Solar and energy monitoring research

Re: Solar and energy monitoring research

I think the question was--"is the survey going to give you some useful answers" or it is an academic exercise? I don't think anyone was looking for prizes.

So, it would be interesting to find out a bit more about you and what is your connection with solar power.

-Bill

Re: Solar and energy monitoring research

With my grid tied system... I did not install any whole home monitoring other than the utility meter.

And since I did a lot of conservation before I ever installed my GT system 8+ years ago (insulation of a 1930's uninsulated home), CFL and now LED lighting, upgraded to 98% efficient central (natural gas heating) and just being overall keeping an eye on the big picture), the modest size GT system I installed (along with Time of Use Net Metering which gives me ~$0.30 per kWH for power I generate summer afternoons and charges me ~$0.09 per kWH for off peak power), I have consistently generated more power (really positive cash flow) than I use.

So, have not been monitoring my electrical power use much anymore other than to make sure that the solar power system is running well, and if the bill looks a little strange (using more power than I have historically), look for a bad refrigerator/somebody not properly closing a fridge, etc...

If everything is working correctly (my on grid, or my suggestions to others off grid), you should not be in a daily war of data trying to balance supply against demand. There are other things to do in life.

Our utility (Pacific Gas and Electric, northern California) has installed "smart meters" and setup a website where people can monitor their power usage (Google and others have done similar with remote logging, data bases)--I looked at it a bit, and while interesting, I was not interesting enough for me to bother logging in again after a few times. It does not even list my "tiered usage", so I cannot monitor my load shifting except by looking at the other all 24 hour period. And the costing does not work at all (probably because, I never owe any money and graphing software is not configured to support that information--and/or not configured for time of use billing).

Plus, showing how our power usage went down dramatically after my significant other was traveling for a few weeks was not a big hit. :roll:

In the end, the information can be helpful to the person who "owns" or takes care of the system... And there will probably be one of those in a solar powered home--Because that person cared in the first place to install.

And the data always has missing components. For me, my solar GT output is not logged (except "today's solar output" on the inverter). So I look at my graph and it jumps all over the place because of cloudy vs clear weather--But available sunlight is not a data set for my utility's data.

Another is I have no one big appliance (such as air conditioning), so between refrigerator/freezer and the other misc. electrical equipment around the home (all pretty much picked to be relatively energy efficient), people use what they want because they want to. Because we have time of use power, our "optional loads" like washing clothes and cooking with electricity (toaster oven, vent hood, etc.)--It makes sense for use to shift our power usage some--But for now, because we have excess GT solar power available, we don't really make a big deal out of it.

Using a washer @ 0.25 kWH per load on a summer afternoon with ~3x the $/kWH price vs a ~10 kWH per day average total home load (guessing) running 24x7 (appliances, folks on computers doing home work, etc.)... Just not worth making a big deal out of it.

I used a Kill-a-Watt type meter to measure the loads of various appliances (fridge, freezer, washer/drier, laptop computers mainly) to get an idea of the daily power usage--But after that, not paying attention to the details anymore. Just once a month looking at the bill and seeing that all is working as expected.

And, that is how it should be (I believe). If I am fussing over my daily/hourly power usage--That is not where I want to spend my time.

There are people that do enjoy that. And there are people that have to do that (particularly off grid folks with a a close balance between solar power and loads--and who may have manual backup gensets, etc.). But even then, solar power should be a tool, not something that controls your life.

-Bill