Post by Chris HoggOn Wed, 15 Apr 2015 20:37:54 +0100, "harryagain"
Post by harryagainPost by Chris HoggOn Wed, 15 Apr 2015 01:01:30 +0100, "harryagain"
Post by harryagainhttps://www.flickr.com/photos/ara-chloroptera/sets/72157627608971673/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/household-bills/9902805/I-make-4000-a-year-being-energy-efficient.html
Out of interest, how much electricity do you use, kWh gross, per
annum, including heating, lighting, kitchen utilities and car charging
(assuming you had no solar panels)? And how much electricity do your
solar panels generate, kWh, per annum?
I don't know exactly any more.
There are four variables. Sum = zero.
I know how much energy I generate.
I know how much I import.
I don't know how much I export.
I don't know what proportion of what I generate is used on site.
If I knew what three of the variables were, I could work out the fourth.
I know the car has used 3000 x 4.5 Khw/year.
(4.5Kwh takes me about a mile)
The figures refered to in the newspaper were derived from comparing with
previous years consumption.
But things have changed radically since then.
The 3.87Kwp panels on the roof generate about 4000Kwh year. (Four years old)
= £2000 ATM Tax free = £2400, inflation linked. (Will it go down if we have
deflation?)
The new panels on the ground (4Kwp) generate about 8% less ISTM though they
are slighly bigger and newer.
Same orientation but "see" less sky is my theory.
Maybe I couched my questions too narrowly. I was trying to get a feel
for roughly how self-sufficient you were in electricity. You said to
Dennis that you generate more than twice the energy you use. If you
have two sets of solar panels, each generating ~4000 kWh per year,
then you use ~4000 kWh and you export ~4000 kWh, approximately. As
your property is very well insulated, presumably much of that is for
your car.
I generate around 8000Kwh per year.
Absolute max/day would be 60Kwh.
But obviously much less in Winter and none at night.
So I export by day and import by night and on heavily overcast days.
Total yearly income (FIT) is about £2500 (tax free , inflation linked)
Plus savings on electricty imported, no gas system to install or maintain.
Plus no petrol or road tax.
About 2/3 of power for car comes from PV panels.
Post by Chris HoggThe wider thought was how your system would impact the national power
supply if it was widely adopted across the UK. Not that I think that
would happen any time soon: too many dwellings couldn't be modified
the way you have done yours, either with masses of insulation or solar
villages or housing estates having their own centralised wind and
solar generators. But that wouldn't solve the house insulation
problem, and community schemes are simply another name for the wind
and solar farms that we already have. It makes no difference whether
wind generators and solar panels are dispersed, with every house
having them, or are concentrated onto 'farms', the problems for the
grid are the same. Increasing their number simply increases the scale
of those problems, and the arguments go around.
Nor would a smart grid be the answer. It sounds appealing,
superficially, (got the 'smart' word in it!) but you can't get
electricity out of thin (stationary) air! You need back-up generators.
We need as many different source of renewable energy as possible.
And I think we will always need some gas unless there is a breakthrough in
energy storage.
Dispersed energy sources reduce transmission losses.
Most of all we need enrgy efficiency.
I always buy the most efficient electric appliances possible. Still some way
to go.
All new houses should be built to passive house standards.
The immediate problem will shortly be the uncontrolled connection of PV
panels, at some point this will need tobe controlled (by smart meters?) My
own panels drive the local voltage up by around 10 volts. (Local transformer
is small).
The point at the moment is reducing dependence on imported fossil fuels.
We are moving from an era of expensive power stations and cheap fossil fuel
to one on expensive power stations and expensive fossil fuel.
Renewable fuel is free and can't be cut off by nasty foreigners.
And there is the pollution aspect.
And AGW.
But it will all take decades to implement.
However it is the final solution, the energy is cost free, pollution free,
secure and endless.
For me personally I have few fuel bill worries and a good income.
There are idle and dopey toerags here that are envious. (Probably
socialists.)
But their are lifes failures everywhere.