04:37 AM by rbrown3rd
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