Solar panels plus battery storage - anyone have that?

[Yearofthegoat]

Seeing as my supplier has gone bust, and I can't get diesel for love nor money at the moment, I started looking into solar panels plus battery storage so I can stick it to the Man (maybe, just a bit anyway).

 

Anyone got a solar panels+battery system at home?

 

How's it going? Was it straightforward to get installed, and (if you don't mind telling) who did the installation?

 

Cheers!

[Ootohere]

No idea if @domhnallhas battery storage but he might respond if he sees this.

 

Some discussion here, but not totally serious. Well not on my part.

http://briskoda.net/forums/topic/475785-electric-vehicles-and-charging/page/8

 

Cheapest battery storage is probably a used car parked up that can feed power back to the house when needed, and used as transportation as and when required. 

 

Edited 27 September, 2021 by e-Roottoot

[Yearofthegoat]

Thanks. Yeah, one eye on an EV in the future when my dear old Superb finally shuffles off, but mainly to be able to use less grid power.

 

Am also looking at different types of (central) heating, seeing as it's the gas that's the bigger problem now and likely for the foreseable future.

[@Lee]

Probably of no help but there was a chap on LBC Radio on Friday who was generating his own power. Solar, a wind turbine in hs back garden and some ex-navy submarine batteries in his shed for energy storage. A bit 'doomsday prepper' and Heath Robinson but if it works, it works  

[cheezemonkhai]

Looked into it in quite a lot of detail but it’s on pause for us.

 

Firstly because batteries were about to shrink significantly in size for a given capacity (That’s now fixed).

 

Secondly because since the FIT disappeared and even with export they wouldn’t pay for themselves during their expected life on our property.

 

The reason for the pause rather than stop was to wait for the next generation to bring prices down.

 

Last I looked it was much closer now.

Edited 27 September, 2021 by cheezemonkhai

[jjc]

I just have solar at the moment, did look into battery but was not adding up at the time, but as electric goes up it is starting to look better.

It does help with the PHEV as I have an intelligent charger that will divert the excess solar to the car if it needs it.

 

John

[cheezemonkhai]

Can you draw from your car battery or does the car/charger not permit that?

[domhnall]

On 27/09/2021 at 15:15, e-Roottoot said:

No idea if @domhnallhas battery storage but he might respond if he sees this.

 

Some discussion here, but not totally serious. Well not on my part.

http://briskoda.net/forums/topic/475785-electric-vehicles-and-charging/page/8

 

Cheapest battery storage is probably a used car parked up that can feed power back to the house when needed, and used as transportation as and when required. 

 

 

yes I do have a 10.5 kWh Alpha ESS battery which helps me store off peak energy to heat the hous ein the mornign, then capture excess solar which used to go to the grid and we use that to heat the house in the evening. The only car that can do v2G right now is the Nissan leaf as it is a chademo only feature but most DNOs don't allow it. SPEN certianly don't

[domhnall]

On 04/10/2021 at 21:53, cheezemonkhai said:

Can you draw from your car battery or does the car/charger not permit that?

 

only if your DNO allows it, and your energy provider and if you have a nissan leaf. 

 

[john999boy]

17 minutes ago, domhnall said:

only if your DNO allows it, and your energy provider and if you have a nissan leaf. 

Is this specific to exporting from a car as I export and get paid for it without any special hoops to go through - unless I've forgotten since it was all set up!

[domhnall]

On 06/10/2021 at 16:07, john999boy said:

Is this specific to exporting from a car as I export and get paid for it without any special hoops to go through - unless I've forgotten since it was all set up!

 

it's importing to your house from a car, V2G vehicle to Grid. Only Chademo supports it and only on the leaf. Some very limited trials in the UK. A freind bought my leaf for such a trial but then they decided it was not happening in Scotland so he was left with a Leaf he didn't need. 

 

[Aspman]

I know Tesla have been trying that market - https://www.tesla.com/en_gb/powerwall

 

It seems a logical way forward but it's immature for now

[cheezemonkhai]

The tesla batteries were crazy expensive IMHO and also include the inverter, which can be seen as a good or a bad thing.
On the positive side, they are externally rated and do powercut backup.


 

[Ootohere]

Might help some.

 

 

 

[cheezemonkhai]

Now the issue is trying to even get a quote 😂

[fabdavrav]

Well my mate who lives in a village down Deeside (Aberdeenshire) has just had the power out for 48hrs apparently, all due to storm Arwen. Now he's on LPG for his "gas" to a conventional modern boiler with radiators, in an unvented sealed system with an indirect hot water tank. He also has solar panels on the roof which feed into the hot water tank to help heat that up. House is well built, well insulated etc, & less than 10yrs old.

