Solar Generators

[kiver]

With all that is going on with the talk of energy shortages. I started to look at solar generators. I am most fearful of a winter shortage of fuel. My current house is too damn big and poorly insulated due to its age. I have steam heat is heated with natural gas fed in. This has been very costly, so we added a pellet stove about 10 years ago to help offset the cost. We found out one year I was able to heat the entire home for the year on just the pellet stove with 4 tons of pellets. It wasn't toasty but it did the job. I am currently getting the 4 tons of pellets for the year. I do not plan on heating the entire home again, but would like a plan should the NG stop flowing. I have a gas generator and keep 20 gallons in jerry cans that I rotate. I also have several vehicles should I need to siphon them. With all this the gas will run out, so I may need an option. I have been looking at the Jackery solar generators and felt this may serve the purpose. I could also use it with my rv and other purposes. Does anyone have any experience with this unit or ones similar and would this be a good option? Keeping the deep freezer running would be nice, but I do have shelf stable foods stocked. Thank you

 

[walter62]

how many sq ft of panels does it require?

What are you going to do on cloudy days?

 

[kiver]

I read a lot of van-life stuff and that’s a popular unit for those folks.

That said you can build a much better and far more capable system if you are handy and a bit curious.

i can post some links to parts if you are interested in the DIY thing.

Please post the links. I am definitely curious

 

[Kevin_NH]

With all that is going on with the talk of energy shortages. I started to look at solar generators.

Ugh, I hate the marketing phrase "solar generator"

I am most fearful of a winter shortage of fuel. My current house is too damn big and poorly insulated due to its age. I have steam heat is heated with natural gas fed in. This has been very costly, so we added a pellet stove about 10 years ago to help offset the cost. We found out one year I was able to heat the entire home for the year on just the pellet stove with 4 tons of pellets. It wasn't toasty but it did the job. I am currently getting the 4 tons of pellets for the year. I do not plan on heating the entire home again, but would like a plan should the NG stop flowing.

Short of a massive ground-based array of sun-following panels and a geothermal heat pump (with associated five to six-figure initial investment),, your best bet to get heat into a house with "solar" is to go to direct solar heat collection, skipping the inefficient photovoltaic step.

Have you gotten a home energy audit on your "big and poorly insulated" house?

 

[safetyfirst2125]

Natures Generator Elite for home essentials backup use. Uses lead acid batteries for less care and feeding and workhorse usage. Not recommended for common mobile usage due to weight but it is on wheels.

Supports up to 900kW (9) solar panels.

Each of 2 batteries is 100Ah (1200Wh) with the extra pod.

Nature's Generator Elite

Nature's Generator Elite Popular Uses The Nature's Generator Elite is the newest member of the Nature's Generator line of products and accessories. We built off of heritage of the current Nature's Generator to provide an increase of output wattage and battery run time. The Nature's Generator...

naturesgenerator.com

 

[Chevy 2 65]

I am interested in this....

Powering your home, your business, your world.

website

www.generac.com

If I do something it will be along these lines.

And to accommodate the draw from electric heat/baseboards you can add more batteries.

For you you could use the electric heat powered by the sun transferred through the batteries to compliment your pellet stove.

An idea on cost?

 

[SlaveZero]

A thought occurred to me... if we lose power in winter... do we still need to run our freezers? Couldn't we just stick our freezer items in a cooler and stick the cooler in a snow bank?

 

[kiver]

A thought occurred to me... if we lose power in winter... do we still need to run our freezers? Couldn't we just stick our freezer items in a cooler and stick the cooler in a snow bank?

Or make ice outside to bring in. That is how they used to do it

 

[peterk123]

Or make ice outside to bring in. That is how they used to do it

A pond and a chainsaw. We did this year's ago when we had no power for a week in the winter.

 

[MisterHappy]

Or make ice outside to bring in. That is how they used to do it

But, the ice will melt, so make sure you have a drain. The house I grew up in, had pipes for the iceboxes' drains.

As for heating the big, poorly insulated house, the first step I'd take is to do what they did in the old days - have doors to close off all the rooms that don't NEED heating. If you look at a house from before central heating was the norm (or from shortly after), all the rooms can be closed off. Depending upon the layout, and location of the pellet stove, this might be a good way of getting more bang for the buck of pellets.

I have a family room that was added to my mid-century multi-level house. We have no central air, so we run an AC in the family room and the bedrooms. A drape makes a HUGE difference in keeping the room we're in nice, while the other parts are not in active use. The woodstove is in the family room, too. Same deal.

 

[xtry51]

If you want to heat, solar vacuum tubes are legit. Our grandparents have two arrays and mostly heat with solar heated water. The efficiency in the winter is impressive. They are in CT.

