My 4.5kWh setup

reklamos · 08-11-2019 3:19pm

Here are some stats from October. Still had good amount of sun but intensity is is lower and days are shorter.
Monthly Production: 286.6kWh(down from 399.7kWh in Sep)
Monthly Consumption: 550.2kWh
Self production: 52% (down from 76% in Sep)
Highest amount produced a day: 19.2kWh
Lowest amount produced a day: 0.4kWh

Charlie-Bravo · 08-11-2019 5:02pm

Out of your total production, how much of yours ended up going out to grid that you didn't get to use?

reklamos · 08-11-2019 5:35pm

astrofluff wrote: »

Out of your total production, how much of yours ended up going out to grid that you didn't get to use?

Last month I exported 2.7kWh

Since install in July, total export is 53kWh to grid.

With battery, diverter and some smart usage I keep exports to minimum.

unkel · 08-11-2019 7:21pm

Very impressive figures, reklamos!

reklamos · 14-11-2019 1:36pm

The second electricity bill has arrived since PV install.
I imported half of the units compared to the same period last year from the grid.
Lets wait for the next one, as it will be during the darkest period.
I'm happy so far

reklamos · 09-12-2019 9:00pm

A bit late stats for November.
Monthly Production: 152.9kWh (down from 286.6kWh in Oct)
Monthly Consumption: 549kWh
Self production: 27% (down from 52% in Oct)
Highest amount produced a day: 15.1kWh
Lowest amount produced a day: 0.1kWh

garo · 10-12-2019 5:58pm

The benefits of a steep south facing roof! Nice production for a crappy November.

handpref · 12-12-2019 9:24pm

reklamos wrote: »

A bit late stats for November.
Monthly Production: 152.9kWh (down from 286.6kWh in Oct)
Monthly Consumption: 549kWh
Self production: 27% (down from 52% in Oct)
Highest amount produced a day: 15.1kWh
Lowest amount produced a day: 0.1kWh

That south facing roof is savage - 5.4 kWh system here east west orientation
December total so far for 12 days 21.60kwh
Best day 3.10kwh
Worst day 0.60
Even if I doubled the area to 36 panels (10.4) i may not be guaranteed 2kwh on a bad day- incredible the affect of poor weather and orientation.

garo · 17-12-2019 6:03pm

Same situation handpref. Because the sun is so low in the sky at this time of the year, it never really hits the panels at a decent angle except early morning g and late in the evening when the sunlight is watery at best. I played around with the sheet linked on this page and it is clear what is going on.

https://aces.nmsu.edu/pubs/_circulars/CR674/

reklamos · 18-12-2019 11:46am

garo wrote: »

Same situation handpref. Because the sun is so low in the sky at this time of the year, it never really hits the panels at a decent angle except early morning g and late in the evening when the sunlight is watery at best. I played around with the sheet linked on this page and it is clear what is going on.

https://aces.nmsu.edu/pubs/_circulars/CR674/

From what I see the curve still peaking at midday and is regular A shape, just compressed from both sides and 2 times lower. See below on Monday this week.

garo · 18-12-2019 12:46pm

Yes for south facing panels that would be expected. An E/W facing panel would see anything from half to a quarter of the production of a south facing panel at this time of the year based on its tilt angle. Play around with the sheet I linked to get an idea of what impact the orientation and tilt have on production.

reklamos · 01-01-2020 2:28pm

Happy New Year!!!
December stats

Monthly Production: 105.7kWh (down from 152.9kWh in Nov)
Monthly Consumption: 579.3kWh
Self production: 18% (down from 27% in Oct)
Highest amount produced a day: 11.5kWh
Lowest amount produced a day: 0 kWh

So this has been the worst month so far and I would think January is not going to be much better.

There was some weird behavior with inverter this month. One day I noticed that it has started charging battery during the day for 10 minutes from grid at full power and then would dump everything bat ti the grid for 10 minutes. This was going on for almost full day till I noticed it. I had to restart the inverter tog get rid of this.
Anyone knows how to configure backup power to reserve some battery charge in case of power cuts on Solid inverter? I have some IT gear hooked up to backup power and would like to have some reserve(10%) left in batteries. I could not figure out how to do that on the inverter and the manual is not really great on details.
Also anyone that has Solis RHI inverter can you tell me what firmware you have and if you have upgraded one?

Thanks

handpref · 01-01-2020 9:09pm

December stats in-
Generated 100.60 kWh
Was expecting a lot worse after a shocking November.

spose · 01-01-2020 9:39pm

December was my first full month with the panels. ~70kwh generated from 4.7 e/w. ~15% of my total consumption covered.

reklamos · 08-01-2020 12:01pm

After checking my December stats I've decided to disable battery charging for January and conserve charging cycles.
The reason being that the amount generated from PV is quiet low and my battery was never fully or 80% charged. I only see this yo-yo effect where it charges for 5-10% and then discharges.
My base load during the day 0.5-1kWh so most of generation should be used anyway and the extra will got heat the water.
I'll enable charging once average generation will get closer to 10kWh.

garo · 09-01-2020 12:51am

That does not count as a full cycle. So you should be fine to keep charging.

daheff · 15-01-2020 10:20pm

Anybody got a yearly average of how much power was generated vs actual consumption?

Based off that, what is the roughly the payback period for the pv setups?

wexfordman2 · 15-01-2020 10:37pm

daheff wrote: »

Anybody got a yearly average of how much power was generated vs actual consumption?

Based off that, what is the roughly the payback period for the pv setups?

