Solar Pannels for electricity

Duzzie

I have been reading through some of the threads on here about solar power, however they all seem to be about using solar power for hot water.

I have quite a high power consumption, powering a number of fish tanks and reptile vivariums. I was trying to find some information of suppliers, costs and efficiency for solar photo cells. Anyone got any info that they could share with me such as usefull irish based websites?? Most of the ones ive seen relate to solar powered heating rather than electricity.

I was also looking at a small wind turbine, but dont think it would work at my house, as we are somewhat sheltered.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Duzzie

sydthebeat

http://www.constructireland.ie/vb/showthread.php?p=1796

maybe have a look here... hope its ok to post another forum....

AckwelFoley

You are referring to Photovolatic Panes or commonly referred to as pv solar panels.

They are completely different to the solar panels we refer to for hot water purposes.

The problem at the moment as with the turbines is the cost benefit of them.
PV panels are very expensive to buy and install Their main use here are in government run projects, they are required i believe under EU law to reduct their dependancy on fossil fuels for their new buildings by using heat pumps , heat recovery pv panels and evacuated tubes

In your instance, i think at the moment the cost of the pv panels in particular would be too high, for the payback time involved.. i think this will change in the medium term future, but from what im lead to believe this is the case

sculptor

I got a solar powered shed light and battery chargers from Maplins in the Blanchardstown centre (hope I,m not breaking rules) not much power but handy and not that expensive.

AckwelFoley

sculptor wrote: »

I got a solar powered shed light and battery chargers from Maplins in the Blanchardstown centre (hope I,m not breaking rules) not much power but handy and not that expensive.

Yea, but thats pretty small power generation.

What was the cost do you mind me asking?

sculptor

Snyper, It was in the blur of christmas but I think the shed light was under 50 and the 12v battery charger was 2 for the price of one under 40 I think.
I know they are not serious kit but its a good introduction to see does it suit the user without ending up with expensive unused equipment.

ircoha

Duzzie wrote: »

I have been reading through some of the threads on here about solar power, however they all seem to be about using solar power for hot water.

I have quite a high power consumption, powering a number of fish tanks and reptile vivariums. I was trying to find some information of suppliers, costs and efficiency for solar photo cells. Anyone got any info that they could share with me such as usefull irish based websites?? Most of the ones ive seen relate to solar powered heating rather than electricity.

I was also looking at a small wind turbine, but dont think it would work at my house, as we are somewhat sheltered.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Duzzie

one issue often overlooked wit PV is the need to replace the storage batteries about every 3 or 4 years.
The other problem with batteries is that even for what they call deep discharge batteries u can still only use about half the stored power so if u have a power requirement of say 100kWh u will need batteries with a rated capacity of 200kWh
if u go below 50 % or what ever the value is, the battery will be knackered.
this also means that u need good gear to charge the batteries so that the first one is fully charged before u start the next.

barreies also need to be kept 'not cold' so more hassle

this explains in part why in europe they buy the PV power from the householder, no need for batteries

if u decide to do this, look at the marine world for decent batteries: they need them for starting the big diesel engines so loads of amp hours

siralan

Is it possible for to purchase a solar panel which would power the wastewater treatment system at my house. It has an 85watt air compressor which runs 24/7 and also a pump which kicks in for 8 minutes at a time about 3 times a week ??

quentingargan

Well, yes, but the problem is that you have a mismatch of supply to demand. Solar doesn't provide a steady supply - it is obviously more during the day and more in summer than winter (a lot more - my PV array here is shoving out 10kw hrs a day at the moment, but was on less than 0.5kw hrs per day in the winter).

For that reason, you need a system where the grid buys your surplus power at a sensible price. Here, solar PV gets just 9c per Kw Hr for surplus production which makes it hard to stack, unless you have a very constant daytime demand.

rockabaloo

quentingargan wrote: »

Well, yes, but the problem is that you have a mismatch of supply to demand. Solar doesn't provide a steady supply - it is obviously more during the day and more in summer than winter (a lot more - my PV array here is shoving out 10kw hrs a day at the moment, but was on less than 0.5kw hrs per day in the winter).

For that reason, you need a system where the grid buys your surplus power at a sensible price. Here, solar PV gets just 9c per Kw Hr for surplus production which makes it hard to stack, unless you have a very constant daytime demand.

Could you not hack together some sort of solution using a small panel, some batteries and an inverter? Don't really know how you would go about this but I'm sure it could be done.

quentingargan

rockabaloo wrote: »

Could you not hack together some sort of solution using a small panel, some batteries and an inverter? Don't really know how you would go about this but I'm sure it could be done.

Problem with batteries is that, by a conservative estimate, cycling batteries costs about 11c to 12c per KwHr for the wear and tear on the battery itself. You would be better off selling electricity to ESB for 9c and buying it back for 16c.

But you would be better off again if you had the system that prevails in other countries where the electricity network pays a reasonable premium for green energy supplied locally.

By the way, part of my work is developing off-grid power supplies (see here) but these are really only for use where getting in the grid would cost an absolute fortune, such as remote off-grid telecoms site etc. or villages in developing countries with no national grid.

10 years ago, we built our own house to be off-grid, and wasted loads of valuable electricity dumping heat in high winds before ESB introduced its 19c feed in tariff. But we have been through two sets of batteries and loads of tweaking. In the end, I wouldn't recommend batteries unless you absolutely have to have them.

rockabaloo

Good reply quentingargan. What you say definitely sounds logical. It would work then but would cost money rather than save money.

Capt'n Midnight

quentingargan wrote: »

Problem with batteries is that, by a conservative estimate, cycling batteries costs about 11c to 12c per KwHr for the wear and tear on the battery itself. You would be better off selling electricity to ESB for 9c and buying it back for 16c.

But you would be better off again if you had the system that prevails in other countries where the electricity network pays a reasonable premium for green energy supplied locally. .

Don't forget that you could also do day/night rate so hopefully much of the electricity you buy back would be closer to 9c ( 8.97c :pac: ex vat ) than 20c
https://www.electricireland.ie/switchchange/greenNight.htm

Green NightSaver offers a reduced night time price offering a 50.5% reduction on the day price. This price plan is only beneficial if you use at least 22% of total usage within the NightSaver night time hours where you have average annual usage of 5,300kWhs.

quentingargan

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Don't forget that you could also do day/night rate so hopefully much of the electricity you buy back would be closer to 9c ( 8.97c :pac: ex vat ) than 20c
https://www.electricireland.ie/switchchange/greenNight.htm

Aye Cap'n. But in terms of payback, the reality would be that you are only getting 9c back on what you export from the panel. So unless you use a lot of daytime electricity as a constant load, it is difficult to justify the cost of solar PV in Ireland.

The only people who can really benefit are industrial users with a large baseload during daylight hours. Supermarkets with open fridges and freezers for example, who are open seven days a week would possibly be able to justify the cost.

Capt'n Midnight

quentingargan wrote: »

Aye Cap'n. But in terms of payback, the reality would be that you are only getting 9c back on what you export from the panel. So unless you use a lot of daytime electricity as a constant load, it is difficult to justify the cost of solar PV in Ireland.

Totally agree.

It was more to show that if using the grid is the export is similar to importing at night. If you have enough PV it's nearly like having a free battery.