DIY solar array 12.5 kw

[where2]

My 4.4kW array
March 2017 = 549kWh
March 2016 = 495kWh
March 2015 = 562kWh
March 2014 = 554kWh

Highest daily for March 2017 = 23.5kWhs

[Elcam84]

Originally Posted by pinballlooking

@Elcam84
In March we used 1,814 KWh. keep in mind we charge our car two to three times a day. (During the school year) we heat our house with it also.

We power our car over 20K EV miles in 2016.
The last 2 years we received a check from the power company at the zero out date March 1. This year’s check was for $58.78 we even heated our 550 gallon fish tank in our aquaponics greenhouse with solar power.
Here is our power bill for the last couple years. (You cannot off set the meter fee).
We are thankful for this every day.

I knew you charged your cars but didn't know how much that added up to on kwh. It seems like it takes quite quite a bit of kwh for charging the cars. If that were us that would be say 1300kwh of your usage just for vehicles. If you didn't have solar panels the electric cars would be quite expensive to drive. 1300kwh would be about $165 here which would buy allot more gas than we use in a month and we live in tx and everything is a long drive.


Last month we were running running the ac as it was in the mid 90s for a while but we had the furnace on last night and maybe tonight though it may not come on till early morning. We have never run the furnace after mid march. Cool spring here overall.

Oh I will be near your neck of the woods saturday. Headed to GSP tomorrow night and we are going to look are areas and houses there. Mainly between there and Charlotte.

[pinballlooking]

My Chevy Volt takes 12 KWh to charge fully so about 24KWh a day week days. That is about 80 EV miles a day.
On the weekend usually only charge once a day. A months worth of charging is about 300 KWh. This is 1,000 EV miles a month.

When you look a ROI we save more money on gas than we do on power savings alone.
But we save not heating with natural gas. We save not buying gasoline for our car and we save not buying power.

My wife will keep the living room 76-78 degrees so in the winter we will use some lots KWh heating even with mini splits.
But it is no big deal we have the power to cover it.

[Elcam84]

It's a definite no brainer to me. I was planning a 6k system on the shop which is perfect in every respect for panels but since we decided to move a few years ago it didn't happen. I could have expanded the system up to around 18k using the available roof space on the shop. Would keep the shop much cooler as well.

Yup put enough panels up and keep it comfortable. That means 68 in the summer for me though with as hot as it is here it takes big systems and lots of power even on better sealed houses.

[pinballlooking]

My system just went over four years old and we just hit 75 MW produced.
If you look at only electricity saving and nothing else. Then we are on track to have the system pay off at 5 years and a couple months.

Now we use mini splits to heat with using solar power and not natural gas that saving really adds up.

We drive our Chevy Volt 20K EV miles a year and save not buying gasoline.
We offset our electricity every month.
If you take account for all these savings the array paid for itself in two years.
Any way you look at it we are happy with our solar array. I am glad to see others installing solar.

Over the last four years my system average is 51 Kwh a day produced.

[Elcam84]

Very nice. I did the math and we could pay off a 6k system in about 5 years as well. Unfortunately the volt, bolt etc don't fit our needs so we will run gas cars for a while longer. However a volt would work for loml for her airport car as she makes one round trip a week. But it'd have to be a beater car cause they get abused in the employee lot at the airport.

I am looking at possibly buying a small system and ground mount it as we are stuck here another two years as the company is taking too long to integrate and she doesn't want to move and have to commute to DFW.

Spent the last two weekends checking out between greenville and Charlotte and between Columbia and Charlotte. Some nice areas but I'm leaning toward NC as the taxes are appreciably lower there and allot more to choose from in housing and lower housing prices. As it it's SC is going to cost us a bunch more to live there and a comparable house is going to run 50 to 70k more than here in DFW. Oh and 10% tax on fast food is pricey...

[Roostre]

Originally Posted by pinballlooking

My system just went over four years old and we just hit 75 MW produced.
If you look at only electricity saving and nothing else. Then we are on track to have the system pay off at 5 years and a couple months.

Now we use mini splits to heat with using solar power and not natural gas that saving really adds up.

We drive our Chevy Volt 20K EV miles a year and save not buying gasoline.
We offset our electricity every month.
If you take account for all these savings the array paid for itself in two years.
Any way you look at it we are happy with our solar array. I am glad to see others installing solar.

Over the last four years my system average is 51 Kwh a day produced.

Nice. With the extra leverage that driving electric and the mini splits give you...you must feel like the investment has already paid off.

I know that if I include fuel savings on a per kwh basis it knocks about a year off my break even point.

[pinballlooking]

12.5 Kw array we generated 1,628 Kwh April 2017

April 2017= 1,628 Kwh
April 2016= 2,021 Kwh
April 2015= 1,585 Kwh
April 2014= 1,827 Kwh

Highest one day April 2017 = 82kWhs
We banked 557 KWH for the winter.


Other solar producers show us your numbers for April when you have them.

[where2]

4.4kW array:
April 2017 = 590.72 kWh
April 2016 = 619.33 kWh
April 2015 = 560.48 kWh
April 2014 = 674.43 kWh

Highest daily for April 2017 = 23.9kWhs

[celblazer]

5.7kw array
April 2017 Total: 619 kWh
Highest day: 32.1kWh