Since my system went live april 1st

4.78Mwh generated
1.026Mwh exported

So roughly 3.76mwh of self consumption @18c per kwh gives roughly 680 euro of savings so far and another 2 months to go before hitting the full 12 months.

There would by night rate savings also as battery is charging at night during the winter months giving 5kwh of power saving during the day at .09c instead of 0.18kwh.

Also, savings from eddi heating the water and ot having to run oil during the summer, and some winter days also.

5.85kwp system, at a cost of 8k. I reckon, 10yr payback, back if packet of fag calculations, but prob a bit better than that, and if FIT came in, I would generate about a other 60 euro of savings at .06c per kwh of exported power.

unkel · 15-01-2020 11:00pm

wexfordman2 wrote: »

So roughly 3.76mwh of self consumption @18c per kwh gives roughly 680 euro of savings

I don't want to be a spoil sport and you know I'm a big fan of renewables. But only a fraction of that production is worth 18c/kWh. Only the production that you actually use yourself for powering stuff that you couldn't have powered in a cheaper way (read: at night or with oil or gas)

garo · 16-01-2020 11:47am

Agree with unkel here. Some of that 3.76MWh has gone to the Eddi so you are only saving 5c on that. Ditto your night-rate consumption. And you really need a different electricity supplier if you are paying 18c.

My own calculation for a 4.8kW install using 3MWh is 480 p.a. Or 14 years. I discount the Eddi in this calculation.

KCross · 16-01-2020 11:52am

garo wrote: »

My own calculation for a 4.8kW install using 3MWh is 480 p.a. Or 14 years. I discount the Eddi in this calculation.

Thats on the money I'd say. Any calcs I've done have always come in around the 15yr mark.

Unfortunately installers give a sales blurb of half that and people tend to believe it! :rolleyes:

unkel · 16-01-2020 1:24pm

15 years is in the ballpark for a medium / large installation that was done at a good price with the subsidy (or at a cheaper price without the subisdy). A (mostly) DIY install using very cheaply bought parts (second hand or at trade prices) is ballpark 10 years. You might be able to deduct a year or two from this if we get a 5-6c feed in tariff in the next year or two.

That of course doesn't take into account the likely increase of the kWh rate (during the day) in the (near) future, which is very likely. If that happens, you can deduct more time from the pay back period

That said, above numbers are not holy. You don't necessarily have to make your money back in 5, 10 or 20 years. Many of us would make (at least some) financial sacrifice to reducing emissions, increasing renewables and reducing the use of fossil fuels. I know I would. It's good to know which is which though, so you can make a fact based decision whether or not you are going to install any renewables.

reklamos · 19-01-2020 2:36pm

The sun is treating us well today.
I maxed out at 3.6kW, the last time I've seen these type of numbers was back in mid October.

garo · 19-01-2020 4:53pm

With an E/W installation at a shallow angle all I saw was 900W.

handpref · 20-01-2020 7:30pm

garo wrote: »

With an E/W installation at a shallow angle all I saw was 900W.

I managed 4kwh today - east - west and shallow-
I’ve often thought some days should be great for production as it’s clear skies in work but could be raining for the day at home and I generate very little.
A couple more months and it will be business as usual I hope.

garo · 20-01-2020 7:48pm

3.4kWh for me. Though there was nobody at home so the battery was full at 4pm! I have also discovered belatedly that I get shading on the East facing panels for a couple hours for 3 winter months when the sun in low in the sky

Dormer roof of the southern neighbour. Explains why my output has been less than the model prediction that didn’t have any shading built in.

unkel · 20-01-2020 9:00pm

garo wrote: »

I have also discovered belatedly that I get shading on the East facing panels for a couple hours for 3 winter months when the sun in low in the sky

Seller on eBay was selling Tigo optimisers last week for just GBP29 with free UK shipping, a steal. I got one just to play with and use on my one "play" panel (east facing) on my shed that's just connected to a couple of dead lead acid batteries as it gets lots of shade

If only a few of your east panels get shadowing it might be worth your while to get a few of them

Edit: Gone up to GBP35 now, but still decent value for money

Linky

garo · 20-01-2020 10:40pm

Thanks Unkel. My panels have 3 bypass diodes each so they are able to produce about half the expected amount. The problem will go away by early Feb and I estimate I am losing about 0.5-0.7kWh each day. Not sure if optimisers are worth it especially as I will have to pay someone to get up and install them. Also I assume it being winter and the sun hitting the panels at a very oblique angle means any heating is likely to be limited and not too damaging? Or am I clutching at straws here?

rolion · 20-01-2020 10:43pm

unkel wrote: »

Seller on eBay was selling Tigo optimisers last week for just GBP29 with free UK shipping, a steal. I got one just to play with and use on my one "play" panel (east facing) on my shed that's just connected to a couple of dead lead acid batteries as it gets lots of shade

If only a few of your east panels get shadowing it might be worth your while to get a few of them

Edit: Gone up to GBP35 now, but still decent value for money

Linky

You will need more than O N E "a steal" to get them working.
Where is the gateway !?

Make sure they are not SMA as you will need a SMA inverter.

Have fun !!!

reklamos · 01-02-2020 11:15pm

January stats

Monthly Production: 119.5kWh (up from 105.7kWh in Dec)
Monthly Consumption: 584kWh
Self production: 21% (up from 18% in Dec)
Highest amount produced a day: 11.3kWh
Lowest amount produced a day: 0.3kWh

The trend( even though a small) is going up. Lets see what February is going to bring with that extra day

My 4.5kWh setup

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