Comments on: What’s the Best Solar Technology for Your Home, Community, Business or Farm?

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 15:38:00 +0000

You’d want to check the zoning/permitting issues. You may not be able to install close to the lake due to some regulation. I recall someone having problems getting permission to mount panels over his dock. Don’t recall the details.

150′ from panels to house is a long way. Shipping 12/24/48 volt electricity would take some large (expensive) wire to avoid too much resistance loss. You’d probably want to either put in a higher voltage DC system or put your inverter near the panels and run 120 vac (better 240 vac) to the house.

Assuming the water is south (south-ish) of your panels, that could be a good thing. You’d have extra sunlight reflected off the water, increasing your output.

By: Wink

Wink — Thu, 26 Sep 2013 15:10:00 +0000

Question: We on a lake (30 feet above water level) w/ lots of shade. Southern exposure (150 feet from house) calculates 95% access to the sun. Can photovoltaic panels be mounted on private property butting up to water?

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 19:11:00 +0000

Almost no petroleum is used to generate electricity in the US. Some countries/places, especially islands, rely on diesel generators for a good portion of their electricity.

In the US diesel is used in Hawaii and remote villages. And some for emergency backup.

By: opalstey

opalstey — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 17:18:00 +0000

if you sell solar power to the grid do they still use petroleum to distribute electricity to their customers

By: ahmed said

ahmed said — Sat, 08 Dec 2012 09:38:00 +0000

thanks

By: Bob_Wallace

Bob_Wallace — Sun, 16 Sep 2012 03:29:00 +0000

Depends.

Most people are going to be ‘on the grid’. Any extra power they generate when the Sun is shining gets fed into the common electrical grid and used by someone else.

Then when the Sun is not shining they pull electricity from the grid just like others. Generally solar owners get credit for the electricity they send to the grid and use the credit for power they use at other times. People size their systems so that they produce during the sunny hours as much as they use on a 24/365 basis.

This works great for everyone (except coal and nuclear plant owners). When the Sun is shining is generally when demand for electricity is the highest (lots of AirCon) and solar feeding in from rooftops reduces the need for the utility to purchase expensive “peak” power. Then utilities get to pay back with cheap “off-peak” power.

Other people (like me) are “off the grid”. We run our personal free-standing power companies, storing extra power in batteries for the dark hours and generally resorting to a generator if there are a number of cloudy days in a row.

Off the grid is more expensive. Batteries are sort of pricey and have to be replaced every few years, but if you live some distance from the nearest power line it can be cheaper to set up your own system.

Depending on the amount of cloud cover you do get some power from solar panels. I’ve seen people claim 30%, but I find that hard to believe. Perhaps with a very thin cloud cover, but my panels give me very little power in heavy cloud conditions.

By: omar

omar — Sun, 16 Sep 2012 03:08:00 +0000

i want to ask a question, what happened if its raining or its cloudy, does the solar system save energy for that time?

By: Dave Roberts

Dave Roberts — Sat, 10 Mar 2012 20:06:00 +0000

Hey Stan, Not instead of, but additional advantages of CPV, and the related smaller required footprint, is portability. Consider a residential system on wheels on the ground that can be moved — to your next home. Or consider military or disaster applications where urgent trucking or helicopter transit of pre-assembled CPV units is called for. The mind boggles

By: Dave Roberts

Dave Roberts — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 02:35:00 +0000

Many U.S. solar manufacturers, especially German Solar Power (w/plant in Oregon), are upset over Chinese PV panel pricing. Are protective tarrifs called for or is it, in the end, good for the market, despite the increasing number of bankruptcies?

By: Stan

Stan — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 12:13:00 +0000

I LOVE the CPS! Most any geo area qualified land owner can put up a tower and make a 1MW generation system.
But remember, we don’t poduce at night, so 1/2MW…..so take 500 homes for example, and if you’re doing $.18 per KWH to the grid…deduct the tax incentives from your capitalization/ ammortization….and ya got something.But, unlike PVs, these are mirrors…..put a dusting of…well…dust on a mirror, and use it to reflect sunlight…not too bright, huh? Use your hand held if you want an actual rating. So, there is going to be a labor expense to clean the panels withing a time period, AND, if weather conditions are facilitating dust…..at the time of need…..but 100 panels can be cleaned by one person in one day. Let’s call it an expense of about 10 to 20 homes per month in revenue (about $4000)
Also, the CPV’s main advantage, is on homes with too small of a usuable area to allow for enough standard panels. So, if they’re twice the price….who cares?

By: Solarpanels

Solarpanels — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 06:53:00 +0000

I found hybrid solar panels are best working solar panels for office. It also works well for home. Thanks

By: Zachary Shahan

Zachary Shahan — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 22:28:00 +0000

Thanks. Good to know.

By: Mlandersmd

Mlandersmd — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 15:14:00 +0000

CPV systems do not require less land, despite their higher efficiency. The need to avoid inter-array shadowing requires the spacing of CPV arrays farther apart than the PV elements of a fixed-tilt or single-axis tracking PV system. On the other hand, pole-mounted CPV arrays leave 99% of the site ground accessible/usable to a height of 3 feet. This allows native flora and fauna to thrive on CPV sites in a way that can’t happen on fixed-tilt or SAT PV sites.