That's awesome, everyone's home, usage, needs - so on and so forth is different. I have a solar array and I'm net metered which makes sense for my family at the time, but the nice thing is I could always go the other route without a lot of trouble. What I'd really like to do is get a separate inverter and a small set of batteries to close the loop and run electricity during the day should the power go out, but I'm a ways away from that. Keep posting some updates!
The weather has slowed progress a lot. I hate mud...and mud over frozen ground is downright dangerous. Some update photos to share: Looking north, 15 panels mounted. Panel mounting details. The structure looking southwest. The structure looking east. The EV I bought to park inside and fuel with sunshine.
The Leaf image got uploaded to FHC, the other 4 are linked to a googleuser account. I get a broken image content on the first 4 as well.
Here are the photos missing from my post above. Looking north, 15 panels mounted. Panel mounting details. The structure looking southwest. The structure looking east.
I haven't been good about posting updates but I have finally gotten the project finished except for the backup batteries. I thought I'd share a few photos. Production has been great. We're making more than we're using and building up a balance for winter use via net metering.
Wow.. that turned out great Semipro How many Kw are you averaging per day? Gonna have to re-read this thread
We're averaging about 36 kWh/day or 1,125/month. A few more photos: the inverter/charger on the left and the breaker boxes on the right. The right panel is the backup panel. I have many more photos if someone wants to see any specific details.
That would definitely cover more than we need per month Looks like you put up 30 panels.. 200W panels? I can't remember, but I don't think NY does net metering, but utilities buy your excess at a very low rate. No reverse line charges of course
We have 30 230 watt panels. Net metering in VA gives you two options: Surplus production builds a balance at 1:1 kWh on a yearly cycle that you can use when PV production is low. Basically, the grid becomes your big, free battery but you can't access the stored power when the grid is down. We went this route and plan to have some onsite storage for backup. Get paid for excess at the generation rate which is quite low compared to the retail rate, like a 1/3 of it. If you size your system just right with the 1st option you accrue only enough kWh to get you through the cloudy days during any yearly cycle. Any excess the power company gets to use elsewhere and we're okay with that.
