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Nobodybusiness

Nobodybusiness

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This is strictly a thought experiment for now.

Say you had 100 acres to plan a solar sustainable community.

10 acres ( or whatever) for just panels.

How would you go about distribution?

Try to run the HVDC to every home then invert?

Single power house with batteries and inverters then distribute AC?
Transformers to increase voltage then step down at home just like the grid does?


No Grid, no POCO. Generate and use your own power.

The subject has come up more than once about a group buying several acres and doing this.
What would be the best way to distribute power ?
 
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You first apply with your local regulatory body to be an electric utility.

Easier to sell power to the utility. You may have community solar than own a share of the power output that offsets their power bill.

May need a sub-station nearby to feed the power into the system.
 
Unless thebcommunity is VERY close together, distributing power would require MASSIVE cabling...
Invert to 480V first maybe, then reduce at homes? Still pretty difficult.
 
You would likely have to go higher in voltage, like a few kV. Have a single power house, convert your DC to this high voltage AC, put transformers near houses and bring it back down - similar to how the grid works really. You will likely also want to have a higher voltage solar and battery set-up.

Please stay safe...
 
A few years ago I was browsing Battery Hookup for some 18650s. Some how the got their hands on a dozen or so New 480v 3 phase inverters. I think about 25kw. Wrong customer base. They were selling them for $1200 ea.
 
I would do 480Vac 3ph, 800V battery, 1000V PV, diesel backup gen in central power house.
 
AntronX said:
I would do 480Vac 3ph, 800V battery, 1000V PV, diesel backup gen in central power house.
Click to expand...
That would supply 3, maybe 4 houses.
If they are closeby.
If they are distant, or many, a 36kv substation and grid level supply would be needed...
 
Maybe it's cheaper to design houses with large south facing roofs and do distributed solar. You could interconnect them using 120/240Vac distribution voltage over buried 2/0 aluminum wire and give each house 50A breaker. So this way excess solar can be shared and during winter houses can be supplied by central diesel generator located away from residences. Basically like an RV park on steroids.
 
DIYrich said:
You first apply with your local regulatory body to be an electric utility.

Easier to sell power to the utility. You may have community solar than own a share of the power output that offsets their power bill.

May need a sub-station nearby to feed the power into the system.
Click to expand...
Not really interested in selling to POCOS.
This would just be for homeowners of the trust..
 
Supervstech said:
Unless thebcommunity is VERY close together, distributing power would require MASSIVE cabling...
Invert to 480V first maybe, then reduce at homes? Still pretty difficult.
Click to expand...
No doubt.
The more I thought about it the more I realized I was over my head.

Still I think this is going to be a thing soon.

Has anyone else’s done it successfully that you know of?

I realize there are co ops you can buy into but that’s not what I was thinking.

So some sort of HV 3 phase inverters then step up to 13200/7620 then back down at the house?
 
AntronX said:
Maybe it's cheaper to design houses with large south facing roofs and do distributed solar. You could interconnect them using 120/240Vac distribution voltage over buried 2/0 aluminum wire and give each house 50A breaker. So this way excess solar can be shared and during winter houses can be supplied by central diesel generator located away from residences. Basically like an RV park on steroids.
Click to expand...
Have to be pretty close together for that I think.
 
Nobodybusiness said:
Density really hasn’t been considered.

Obviously it will be easier if only a few homes.

Was more considering if possible without reinventing the Grid on small scale.
Click to expand...
So you've got 420k Sq ft of panels at an average (according to google) of 15w per Sq ft. X 5hrs= 32 megs a day. I think you've created a grid.
EDIT: If I were creating a community in which I intended to live, the first considerations would be who and how many. The infrastructure comes after. That sounds too much like,an HOA for my comfort.
 
