Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Solar panels on home?

and those aren't ugly?

Probably why his landscaping and trees are placed where they are, a foliage obstruction that hides the panel's, just let the neighbors look at them.

Personally I'd rather look at those than a electric bill every month.

Can you recharge your batteries with a gas generator? Seems like a nice option in a grid-down storm situation.

Let's say the solar system costs $20k. Compare conservatively investing that with an annual 4% return ammortized over 20 years and you have $43,800. So if you save more than $2180 per year, it'll jut pay for itself in 20 years if you don't have to make any upgrades or repairs.

I agree with you. I can't stand the way they look on the roof of most houses. Our house has a near ideal design for them where they would be on the roof of two garages in a back drive area so they wouldn't be seen from the street, but I don't like the idea of being financially on the hook to remove and replace for a damaged roof by hail or other means.

Then it dawned on me. I want to build a very large patio cover to shade an area between our pool and one garage. It would be ideal for a "solar" roof. Nobody would see it and it would provide double duty. Looking into it now. The roof would be about 25' x 35' which would be about 55 or so solar panels.

Florida is a good place to be FROM.
In not too many years, hip waders will become mandatory.
Then its between you & the Burmese pythons

I got a quote for a single 400+lb. TESLA batt. $5,000 to install. $1,000 ship/handling. GRAND Total...$17K.

One of the guys on my crew had them installed when the govt was paying big to help with cost and he has almost no electricity bill. He believes his will pay off. He works 14 and 14 and is single. He sells power back when at work and uses a little from the grid when he is home.

I'm in Kalifornia. I had solar panels and an SMA battery backup system installed in October of 2019. Valley Solar did the installation. First, their salesman and I accessed the PG&E website to determine my usage and then they had their engineer design a system to meet my needs.
In summer when using the AC in my house, we would get bills up to $300 a month. After I had the system installed, I have yet to receive a bill, except for the connection fee. When my significant other lived with me, I was told I'd pay for the system in 11 yrs. She is gone now, so I'm finding I generate 35-40% more power than I use. That's OK. Maybe I'll have another lady in my life someday.
Total cost for the whole system was $25,000. I have had perhaps a dozen power outages, and I've always had power to the house. No, I have no AC or 220 circuits, but I do have heat, my refrigerator, lights, wall plugs, and ceiling fans. I am delighted with the set up. I have friends that pay $600 per month with the current power rates. All I pay in the $10 connection fee.

I'm fairly sure that modern hybrid inverters are configurable to be able to recharge the batteries from both line and solar sources. Realistically, you could run a grid-tied inverter, and your gas powered generator would take the place of line power - enabling your solar panels to provide power to the home. That's my plan for the short term, as I'm not wanting to swap out inverters and buy batteries quite yet.





The quote from PG&E to hang a transformer and run cable 75' to a 100A Ag panel last year, was $16K. I'd be responsible for the power pole and panel installation. So, even though the power lines are right at the property boundary, I'll never put it on the grid at that price. A small off-grid system with enough split phase to run the water needs on that particular property would be significantly less expensive, and likely more reliable than PG&E. Currently (ha!) just using a 7500w gasoline powered inverter with zero issues.

A friend looked onto them.

1, Expensive. 15 years to pencil out. Optimally!
2, their production falls off with time. Replacement closely aligns with break even.
3, This isn't a sunny place. Overcast is the norm.
4, If you tie into the grid, they are required to automatically shut down if the
power goes out, to prevent feed back.
So, if the power goes out, it's not night, it's sunny, they still can't be a backup.
(Power outages here never happen when it is sunny)



If you want to be Green, or think you are Green, they will make you feel fuzzy inside.
If you want to save money or have backup, they ain't it. At least here.

Grid-tied inverters are the most commonly installed, and as you state, require line power in order for the energy created by the panels to be used. Hybrid inverters will automatically disconnect from the grid when line power is cut, but still allow solar power to be used in the home.

So, since you're in a place that isn't sunny, your solar energy production is low. Which means that the break even time is long, which means that panels will degrade to the point of needing to be replaced just as break even occurs. So, your point three is actually the most important point. Now do the evaluation for a moderate climate with lots of sun, stupid expensive energy costs provided by a flaky grid. Completely different scenario, no?

Solar is not for everyone. But that doesn't mean that it's useful for no one.

I read a comment by some brain-dead greenie weenie that he was installing solar panels so he could charge his electric car - over night.

My son’s place is in a north FL swamp. No line power was available, so he went solar. 12KW system with battery back up. A shed full of converter and controllers. The system has run their tiny house, deep well and out buildings for 7 years now with no issues.

Easily offended when some critiques your pet?

Made it pretty clear all of that applied to this area. Would fit alot of territory.

Also insinuated it would not apply everywhere.
Figured anyone reading would easily figure out how it fit them.


So, do you make, sell or install solar?
Or just have a system?

My property in Arizona is 7+ miles from the grid.I was quoted something like $15 or $20 per ft to get power to my place 15 years ago.
Ya
I will not pay that with the modern stuff on the market these days.

Did he live in Alaska for 6 months out of the year it may work if things do not freeze up because of the cold.

Just askin.

I certainly wasn't personally offended by your first post, but did want to make sure that thread readers know your situation is just that, YOUR situation. Which is not nearly as universal as you think it is. Nor is solar as universally worthwhile as a bunch of fanbois think it is.

Solar is not my pet, it's can be a handy tool in the tool chest of living rural. I use it to power electric fencing 24/7 for instance. A lot of rural folks use solar in lieu of grid power, because it can be financially advantageous as well as being flexible. Note I used "can", as not all locations are equal. Note funshooter's and Mannlicher's posts.

I'm in complete disagreement with "Made it pretty clear all of that applied to this area" and "Figured anyone reading would easily figure out how it fit them." As I pointed out, you completely buried the lead. The fact that you have low peak sunlight hours in your location is the key. Were I you , or someone in your location, I'd have to think long and hard about solar as well, mostly depending on your grid reliability.

I guess you made your "insinuation" with the three word afterthought at the end of the post? I honestly didn't see it, what with being concerned with the location specific truths in your points 1 and 2, and your partial truth in your point 4. Shame on me for not catching that.

I do not make or install solar as a profession. I do have a solar system that came with my house. I figured it was worth about $5k when it came to making my purchase offer on this place last October. At that figure, break even time is likely less than 18 months. I don't even have a pre-solar energy bill to compare, but this place is 100% electric. If you'd have attentively read the whole thread, you would know that I owned a system. My solar system is purely grid-tied and suffers from what you stated - it goes offline if the grid is down. The grid-tie issue will be addressed in the near future.

Now, back at you - what was it about my critique of your post that you went ad hominem? Or am I incorrectly interpreting "Easily offended when someone critiques your pet"? Because that appears to be an attack on me, and not the facts of my post.

Short version. They have a 20 year lifespan if everything goes right and it takes 20 years to pay them off. In terms of an investment, that is called a turd!

Scott,
Maybe it's the heat?

Seems like we are in agreement, in different locales.

Don't doubt places with 300 days of sunshine and 0 haze can yield better results.