The days grow shorter, but in the past 31 days the solar array has generated 158.5 kilowatt hours of electricity. That’s 5.11 KWH per day, which is about equal to the previous month.
That’s all attributable to good weather. It’s been remarkably sunny and pleasant, with almost no rain at all. At one point, during a three-week period, we used just 24 KWH from the electric company. Nearly 90 percent of our electricity came from the sun.
And, yes, the new electric meter is still going backwards on clear days.
5 comments
Comments feed for this article
November 25, 2007 at 11:06 pm
madone52
Hi Lifted Lorax – Like you, we have a solar powered home; our system uses SunPower panels. I am impressed that you are getting 90% replacement, we are not even at that level and we have 24 panels.
If your are interested, I have set up two pages on WordPress for friends interested in learning from our solar experience. Visit our Solar Generation Summary at http://madone52.wordpress.com/solar/solar-generation-summary/ and our solar installation story is at http://madone52.wordpress.com/solar/.
November 26, 2007 at 9:49 am
Ron
I commend you for your use of solar power. However, you must be consuming a lot of power if you have 24 panels and are still using juice from the grid. Your generation of 15 KWHs and more from the sun per day would exceed what we use except in the very hottest of months.
We currently have nine solar panels. If we eventually increase that total to 12 or 13, we’ll probably be at or very close to the 100 percent mark.
I’ve always recommended that people cut their daily consumption as much as possible before buying solar panels. That way, you might not need as many panels as you think.
November 26, 2007 at 2:42 pm
madone52
You are correct; our base load without AC or heating is between 15 -20KWhr per day. We are in Southern California, so our AC usage is very high during the summer and early fall. While we do use a programmable thermostat to adjust the temps, our usage can easily hit 40 on a day when the temps are over 100. The rest of the load is the usual stuff: fridge, laundry, computers (3) and lighting. We did replace our fridge prior to the solar and we use a few CFLs. Personally, I don’t like CFLs because it is my understanding that they create hazardous waste due to the mercury whereas normal bulbs are not toxic.
We track our generation and usage daily and we update our blog stats monthly, so we’ll see how it all balances out by April. I may be closer than I think as production ramps up to around 30Kwhr in the spring.
November 26, 2007 at 4:54 pm
Ron
Two things about CFLs, Madone:
– Many manufacturers are now making low-mercury CFLs.
– A lot of places are now accepting CFLs for recycling. That way, they can safely dispose of the mercury instead of having them going into landfills.
Because of those two things — plus the obvious power-consumption benefits — I would encourage you to make the switch to CFL lighting (except with dimmer switches, of course). It will make a huge impact.
And you may already do this, but set your thermostat to 78 or 80 during the summertime. It’ll make a big difference in your power consumption. And we’ve always found that temperature range to be quite comfortable.
December 3, 2007 at 2:46 am
Even better than the real thing « The House of the Lifted Lorax
[...] 3, 2007 in Alternative energy, Solar energy by Ron A few weeks ago, I said “nearly 90 percent” of the power we consumed came from our solar [...]