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Since this thread falls into the thought experiment category, I suppose its OK to expand the scope of the thought a bit. I believe its interesting enough to deserve the following mention.
Michael Tellinger has a concept he calls. "One Small Town". Abbreviated description: Within a given community, the residents would participate in not only generating their own electricity but growing some of their own food and using community based projects/businesses to produce things like Honey or really any widget. They would aim to produce 3 times as much as they need so that 1/3 goes to the community participants for free and the other 2/3 is sold to generate capital for the next community project. Tellinger calls this Ubuntu, an African tribal concept. If its not good for everyone its not good at all. The underlying idea is to partially get away from the 100% dependence on Fiat Currency and Government.
NOTE: for anyone that has no knowledge of this subject please refrain from posting ignorant comments comparing the above to Socialism or Statism or some kind of Amish thing. Its NOT, look into it first.
 
BentleyJ said:
Since this thread falls into the thought experiment category, I suppose its OK to expand the scope of the thought a bit. I believe its interesting enough to deserve the following mention.
Michael Tellinger has a concept he calls. "One Small Town". Abbreviated description: Within a given community, the residents would participate in not only generating their own electricity but growing some of their own food and using community based projects/businesses to produce things like Honey or really any widget. They would aim to produce 3 times as much as they need so that 1/3 goes to the community participants for free and the other 2/3 is sold to generate capital for the next community project. Tellinger calls this Ubuntu, an African tribal concept. If its not good for everyone its not good at all. The underlying idea is to partially get away from the 100% dependence on Fiat Currency and Government.
NOTE: for anyone that has no knowledge of this subject please refrain from posting ignorant comments comparing the above to Socialism or Statism or some kind of Amish thing. Its NOT, look into it first.
Click to expand...
Sorry Nobodysbusiness this one is bound for chit-chat. ?

That isn't socialism or statism. It is unadulterated communism. Everyone surrenders 100% of their production, they get 33% back for their own needs, and 66% goes to (some kind of deciding body) to buy other things and distribute them equitably.
Spoiler alert: there were many trial communes in the US during the 60s and 70s. 100% weed-smoking-lazy failure rate.
 
HighDesertOffgrid said:
So you've got 420k Sq ft of panels at an average (according to google) of 15w per Sq ft. X 5hrs= 32 megs a day. I think you've created a grid.
EDIT: If I were creating a community in which I intended to live, the first considerations would be who and how many. The infrastructure comes after. That sounds too much like,an HOA for my comfort.
Click to expand...
No it would be a trust.
 
HighDesertOffgrid said:
It is unadulterated communism. Everyone surrenders 100% of their production, they get 33% back for their own needs, and 66% goes to (some kind of deciding body) to buy other things and distribute them equitably.
Click to expand...
Yep, belongs in Chit Chat.

BTW, you are correct about one thing in your comment, that being 100%. As in you are 100% ignorant of this particular subject. The One Small Town concept as actually is based on volunteering about 5 hours a week to a community project which no one is obligated to participate in. So unless you are one of the weed-smoking-lazy failures who only works 5 hours a week, no one is giving up 100% of a their productive capacity or being forced to accept anything that someone else dictates. That's kind of what we have now, YES?

I'm not promoting or advocating for anything and have no personal affiliation with Michael Tellinger or the OST group. Was just throwing it out there since many of the Forum participants are decidedly in favor of more self-reliance, healthy communities and less Government overreach. The present broken-down, corrupt, rotten system run by criminals is never going to change unless we are open to alternative ways of organizing ourselves that doesn't include 100% top down dictates from a ruling class.

Quote of the Day:

Dumb people gossip about other people
Average people talk about events and things.
Smart people discuss ideas & concepts.
 
Nobodybusiness said:
No Grid, no POCO. Generate and use your own power.

The subject has come up more than once about a group buying several acres and doing this.
What would be the best way to distribute power ?
Click to expand...
My shaky memory is that this was the initial concept for the Sunny Island. One central location would house the Sunny Island(s) and the battery bank. All of the satellite locations would have a SunnyBoy and PV. As new structures were added to the grid they would be responsible for installing enough PV on their site to produce thier energy thus maintaining the system balance while still benefiting from the community grid.
 
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