Based off your experience, would you say it would be possible to have such a system in a colder climates where it's rainy and cloudy often?
Yes.
You need to find your lowest amount of sun hours per day. And buy enough solar panels based on that. Even if you get 1 hour per day, you can do it. You'll just need enough panels to extract. For example:
If you consume 5KWH per day and you get 1 hour of sun per day, you will need 5KW of panels in order to charge your batteries. If you get 2 hours of sun per day, then you'll only need 2.5KW of panels.
Of course, you'll need to plan some margin in there in case you don't get the same amount of sun every day. But I think you know where I'm going.
You can gang up multiple arrays using multiple chargers.
So I worked from the inverter to the batteries to the panels to determine what I needed.
Consider your house wiring. I used a 6KW inverter because I back feed the inverter to my panel on a branch circuit. My wiring and branch circuit can handle 30 amps @ 220 volts. So a 6KW inverter is as big as I can go without making major changes to my panel.
The batteries depend on how many KWH you need. By the way, I went with 48 volt batteries to keep my wiring costs lower.
Good luck.
Thanks for the info and taking your time to write that. Now I have a lot better idea of what to do.
If I was interested in having some solar installed, is there a reputable company to go through. I have 0 DIY skills and would die or make a huge mess attempting anything like this, but I also don't want to get screwed by some shady solar shlomo.
Also, any gubmint gibs-me-dats to help with the cost?
Ah. This is where you're going to have problems. I tried that route. I researched for all my equipment, bought it, then looked for someone to help me install it. It didn't occur to me this would be a problem, it was.
Every solar installer I contacted had no interest installing an off grid system. Every one of them only installed grid tied systems and you had to use their equipment.
I hadn't considered that. Shocker! It turns out, not only do installers make money selling you their gear, but also, they get a cut of the reoccurring revenue when you sell your power back to the utility. They simply are not interested in the risk of using some unknown gear (to them) or learning something new and going through the install process to lose money fumbling through the setup.
Nope. No body would touch it. I realized this had to be a do it yourself project. I had an extremely hard time finding an electrician willing to even look at my wiring to make sure I didn't fuck it up. I did manage to pull that off though. It turns out I wired a load switch backwards.
Then I looked for a roofer to help me with mounting my panels. The second they heard the word solar or panels or rails, they hung up on me. No one is interested.
Sorry, but this is what happened to me. Just to be sure, I called people in 4 different states. I must have tried over 30 contractors.
How's the longevity of your panels?
20 years plus or minus.
depends on the clouds
cloudy sky basically reduces everything to nothing
also, there is a sixfold DECREASE of solar energy between winter and summer .... (in most part of the world, beside equator)
so, if you have batteries (yes, 20kwh is a proper sizing for a house) also get a generator,
being grid connected is less "complicated" but a bit more expensive
also, there is a sixfold DECREASE of solar energy between winter and summer .... (in most part of the world, beside equator)
This would be a huge factor as the area where the property is gets proper frigid during winter, so thanks for the heads up.
Quite a few of the "weather forecast sites" have an indication of the daily theoretical production for a reference solar installation
what you should look (if it is available) is the historical data and differences in the various months of the year, for your location
in any case, if you are off grid, you got to have a generator
if only to handle possible faults of the "panels/inverter/batteries"
get one of the smart ones that reduce "speed/power" i there is little load
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