MAULBROOK wrote: » Holy fxxk if anyone needs solar PV fitted its you. 6k a year on power you would have pay back on a decent setup in less than 5 years or less.
blue5000 wrote: » What percentage are you able to use at night rate? I'm guessing the bulk tank is direct expansion? It's a fair whack of a bill alright. Would a gas heater in the dairy work out better I wonder?
whelan2 wrote: » Who were you with previously?
mahoney_j wrote: » I have used utility solutions for over a year ,he dose all the work setting up account checking tariffs and getting a deal .I just submit a reading every month .I’ve tried bonkers etc and none come close to the unit price I’m paying .there’s a small yearly fee involved but we’ll worth it as I’ve saved a significant amount on what I would of been paying if I hadn’t got this guy involved .for reference on my house I’m paying 12.50 per unit snd on farm paying a day rate of 13.70 and night rate of 6.55.if anyone wants a contact number drop me a dm ,most here on Twitter will probably already know
K.G. wrote: » Ifa (bord gas).ifa doesn't suit larger users.we use 38 000 units a year
whelan2 wrote: » It's just the same as looking up bonkers.ie and no fee. I said that to him when he rang me
whelan2 wrote: » It's a bit of a joke really, not really working for the farmer are they?
mahoney_j wrote: » Tbh I think the ifa should have nothing to do with this and just represent all farmers ,take on the coops ,meat factories ,lobby govt etc
Mooooo wrote: » Anyone using solar pv, any idea what the ROI would be on a dairy farm?
blue5000 wrote: » The big problem with dairy farms is the demand peaks-troughs. There is a huge demand at milking, the rest of the day it's like a normal house, unless cooling with an ice bank at night rate. I think wind would be a better option on a dairy farm. There's not too many lads still milking at 10am.
cute geoge wrote: » How can you use a car for battery storage ,is it just by leaving it parked up and hooked on to it with cables???
Say my name wrote: » Seemingly that's it. If your home is run by renewables and your car is fully charged up and the renewables start to fade. You can use the power from the car's battery.
KCross wrote: » Thats the theory. This vehicle-to-home technology would be a bit slicker in that you would simply come home, plug the car in as you normally would to charge the car and if there is a power cut it will automatically (via a bi-directional charge point) start feeding power back to the house. No need to get any inverters or cables out or popping the bonnet etc and it would drive the entire house rather than just a few essential items. Its in the future...
J.O. Farmer wrote: » Sounds great but what happens if the power goes and doesn't come back for hours could you end up stranded at home because your house has flattened the cars battery.
KCross wrote: » Technically yes. But new EV's would have a battery that would power an average house for many many days... maybe even weeks, so it would want to be one hell of a power cut. The longest power cut I've had was storm Ophelia and I was down for 5 days.... an EV would have powered the house for that time period no problem. Most power cuts in reality are a few hours, maybe a day or two. And nobody is stopping you from disconnecting the car from the house. Pick your poison, lights in the house or the ability to drive somewhere. You could also let the car run down just to a point where you could get to a nearby charger that does have power and charge the car up for 30mins and come back to your house to power it away again for another few days!
J.O. Farmer wrote: » Didn't realise batteries would have that much power. I was more thinking of hours and you could have the battery fairly well run down before you realise it's running off the car.
KCross wrote: » Its a little off-topic but its worth a reply. Any farmer, particularly dairy, who has some capital to spend now for a long term gain should take a serious look at Solar PV. Dairy farmers, in particular, because the sun is shining most at the time that dairy farms have the ability to utilise it (self-consumption is critically important for ROI), which is ~10:00-19:00 during the summer months..... what with plate coolers, bulk tanks, milking machine, compressors, hot water, water pumps etc. In addition farmers have loads of wide open roof space with no shading which is quite important to maximise the output. Ideally south facing. There are several threads in the Renewable forum that you should look at for costs and consider getting some installers out to quote you.https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=117396876 As for your ROI question... thats a very difficult one to answer definitively as it depends on what exactly you go for and what your usage profile is like. e.g. How many panels, what direction they are facing, how much of the electricity you can use, have you got batteries, have you got 3-phase... lots of variables but the payback should be, for a dairy farmer, somewhere around 5-7yrs. After that its money in the bank and SolarPV has no moving parts or servicing required. It either works or it doesnt. The panels are good for decades (25+ years). The weak link is the inverter which will die eventually (10 year warranty usually) but they are relatively cheap (€hundreds) to replace. Alot of farms have their electricity supply connected to their house in which case you'd be able to apply for the domestic SolarPV granthttps://www.seai.ie/grants/home-energy-grants/solar-electricity-grant/ Im not sure if you can apply for a grant if the farm supply is separate but you dont need the grant to make it viable and I'm sure you'd be able to claim other tax reliefs since it is a capital expenditure. Finally, as a headsup, there is a Feed-In-Traiff coming in the next month or so. A FiT is where you get paid for any generation that you dont use. That energy gets sent to the grid and at the moment Eirgrid get to use it for free! There will be a new microgeneration scheme put in place next month which will allow you to get paid for the unused energy... probably around the night rate value. It requires the installation of a smart meter which might be a double edged sword as the rates so far on smart meters are higher than standard day/night tariffs. If that occurs then you just let it go to the grid for free and do your best to use it all by dumping the excess to heat hot water or any other means possible (timing ice generators etc). Come on over to the renewable forum for further discussion, there are some farmers over there!
yosemitesam1 wrote: » With solar, is there an ideal roof slope and direction to face it in?
yosemitesam1 wrote: » And would there be any issues with additional weight on the roof?
yosemitesam1 wrote: » Just thinking about setting up buildings to maximise efficiency if I was to ever go down that road. I presume it would be an ideal setup for hydrogen if we start to see them become commercialised
KCross wrote: » As I mentioned above, an energy monitor over one summer to see what your usage is like and then a Solar installer to guide you on what is best to match that.!
Hard Knocks wrote: » Can you give a link to the monitor Do you just plug in or do you need it installed
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