 

He also has PV solar panels on the roof for feeding into the grid. He was previously thinking about getting a Tesla "Powerwall" to charge up via his PV on the roof, mainly to help in the case of power cuts etc.. Now the Tesla Powerwall-2 & "+" each have 13.5kWh capacity, & can be linked upto 10 units maximum, thus providing a maximum of 135kWh. 

 

So with a power cut of 48hrs & say all 10 x Powerwall-2 units that's 135kWh divided by 48hrs = 2.81kW (2,810W) per hour supply.

 

That would be enough to run the average fridge, freezer, & all the standard pumps, valves, controls & ignitors in the gas boiler heating system, laptop, router, & the essential house lights (LED) nothing else, no kettle, maybe one electric hob ring on a low setting...& maybe the microwave 

 

Here's the crunch:- There is a big push away from gas & LPG, towards electric powered heat pumps (air or ground). Unfortunately these start at 4kW & go upwards, & for his size of house & in those winter weather conditions 6-8kW would be the minimum. Less say he got it to ramp down & ran it at 4kw, for the 48hrs on a "frost protect setting"...thats 4kW x 48hrs = 192kWh....which is 57kWh MORE than the 10 x Tesla Powerwall-2 units can provide!

 

Now you may argue that he should be able to get some electricity from his PV solar on the roof. However there are 7hrs of daylight ATM, & with the cloud cover due to the storm the amount gained is minimal.

 

Now I would tell him to get a wood burning stove (like I have) as it provides heat & you can cook on them (if you have flat top), but many of the eco/green lot are trying to ban those as they pollute...

 

 

Welcome to the all electric future...which should be called "the new dark age"....

 

Edited 28 November, 2021 by fabdavrav
clarity

[lol-lol]

 

Just order this..... Poweroak EB 1800.  Just as a start kit.  Will be looking for a handful of solar panels to plug in to the solar power input, presumably might have to juggle the panel around to keep it under 60 volts.  Should keep broadband router, laptops and a few other things going in blackout.

Would have like the AC300 with 2, 3,,4 or 8 if doubling on everything, battery packs but that is really big money. 

Looked at Ecoflow but they seemed to use poor quality batteries.   

Two AC300 and eight B300 batteries type system is what I would like to build up with over 5 kWh of solar eventually ie when prices fall, great Black Friday deals and natural fall in prices which means UK currency needs to keep strongish as if not both petrol and these power station will stay expensive unless we start building in the UK.

 

Edited 28 November, 2021 by lol-lol

[fabdavrav]

4 hours ago, lol-lol said:

 

Just order this..... Poweroak EB 1800.  Just as a start kit.  Will be looking for a handful of solar panels to plug in to the solar power input, presumably might have to juggle the panel around to keep it under 60 volts.  Should keep broadband router, laptops and a few other things going in blackout.

Would have like the AC300 with 2, 3,,4 or 8 if doubling on everything, battery packs but that is really big money. 

Looked at Ecoflow but they seemed to use poor quality batteries.   

Two AC300 and eight B300 batteries type system is what I would like to build up with over 5 kWh of solar eventually ie when prices fall, great Black Friday deals and natural fall in prices which means UK currency needs to keep strongish as if not both petrol and these power station will stay expensive unless we start building in the UK.

 

 

 

So that EB180 has as capacity of 1.8kW..& can supply a maximum of 1kW per hour...

 

An average standard combi gas boiler consumes 160W/hr, so that pack will last for 11hrs 15mins....

 

The big power bank that's in the lowest photo has a capacity of 24.576kW...& a max supply of 6kW/hr...

 

Now in the case of the 48hr power cut that would be able to provide 512W per hour over those 48hours....so enough to power the boiler, freezer & maybe a few LED lights...

[lol-lol]

50 minutes ago, fabdavrav said:

So that EB180 has as capacity of 1.8kW..& can supply a maximum of 1kW per hour...

An average standard combi gas boiler consumes 160W/hr, so that pack will last for 11hrs 15mins....

The big power bank that's in the lowest photo has a capacity of 24.576kW...& a max supply of 6kW/hr...

Now in the case of the 48hr power cut that would be able to provide 512W per hour over those 48hours....so enough to power the boiler, freezer & maybe a few LED lights...

