feedback: this forum has convinced me not to build a solar system.

[thomBangor]

Hi, just wanted to leave some feedback here. You have all provided some great advice and wisdom and I appreciate it.

I have been watching solar for 20 years wondering when is the right time to go.

I believed that now the high price of electricity ($0.30/kwh), low price of panels, reasonable price of batteries, and advancements in inverter/battery electronics and all-weather capability had finally hit the sweet spot.

This forum has convinced me that is not the case.

In my area it seems my options are
1. To execute some sort of agreement with the power company, which would be cost prohibitive and take years in my area.
2. To extend my purchase budget way way up and purchase ~triple the panels and battery capacity that I need, in order that I could safely go completely off-grid without worrying about running short on power.

Neither of these options yield a return on investment that would make solar worthwhile, and that is greatly disappointing to me.

 

[SparkyJJO]

Why not run part of your stuff off grid, so you don't run afoul of any rules with the Poco, with gris input as backup when the solar and battery run dry? That's what I plan to do next property we get. Solar here alone in the winter is extremely hard and cost prohibitive, but muxh more easily attainable for 9-10 months of the year.

 

[Sergio95050]

which would be cost prohibitive and take years in my area.

Well, in my area it wasn't prohibitive [around 5000 euros] and ROI was 5-7 years for 5MWh/y , what is already behind working period. "Making money" for last couple years

 

[thomBangor]

Why not run part of your stuff off grid, so you don't run afoul of any rules with the Poco, with gris input as backup when the solar and battery run dry? That's what I plan to do next property we get. Solar here alone in the winter is extremely hard and cost prohibitive, but muxh more easily attainable for 9-10 months of the year.

What device would I need to get that would switch to the grid when solar/batt run dry?

 

[Sergio95050]

A charger

 

[SparkyJJO]

What device would I need to get that would switch to the grid when solar/batt run dry?

Most off grid inverters can do that when set to the right mode. Commonly called SBU (solar, battery, utility). It isn't synced up to the grid, so it can't backfeed. It utilizes an ATS internal to the inverter to switch over to grid power when the other two are unavailable.

Alternatively, you can set up dual conversion with something likena Chargeverter to grid charge your batteries while your inverter pulls to power loads, and grid never directly touches your inverter. Set it low enough so that the batteries don't go below, say, 20%, but it won't pull from it normally.

 

[thomBangor]

Most off grid inverters can do that when set to the right mode. Commonly called SBU (solar, battery, utility). It isn't synced up to the grid, so it can't backfeed. It utilizes an ATS internal to the inverter to switch over to grid power when the other two are unavailable.

Thanks. Since is the beginner/newbe forum I will write out the acronym for other beginners-- ATS -> Auto Transfer Switch

 

[1201]

If you are paying .30 and can't make a diy system make financial sense ,you are doing something quite wrong.

 

[Sergio95050]

Thanks. Since is the beginner/newbe forum I will write out the acronym for other beginners-- ATS -> Auto Transfer Switch

Would be is the same device as "Microgrid Interconnection Device (MID)" ?

 

[BarracudaBob]

Make your self a bad ass portable system, then put a few solar panels & MPPT on it, start running refrigerators and other OFF GRID devices. Watch your power bill drop and it start to pay for itself. Open a Fermented Barley Pop (FBP) and rejoice in all you had made, and he saw that it was very good!

 

[Hedges]

It is important to do the financial analysis.
If we saved you from making a less worthwhile investment, that is good.

If your consumption is high and net metering is available, PV should give rapid payback (7 years turnkey, 2 years DIY).
If utility has been successful in defending their turf, it may not be.

Do you get power failures? PV & UPS can improve reliability for critical loads.

There may be a way to handle some of your loads and save money with PV. That can be more difficult for high starting current loads. But worth evaluating, if your bill runs $hundreds/month.

 

[Mattb4]

...

Neither of these options yield a return on investment that would make solar worthwhile, and that is greatly disappointing to me.

It is darn difficult to get a ROI from solar without selling to the grid or having really high grid costs. The thing is solar can provide something that is not tangible in terms of investment. A backup power supply. Also for those that have no grid availability it can provide power.

But if what you want is to make money from solar then the best way is to sell solar products or services.

 

[ThaiTaffy]

It is darn difficult to get a ROI from solar without selling to the grid or having really high grid costs. The thing is solar can provide something that is not tangible in terms of investment. A backup power supply. Also for those that have no grid availability it can provide power.

But if what you want is to make money from solar then the best way is to sell solar products or services.

Think it's relative to your location here in Thailand we pay 13¢ per kWh but panels/inverters are almost half the price compared to the US, batteries are what seems to be a steady price no matter what continent you live so a DIY install is likely 7 year ROI for off-grid haven't had chance to do the maths for grid tied but the other way to look at it is our power isn't stable. A small rain shower can cause a prolonged blackout not to mention some drunk folding a 33kvpole in half that's a good 8 +hours and surprisingly a regular occurrence.

