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Who's gone Solar

ThinkFast said:
Thanks for the heads up on this feature - had no idea. I pinged Jay and asked him about it and it turns out I didn’t get it because it wasn’t available when they installed my system a year ago. But he said just call the 800 number and ask and they should be able to configure/add it. So I did and now it’s showing up in my app. :Cool.
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:thumbup

Thanks for the reco on Sunpower.

While there were some hiccups, in the end it only took 5 months from making our first enquiry to being up and running so I'd give them an A-/B+ overall.

The placement of the panels seems perfect.

2 days ago when we had full sun all day the lowest producing panel produced 1.94kwh while the highest produced 2.40 across 20 panels in 4 banks.

The 5 panels pulling in the most "expensive" power from 4-7 produced an average of 2.0kwh so I think we should at least break even over a full 12 months even after adding Envi electric wall heating panels to replace most of our gas heat in the winter.

Gas averages $40/.month in summer and $250 in fall/winter (6 months) so our goal is to knock down that winter number by 2/3 or so.
 
Permit was approved back in March, panels are finally being installed today. Fingers crossed that all goes well.
 
FINALLY! After almost 12 weeks of waiting, and bugging Tesla several times, I got the email from PG&E that I'm approved to turn on my system. Just turned it on about 1/2 hour ago. :party
 
bojangle said:
FINALLY! ... Just turned it on
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:party:party:party:party:party

bojangle said:
I'm not sure which EVs currently allow reverse charging to power a house, but I know Tesla doesn't allow it currently.
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I was just reading about this yesterday.

https://techcrunch.com/2023/08/08/gms-ultium-evs-v2h-bidirectional-charging/

GM said Tuesday it is bringing its vehicle-to-home (V2H) bidirectional charging technology to its entire lineup of Ultium-based electric vehicles by model year 2026.

...

The V2H offering follows a pilot that began last year with Pacific Gas and Electric Company in California.

The first vehicles to receive the technology will be the 2024 Chevrolet Silverado EV RST, the 2024 GMC Sierra EV Denali Edition 1, the 2024 Chevrolet Blazer EV, the 2024 Chevrolet Equinox EV, the 2024 Cadillac Lyriq and the upcoming Cadillac Escalade IQ, which has a reveal date set for August 9.
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tgrrdr said:
:party:party:party:party:party



I was just reading about this yesterday.

https://techcrunch.com/2023/08/08/gms-ultium-evs-v2h-bidirectional-charging/
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Nice! I think this will start becoming standard with BEVs. Tesla hasn't had to allow it yet because of very limited competition, and they want to sell and install power walls. But I'm betting competition will eventually drive them to allow this as well.

Also not sure how I feel about doing reverse charging of an EV to power a house at night, on the regular. Seems like it would increase charge/discharge cycles and shorten the life and range of the vehicle a lot quicker.
 
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Congrats Bo; what an excruciating wait.

We went "live" August 3rd and are at 211% usage for the month.

549kwh produced.

260kwh used.

Even on the cloudiest day we produced more than we used but of course these are the longer days of summer.
 
I can look at each panels performance through the day and my 400 watt panels never produce more than a max of 330 during peaks which I guess isn't surprising.
 
Maybe overpaneling to widen the curve. You could math it out by comparing your charge controller specs against watts per panel totaled.
 
byke said:
Maybe overpaneling to widen the curve. You could math it out by comparing your charge controller specs against watts per panel totaled.
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Well I am doing better than the 75 percent rule of thumb mentioned here but, again, it is summer. But 75 percent is about what I get for all panels simultaneously during the peak production hour for the total 20 panels.

Solar panels can only produce their rated wattage in ideal conditions, including an optimal temperature of 25°C, peak sunlight, freedom from obstructions like debris and shade, and an optimal tilt angle. Such conditions rarely occur in the real world, so solar panels usually produce less than their rated maximum wattage. 75% of rated wattage per peak sun hour is a relatively safe estimate in most climates.

The rated power for solar panels is determined by a laboratory test under Standard Test Conditions. These conditions are:

An optimal operating temperature of 77°F (25°C).
A sea level air mass (AM) of 1.5.
Solar irradiance of 1000W/m2 (1kW/m2).
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https://blog.ecoflow.com/us/why-don...ls can only produce,and an optimal tilt angle.
 
If you think the system is capable of more, then it's where the single post ground mount group setups are nice. Even if it's not auto-tracking, you can manually pan/tilt throughout the year to get closer to peak. It's something like 30 degrees in the summer and 45 degrees in the winter, which you can't really do on a roof mount, plus there's no pan ability. You'd be doing really good to get ~82% of max at peak.
 
byke said:
If you think the system is capable of more, then it's where the single post ground mount group setups are nice. Even if it's not auto-tracking, you can manually pan/tilt throughout the year to get closer to peak. It's something like 30 degrees in the summer and 45 degrees in the winter, which you can't really do on a roof mount, plus there's no pan ability. You'd be doing really good to get ~82% of max at peak.
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I'm not worried about it to be honest.

I just hadn't seen it mentioned in the thread.
 
PSA to keep monitoring your system. I recently failed to catch that mine wasn't communicating for 2 weeks. Ended up being an easy fix but I can't get that time back.
 
Just received Permission To Operate from PG&E.


much excite. very sun power.
 
westie said:
Had my semper solaris system final inspection this week and all is done. About $45k with the tesla battery. I'm addicted to the apps, panel app and tesla app. I'm constantly showing people like they're pictures of my children. Battery is usually charged by 2 pm and still at about 30% in the morning. The real test will be next month's pg&e bill. This month was $350. Will be exciting to see how much savings after a full month in use. Also, I give semper a 50% approval rating. They got the layout wrong 3 times and were poor on communication but when the physical work started these guys worked their asses off.
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What's your kw production and your storage capacity? I'm coming late to this game, but I don't expect to stay in my current house for more than 8 more years.
 
HeatXfer said:
What's your kw production and your storage capacity? I'm coming late to this game, but I don't expect to stay in my current house for more than 8 more years.
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I'll have to look it up but the first months bill arrived and as you can see the proof is in the pudding! (happy dance)
 

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westie said:
I'll have to look it up but the first months bill arrived and as you can see the proof is in the pudding! (happy dance)
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:thumbup

Looking forward to my first bill.

We were on line on August 4th.

Producing 41kwh per day, using 21.
 
Looking at the NEM savings, I sold PG&E .43 cents in electricity but they charged me $1.43 for it. Those f@cking f@ckers. They say a true accounting will take place in a year. (7/24)
 
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