 

First priority would be to keep the fridge/freezer going I suppose and the EB180 would just about keep the fridge going but probably only plug it in half the time and use it for microwave and lighting and there is increasingly around cheap LED lighting solutions.

 

If really cold then deffo try to power the boiler and circ pump if it was zeroish or below outside.

 

Hopefully get close to 500W during the daylight hours to help run thing during the day and it will be interesting to see if the draw from the 3 pin AC connectors is limited to 1000W or a bit more when supplemented by the solar DC.

 

Power torch-lights etc off the DC charging outputs as it will be more effcient that using the DC/AC invertor.  I have numerous lead acid batteries and handy sized lithium power banks but hopefully can develop a suite of these "solar generators", perhaps one per room, the EB240 was not on such a good deal and still only has a 1Kw dc/ac convertors.  I do have standalone invertors of that size but the AC system does look a better future solution modular solution.

 

Be great to pull some power from the Zoe's 52 kWh battery but I do not know of ways of getting more than 120w from the 12v supply and 24w from the four USB sockets so charge a few US torches I suppose.

 

Wi keep the EB180 charged up once a week or so using the Octopus 5p per Kwh night time power and run the laptop and phone charging, maybe the full fibre router and other new white box they seem to have fitted.

 

A gradual charge with the aim of generating more and more solar ie firstly aiming for 500W, then 1 kw, then 1.5kw, then 2kw and so on. And up the capacity to 2kw,4, 6,8, 10 kwh etc

Maybe a wind turbine as well the the solar. Very cheap. £140.

 

    

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

[KenONeill]

1 hour ago, fabdavrav said:

An average standard combi gas boiler consumes 160W/hr

So it can, by your figures, and if I've got the conversions right, heat 160g of dihydrogen oxide by 1 Celsius degree in one hour.

[@Lee]

Maybe a tad OT but has anyone considered building their own generator? I was mulling over the idea of using an old 1.9  SDi as they're bomb proof and easy to maintain. 

 

[fabdavrav]

8 hours ago, KenONeill said:

So it can, by your figures, and if I've got the conversions right, heat 160g of dihydrogen oxide by 1 Celsius degree in one hour.

 

No idea what you're trying to do there but 160W is the electrical power consumption of an average combi boiler...this is for the pump, ignitors, valves, timers, controls etc...nothing to do with actually heating the water as thats the gas..but to use the gas requires all the above which is powered by electricity.. 

[lol-lol]

7 hours ago, @Lee said:

Maybe a tad OT but has anyone considered building their own generator? I was mulling over the idea of using an old 1.9  SDi as they're bomb proof and easy to maintain. 

 

 

Does not help the "reducing CO2" agenda.  These "solar generators" have Photovoltaic input and solar panels are getting cheaper and better year on year and work on a winters day as long as their is some sunlight but it obtaining electrical power when there is no sun or perhaps even wind.   Storing the nuclear and renewable hydro energy for when one needs it in the middle of the night.  Linking the whole world up to a worldwide electrical grid so there is always somewhere generating hydro, solar or wind power with nuclear making up the difference to even that can be phased out.

 

It is happen gradually.  UK has just got plugged in to a 1.4 GW connector to Norway which is helping the UK go carbon neutral just a shame the UK France 2 GW connector went down for a while though at least 1 GW is working currently.

https://grid.iamkate.com/

 

Pace of all this technology is moving along pretty well and if distributors and users pick it up then maybe the extreme weather to come may kill a few less million people.      

Edited 29 November, 2021 by lol-lol

[lol-lol]

10 minutes ago, fabdavrav said:

 

No idea what you're trying to do there but 160W is the electrical power consumption of an average combi boiler...this is for the pump, ignitors, valves, timers, controls etc...nothing to do with actually heating the water as thats the gas..but to use the gas requires all the above which is powered by electricity.. 

 

Perhaps home gas boilers, and the circulation pump, should have alternative power feeds to their 240v ie a 12volt for the pump and 12 / 5 volt for the boiler electrical circuitry ? 

 

On the news it was saying Ammonia was a better way to transport Hydrogen and presumably then strip the nitrogen when one wants to use the hydrogen as fuel. 

Much of the technology is already here or close to commercial scaling so it sounds hopeful we can have both carbonless fuel which still has a burning process with those benefits we know of.

     

[Ootohere]

Plenty windblown timber about for those with a chainsaw or someone with a vehicle with fuel to get wood to them or maybe a horse and cart / reindeer & sleigh and that still have a fireplace and chimney.

 

Lang may there lum reek.