 

[Mattb4]

Think it's relative to your location here in Thailand we pay 13¢ per kWh but panels/inverters are almost half the price compared to the US, batteries are what seems to be a steady price no matter what continent you live so a DIY install is likely 7 year ROI for off-grid haven't had chance to do the maths for grid tied but the other way to look at it is our power isn't stable. A small rain shower can cause a prolonged blackout not to mention some drunk folding a 33kvpole in half that's a good 8 +hours and surprisingly a regular occurrence.

Not knowing your prices I could not speak to them. I have found that that I have to include all the costs of a PV installation such as mounts, wires, breakers, panels, fuses and bandages (I tend to put blood sweat and tears into my work) before a real ROI can be calculated. For me it would really be impossible to get a ROI if I had to pay someone to do it all and jump through permit hoops and costs.

But for backup purposes when grid down it only takes a few times and I feel that I am getting my monies worth. Well that and it is a interesting retirement hobby for me. Cheaper than Yachting or chasing women.

 

[Brucey]

But for backup purposes when grid down it only takes a few times and I feel that I am getting my monies worth. Well that and it is a interesting retirement hobby for me. Cheaper than Yachting or chasing women

When little Rocket man takes out the grid the babes will be chasing you.

 

[ThaiTaffy]

Not knowing your prices I could not speak to them. I have found that that I have to include all the costs of a PV installation such as mounts, wires, breakers, panels, fuses and bandages (I tend to put blood sweat and tears into my work) before a real ROI can be calculated. For me it would really be impossible to get a ROI if I had to pay someone to do it all and jump through permit hoops and costs.

But for backup purposes when grid down it only takes a few times and I feel that I am getting my monies worth. Well that and it is a interesting retirement hobby for me. Cheaper than Yachting or chasing women.

It's about $3000 for 5kw and all the bells and whistles but as I said that doesn't include batteries, also bandages aren't that cheap here, where as super glue is a few ¢ so I tend to use that for anything that doesn't needs more than 3 stitches.

The backup is the important thing for us we have a smart home(pita before I installed my first small solar system as a UPS)and most of the farm needs it for irrigation in the dry months not to mention the food we store. we have 11 malinois crosses so they consume large amounts of meat which we prefer to buy fresh and freeze every few months.

Thailand is now pushing EV in a big way which the grid has no chance in handling so I forsee big issues in the future so solar no matter the cost seems to be a no brainer.

 

[Q-Dog]

Our system is not grid tied.

My wife says our system pays for itself every time there is a power outage. So far this year we had 2 major outages lasting about 36 hours each, and hurricane season is just getting started.

The cherry on top is lowering our power bills by about $30 per month by running air conditioning whenever we have surplus power. And now we are adding more PV panels.

 

[ThaiTaffy]

Our system is not grid tied.

My wife says our system pays for itself every time there is a power outage. So far this year we had 2 major outages lasting about 36 hours each, and hurricane season is just getting started.

The cherry on top is lowering our power bills by about $30 per month by running air conditioning whenever we have surplus power. And now we are adding more PV panels.

Anything with a wife's stamp of approval is worth it's weight in gold, screw the ROI.

 

[TomC4306]

It is darn difficult to get a ROI from solar without selling to the grid or having really high grid costs. The thing is solar can provide something that is not tangible in terms of investment. A backup power supply. Also for those that have no grid availability it can provide power.

But if what you want is to make money from solar then the best way is to sell solar products or services.

Once my current configuration overcame the 13-month rolling average my power company employees to determine average payment, my power bill went down by $125 a month.
After tax credit I spent a little less than 5K.
About three and a half to 4 years break even. Then it's all R.

 

[mciholas]

I believed that now the high price of electricity ($0.30/kwh), low price of panels, reasonable price of batteries, and advancements in inverter/battery electronics and all-weather capability had finally hit the sweet spot.

This forum has convinced me that is not the case.

Since you provide no specifics, it is hard to help you.

In my area it seems my options are
1. To execute some sort of agreement with the power company, which would be cost prohibitive and take years in my area.

Is this the metering program you can get?

Connecting Renewable Resources - Versant Power

Find information about net energy billing and interconnection here.

www.versantpower.com

At first glance, this looks like 100% net metering with credit roll over for 12 months. If true, then this is about as generous a program as you can get and you should be able to make this work financially. You build an array sized to cover about 100% of your yearly needs and that will zero out your utility bill. In the winter, you will make less than you use, in the summer more, but the 12 month credit roll over will even that out. All you need is an array and a grid tie inverter. Hard to see how this doesn't work out financially.

2. To extend my purchase budget way way up and purchase ~triple the panels and battery capacity that I need, in order that I could safely go completely off-grid without worrying about running short on power.

