Measuring KWH on major appliances.
Hi all,
I am planning to build a new house in the not too distant future and am considering the possibility of keeping it off grid.
We are currently "on grid" and all of our major appliances are electric. This includes clothes dryer, hot water heater, cook top and oven. We have a pretty good handle on our usage, and I would like to use our history to help in planning an off grid system.
My question is how do I measure the KWH used by the above mentioned appliances so that I can remove that amount from my daily required KWH? All those appliances would be propane fired in the off-grid build. Home heating is wood, with propane back-up.
Is there a clamp-on amp-meter that can measure KWH over time? Then I could just put it on any of those appliances for a 1 or 2 months at a time and get a pretty accurate idea of how many KWH each one uses, and take that amount off of our current usage, which is in the 24-30 KWH per day range, then I would be left with a number that should be pretty close to what would be required for a system. thanks hh
I am planning to build a new house in the not too distant future and am considering the possibility of keeping it off grid.
We are currently "on grid" and all of our major appliances are electric. This includes clothes dryer, hot water heater, cook top and oven. We have a pretty good handle on our usage, and I would like to use our history to help in planning an off grid system.
My question is how do I measure the KWH used by the above mentioned appliances so that I can remove that amount from my daily required KWH? All those appliances would be propane fired in the off-grid build. Home heating is wood, with propane back-up.
Is there a clamp-on amp-meter that can measure KWH over time? Then I could just put it on any of those appliances for a 1 or 2 months at a time and get a pretty accurate idea of how many KWH each one uses, and take that amount off of our current usage, which is in the 24-30 KWH per day range, then I would be left with a number that should be pretty close to what would be required for a system. thanks hh
510 watt pv, TS-MPPT 60, Exeltech XP1100, XP600 & XP250 @ 24V, 4x Trojan 105RE, Trimetric 2030, Yamaha EF2400i gen.
Comments
http://www.p3international.com/products/p4400.html
Be aware that it will only measure 120v and a max of 15 amps.
You will also need to know the surge amps on each appliance in order to calculate true needs for solar. Enjoy the journey.
5,000 watt array - 14 CS 370 watt modules. HZLA horizontal tracker. Schneider: XW6048NA+, Mini PDP, MPPT 80-600, SCP. 390ah LiFeP04 battery bank - 3 Discover AES 42-48-6650 48 volt 130ah LiFePO4 batteries
I am available for custom hardware/firmware development
- 30,000 WH per day * 1/0.52 typical off system eff * 1/2.5 hours of sun (winter) = 23,077 Watt array nominal
- 30,000 WH per day * 1/0.85 inverter eff * 2 days of storage * 1/0.50 max discharge * 1/48 volt battery = 2,941 AH @ 48 volt battery bank
- 2,941 AH * 59 volts charging * 1/0.80 charger eff * 1/0.80 genset derating * 0.10 rate of charge = 27,112 VA rated genset minimum
That is a quick estimate of what you would be looking at if you want to continue to use 30 kWH per day in winter.For measuring larger electric appliance usage--You can get whole house monitoring systems like this (some models can measure several specific circuit energy consumption at the same time).
http://theenergydetective.com/
-Bill
I don't intend to need anywhere near 30 KWH per day if off grid. I was guessing more like 5ish, but I don't want to guess. I'll check those suggestions, I suppose it will require wiring something into the circuits I wish to check. I am in Thunder Bay Ontario. Thanks guys!!
-Bill
BEWARE the gas heating appliances, often the oven and clothes drier have a "glow coil" ignition system that uses 400W to ignite and 200w to monitor the presence of the flame
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