my first year of small scale grid tie

cool thing: for the last 2 months our electric bill was only $20, representing about 100kwh's each month for a family of 3, and running a business at home with a computer on roughly 16 hours a day (what me, overwork?!). as you most know alot of the time i can run that computer on DC directly , entirely off the grid so this isnt entrely representative of actual usage as to the home office stuff. anyhow, we could do better but its a good start. sadly about $10 a month isn't even electric usage charges, its "connection fees" or some such..this month marks one year of production reporting ive done on the system for the grant agency i received my rebate from here in MA. since i just grabbed the numbers moments ago so here they are, basically, .76 kw of panels generated 851kwh's for the year. this is mounted rather flat and they were almost useless in winter with snow buildup on them (ive got some ideas for that this year), but that is because they are in a location almost impossible to get to when snowy. also we had excessive amounts of cloudy weather this spring which made a big difference in what should have been some of my best months in early summer.


Production by Month - All Systems
Production Month Energy Produced (kWh) Maintenance Activities Service Costs Hours of Downtime

September 2005 48.33 0 $0.00 0.0
October 2005 48.33 0 $0.00 0.0
November 2005 48.33 0 $0.00 0.0
December 2005 24.00 0 $0.00 0.0
January 2006 18.50 0 $0.00 0.0
February 2006 101.50 0 $0.00 0.0
March 2006 35.00 0 $0.00 0.0
April 2006 104.00 0 $0.00 0.0
May 2006 67.00 0 $0.00 0.0
June 2006 90.00 0 $0.00 0.0
July 2006 90.00 0 $0.00 0.0
August 2006 107.00 0 $0.00 0.0
September 2006 69.00 0 $0.00 0.0

Production per System
Number of Systems: 1 Totals: 0.684 851.0


i am going go through my electric bill just out of curiousity to see what percentage of our usage this covered. i was estimating 1/3rd. ill post that later..
im hoping finances will allow expansion next year. :mrgreen: <-mr green

Comments

  • niel
    niel Solar Expert Posts: 10,300 ✭✭✭✭
    Re: my first year of small scale grid tie

    matt,
    that's great. you just adding another series pv with what you have or another whole new series string? also recheck feb 06 as that's got to be a typo. i guess you noticed i moved it here as it is more appropriate here.
  • System2
    System2 Posts: 6,290 admin
    Re: my first year of small scale grid tie

    Hi Neil

    well theyve explained to me that the pvi1800 can take up to 5 sanyo 190's in series (i have 4), so my plan is yes, another series string of 4 or 5, but they will probably be the higher wattage sanyos as i understand the 190s are made no more. they have a couple in stock i might buy one just to finish off this undone string, but the install costs for one are ridiculous so im saving :)

    apparently that number from feb is right: they all add up, and i just read the number 851 today off the meter. we must have had some cool and sunny days and/or the snow melted. remember how rainy march was (35kwh). i have seen myself how i can get 30kwh in a week if the weather is perfect.
    i had to read the meter and report it to their website over a 1 week spread at the end of each month, so it doesnt represent exact 30 day increments either.

    the first three are the same as i started reporting a little retroactively, so i gave them the 145kwh's generated in the first three (dark) months. The june and july being the same are coincidental.
  • System2
    System2 Posts: 6,290 admin
    Re: my first year of small scale grid tie

    electricity usage from my electric bill

    sept 05: 253 kwh's
    Oct 05: 204 kwh's
    Nov 05: is BLANK ON THE BILL?!
    Dec 05: 262 kwh's
    Jan 06: 761 kwh's (ouch, pellet stove and occasional electric heater :|)
    Feb 06: 359 kwh's
    Mar 06: 309 kwh's
    Apr 06: 20 kwh's (yeah baby, :mrgreen:)
    May 06: 197 kwh's
    Jun 06: 159 kwh's
    July 06: 169 kwh's
    Aug 06: 289 kwh's
    Sept 06: 105 kwh's

    assuming the blank month is accounted for in subsequent bills, 3087 kwh's of carbon based fossil fuel fired electricty used for the year.
    If i did the math right (and i know some of you will check it ;) , thats about 27.5 % covered by solar for the year. NOT BAD since we had a regular, LONG, DARK monsoon season in spring (as you might remember Neil).
  • niel
    niel Solar Expert Posts: 10,300 ✭✭✭✭
    Re: my first year of small scale grid tie

    do i ever remember? you, me, and lots of others all remember. i see it reflected in those months in question you've just listed too. well crap happens, but we lack the ability to burn that kind of crap. :lol: :-)