There is an in-between option, a system that is grid tied with a battery.

Neither of these options yield a return on investment that would make solar worthwhile, and that is greatly disappointing to me.

Something feels wrong in your assumptions or your expectations.

Mike C.

 

[Mattb4]

Once my current configuration overcame the 13-month rolling average my power company employees to determine average payment, my power bill went down by $125 a month.
After tax credit I spent a little less than 5K.
About three and a half to 4 years break even. Then it's all R.

Big Tax credits for those that can take advantage of them will also add into the equation. I forget that there are subsidies to those with tax burdens. Just like some folks have much more lucrative grid tie agreements than others.

 

[SolarFlares]

You have to prioritize your goals and what you want out of the system. Only grid tied and looking for quickest ROI didn't make sense for me. I wanted to have easy backup power during grid outages, to get some experience with solar to see how feasible it would be to go completely off grid, and finally to hedge somewhat against increased grid prices.

When I purchased the system, my grid price per kWh was $.09. 1 year later it was at $.17 and I had multiple 24 hour+ grid outages in a 3 month span that I never had an issue with. Grid prices will never get lower, its just a matter of how quickly they will go up. If your power company is as restrictive and complicated connecting to the grid as you say, you should probably start looking into going completely off grid sooner rather than later. In 5 years you'll be wishing you did.

 

[Zwy]

Grid tie is dying slowly, the power companies don't really want it and even though a state might have a law stating the utility has to allow grid tie, doesn't mean the utility can't set their own rules. The only reason grid tie hasn't died completely is net metering is many times mandated by a state utility board or legislature. However, the utilities are lobbying heavily to change the rules, especially investor owned utilities like Mid American (Berkshire has controlling interest).

Build your own micro grid to power daily loads and provide backup power is the answer. I looked thru your past posts and you had been involved in threads with grid tie and interconnection agreements. This is not the future. I recognized this early on and why I decided to not pursue grid tie and interconnection.

At $0.30/Kwh, it would be a no contest on whether to install a solar system or to remain on grid unless you are planning on moving in a few years or don't expect to live long enough to realize a decent payback. In my case, I'm in my late 50's and wanted energy security/comfort when I semi or fully retire. I had the money upfront, no need to borrow funds and money market was paying less than 2% interest so a solar system made sense as a place to put some of my funds.

I want to be energy independent as much as possible. I would not count on utility rates to remain at current levels in the future, the data centers and AI will consume huge amounts of power and you, the little guy, will be subsidizing the cost of the infrastructure needed to supply the large consumers of power.

 

[ThaiTaffy]

Grid tie is dying slowly, the power companies don't really want it and even though a state might have a law stating the utility has to allow grid tie, doesn't mean the utility can't set their own rules. The only reason grid tie hasn't died completely is net metering is many times mandated by a state utility board or legislature. However, the utilities are lobbying heavily to change the rules, especially investor owned utilities like Mid American (Berkshire has controlling interest).

Build your own micro grid to power daily loads and provide backup power is the answer. I looked thru your past posts and you had been involved in threads with grid tie and interconnection agreements. This is not the future. I recognized this early on and why I decided to not pursue grid tie and interconnection.

At $0.30/Kwh, it would be a no contest on whether to install a solar system or to remain on grid unless you are planning on moving in a few years or don't expect to live long enough to realize a decent payback. In my case, I'm in my late 50's and wanted energy security/comfort when I semi or fully retire. I had the money upfront, no need to borrow funds and money market was paying less than 2% interest so a solar system made sense as a place to put some of my funds.

I want to be energy independent as much as possible. I would not count on utility rates to remain at current levels in the future, the data centers and AI will consume huge amounts of power and you, the little guy, will be subsidizing the cost of the infrastructure needed to supply the large consumers of power.

Personally I think something weird is going on in Asia, the Chinese seem to be flat out trying to produce electricity and pushing EV`s on all their neighbours with badly inadequate power infrastructure.

Maybe they've looked at Tesla's business model and come up with the idea that they can sell massive amounts of extremely discounted EVs to their neighbours in the hope that they will have to buy electricity in the future from them at hugely marked up prices.

Between Ev`s, AI, Cloud storage and our vast reliance on technology the world over the quicker we can become energy independent as individuals the better.

 

[bestconcreteblock]

At first glance, this looks like 100% net metering with credit roll over for 12 months. If true, then this is about as generous a program as you can get and you should be able to make this work financially. You build an array sized to cover about 100% of your yearly needs and that will zero out your utility bill. In the winter, you will make less than you use, in the summer more, but the 12 month credit roll over will even that out. All you need is an array and a grid tie inverter. Hard to see how this doesn't work out financially.

Exactly. This is how it works with Central Maine Power as well. I found CMP moved pretty quickly with the paperwork for me. The hardest part for me is getting the required inspection for final interconnect. This final step is still in progress, but shows signs of possible success.