 

[peterk123]

Keep us posted if you move forward with this. I did a bunch of research on solar last year. I couldn't get past the cost of the battery storage. I think to do it right you need something like the Tesla batteries. Not cheap.

You do make an interesting comment about the size of your home and it being old. My recent move to Montana placed us into a 1400 sq ft home. 2x6 construction, built in 1996. Out average utility bill including gas, water, electric, water and sewer is around $140 per month. It's not that the house is super efficient. It is the lack of size that makes it so much less than our home in Mass; not that is was large. Our home also has a gas insert in the fireplace. It is an old unit and I probably should replace it but I can heat the whole house with it if I have to. I have really come to appreciate smaller homes. You have to get creative with storage but it can be very cost effective. I bet I could replace the gas insert with a pellet stove and vent through the chimney. I could then heat my house if I ever lost power or gas.

 

[MaverickNH]

Solar-Panel Shortage Snarls U.S. Green-Energy Plans

Thousands of containers have been detained by U.S. Customs and more have been held back or diverted from U.S. ports due to a new law targeting labor abuses in China.

www.wsj.com

Too late now…

 

[garandman]

Problem here is very simple: the coldest days are also the shortest and snowiest.

The old fashioned solution was to shut down most of the house and live on the first floor, or less, in winter.

 

[MaverickNH]

Problem here is very simple: the coldest days are also the shortest and snowiest.

The old fashioned solution was to shut down most of the house and live on the first floor, or less, in winter.

Yes, that’s the plan. We have a few bins of plastic sheeting, duct tape and packing blankets to close off a limited 1st floor section. Water is in the basement - hopefully the last to freeze. Shut the boiler valves to 2nd floor and see how long we can cycle the generator off 2x250lb tanks to keep the lights and heat above freezing. A few 100lb propane tanks to run a camp stove In the fireplace - damper cracked with doors closed when running to draw off CO/fumes.

 

[xtry51]

Signature solar still has pallets of panels and inverters available if you want electricity.

Will Prowse's YouTube Channel. Look at Bluetti as another scalable option for electricity.

https://youtube.com/@WillProwse

If you want a mobile power option that is pretty dam capable based on betteries and can use panels, look at this setup. An EG6500 could also be used allowing more solar.


View: https://youtu.be/J9WZcMDQaDg



If you want heat, buy a solar vacuum tube setup. They are amazing. Our grandparents have them in CT.

 

[Greg7580]

Check out Bluetti see website below:

BLUETTI AC200MAX Expandable Power Station | 2,200W 2,048Wh

AC200MAX is BLUETTI®'s first expandable solar generator that can be connected to B230 or B300 batteries, enabling up to 8,192Wh! Order yours right away!

www.bluettipower.com

I have the AC200max and the EB70S. I use them for my concession business. The AC200 with the solar panels will run my equipment all day on a sunny day and not even lose any charge.

Watch out for brands like Jackery. They are cheaper but use lithium battery’s that can only be charged 500 times before you will only get 80% charge out of the battery.

Bluetti uses lithium iron phosphate battery which has anywhere from 2,500 to 3,500 charge cycles.

Check Bluetti reviews they get very high reviews.

 

[xtry51]

If you do solar, the path you take will have a lot to do with your budget. If I was made of money, I'd have 70 Bi-facial 400W+ panels, 4 EG6500 inverters and 30 or 40 EG4 server rack batteries. EG4 makes the battery/inverter connections pure plug and play.

Server rack betteries are the most affordable plug and play. You definitely want LiFePO4 (Lithium Iron Phosphate) batteries.

I went DIY on batteries and saved over 50% on cost per kWh, but there is a knowledge curve and you need to be comfortable with electricity and a multimeter to set it up.

Companies like Bluetti make very nice, scalable options. But be aware you pay a steep premium for that easy of use, build quality and portability.

 

[garandman]

A friend of a friend took a lower-cost path. He worked from home and had frequent but relatively short outages.

He purchased a used data center UPS. He was able to replace the batteries at fairly low cost, as they used standard led acid batteries: weight doesn’t really matter in those installations.

He didn’t have any solar or even a generator: he relied on the grid to fully charge it. The capacity of some of these centers is impressive. We had an Architect customer in Cambridge who could run their commercial 3D printer for 6-8 hours.

 

[Yazz]

I have a Jackery solar generator for SHTF and it will run things I need to heat my home as long as the Natural gas is on. In the summer it will run everything but an air conditioner (well for 5 houres it will) But as xtry51 said they are not cheap and when the batteries wear out you have to send them to manufacturer for repair. But it's portable. But in the winter it will keep my heat running. Check out the survival thread.

 

[Yazz]