Family lives on single solar panel

[BlueHouse]

I'm really impressed with this family.  A "normal" family that decided to reduce their carbon footprint.  Started off over an ongoing fight with the electric company and turned into a lifestyle change. 

http://www.popville.com/2016/08/i-cannot-help-fearing-that-men-may-reach-a-point-where-they-look-on-every-new-theory-as-a-danger-every-innovation-as-a-toilsome-trouble-every-social-advance-as-a-first-step-toward-revolution-and-th/#comments

From The Atlantic:

“In the heart of Washington, D.C., Keya Chatterjee and her family live off the energy produced from a single solar panel. It started in 2006, when Chatterjee and her husband had a fight with their electrical company. They were so tired of the astronomical bills that they stopped power to their home and spent the entire winter living without heating or electricity—essentially camping in their own home. After a frigid few months, they installed the solar panel and returned to Pepco, but now they supply energy to the grid rather than using it. Today, Chatterjee’s life runs on solar energy, she takes public transportation everywhere, and she’s figured out how to live with as little consumption as possible.”

[nereo]

I love to hear about people who challenge our now-ingrained assumptions about electricity (that modern life requires lots of it, that we need to be grid-tied, that electricity should always be available and in near-unlimited quantities, etc.).

What I wonder though is why just the single PV panel?  Why not at least hook up 4 or 8?*

*note: I'm in a crappy WiFi location so I can't watch the entire video, but only read the text.  Perhaps they explain?

[RWD]

What I wonder though is why just the single PV panel?  Why not at least hook up 4 or 8?*

*note: I'm in a crappy WiFi location so I can't watch the entire video, but only read the text.  Perhaps they explain?

I just watched the video. It looks like they do have four panels at this time (but perhaps started with just one?).

[BlueHouse]

What I wonder though is why just the single PV panel?  Why not at least hook up 4 or 8?*

*note: I'm in a crappy WiFi location so I can't watch the entire video, but only read the text.  Perhaps they explain?

I just watched the video. It looks like they do have four panels at this time (but perhaps started with just one?).

I noticed that too.  When I watched the video, I was curious why they called it a single solar panel.  It looks like 4 to me.  But maybe they're like graham crackers.  Do the perforations mean there are multiple crackers on one sheet of cracker?  (and BTW, they're really cookies)

[Fudge102]

Hard to tell without seeing the hardware involved, but that does look like four panels put together into a single array setup. It's also pretty huge.  I mean, get me enough panels setup into an array and I could power the world on one "panel."  The title is misleading.  Good on the people don't get me wrong, but the panel they are using is quite larger than what I've seen to be a normal panel on all the houses around here.  Maybe one of those four would be the right size...

[nereo]

What I wonder though is why just the single PV panel?  Why not at least hook up 4 or 8?*

*note: I'm in a crappy WiFi location so I can't watch the entire video, but only read the text.  Perhaps they explain?

I just watched the video. It looks like they do have four panels at this time (but perhaps started with just one?).

I noticed that too.  When I watched the video, I was curious why they called it a single solar panel.  It looks like 4 to me.  But maybe they're like graham crackers.  Do the perforations mean there are multiple crackers on one sheet of cracker?  (and BTW, they're really cookies)

Dammit bluehouse! Now all I want is a cookie...

[BlueHouse]

Dammit bluehouse! Now all I want is a cookie...

Reb started it! 
http://forum.mrmoneymustache.com/off-topic/graham-crackers-closer-to-a-cookie-or-a-cracker/

[former player]

Agree it's a single array of four panels.

They are right that hot water bottles are wonderful - heat the bed not the bedroom.

[jengod]

Really nice to see this in practice somewhere that isn't an off-grid yurt. Good for them.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[forummm]

How do they heat the water? Maybe gas? It can't always be the solar oven. Do they take ice cold showers in the winter?

[nawhite]

I love to hear about people who challenge our now-ingrained assumptions about electricity (that modern life requires lots of it, that we need to be grid-tied, that electricity should always be available and in near-unlimited quantities, etc.).

What I wonder though is why just the single PV panel?  Why not at least hook up 4 or 8?*

So we've been doing the whole living off grid thing for a few months now in our RV. We have 4 solar panels on the roof each a little smaller than that family's panels. I'd guess they have about 1000W of generation and we have about 660W. We have 3.3kW of usable battery storage. It really isn't hard at all, you just need to be conscious of your usage. Turn lights off, be aware of how much power every single object you use draws, keep an eye on the battery levels (you may need to change your plans based on current battery level). We also have the crutch of a 40 lbs propane tank that we use to do some cooking and run the fridge when we are parked in shade or it's cloudy for a few days (if we had a compression fridge instead of a 3-way fridge, it would use less electricity but we like the flexibility). We fill up propane about once a month.

The biggest question I have for them is what do they do for heat in the winter. From the looks of it, they mooch off their apartment neighbors through un-insulated interior walls. That pretty much puts a floor on interior temperatures around 55 degrees F. If they had a free standing house, or their neighbors started doing the same thing, it would get MUCH colder in their place in the winter.

[WerKater]

We have 4 solar panels on the roof each a little smaller than that family's panels. I'd guess they have about 1000W of generation and we have about 660W. We have 3.3kW of usable battery storage.

Do you mean 3.3kWh?

[nawhite]

We have 4 solar panels on the roof each a little smaller than that family's panels. I'd guess they have about 1000W of generation and we have about 660W. We have 3.3kW of usable battery storage.

Do you mean 3.3kWh?

Yep, thank you! These units get crazy fast.

[WerKater]

We have 4 solar panels on the roof each a little smaller than that family's panels. I'd guess they have about 1000W of generation and we have about 660W. We have 3.3kW of usable battery storage.

Do you mean 3.3kWh?

Yep, thank you! These units get crazy fast.

Do you remember how much the 3.3.kWh of storage cost you? Last time I checked, the storage was the really big obstacle that stopped me from considering solar (well, that and the fact that Germany is not well-known for its abundance of sun -- and that my city is known in the region for its tremendous amounts of fog).

[nawhite]

Do you remember how much the 3.3.kWh of storage cost you? Last time I checked, the storage was the really big obstacle that stopped me from considering solar (well, that and the fact that Germany is not well-known for its abundance of sun -- and that my city is known in the region for its tremendous amounts of fog).

I picked up four 134-Amp-Hour AGM lead acid batteries from craigslist for $100 each new (which is wholesale cost before shipping from what I've read). They'd retail for around $330 each. A company had bought them to be the backup power supply for their datacenter to cover things until their generators could kick in and they had about 8 left over they were selling on craigslist. So technically it's more like 7kw of storage but you're only supposed to discharge lead acid batteries to 50% if you want them to last.

For a residential setup, you don't care about weight as much but you care about lifetime cost more. Lots of RVers swear by Trojan T-105s which are 6V golf cart batteries but you can do better if you have a lot of space and don't care about weight (which you don't when they are sitting on a concrete pad at home). I'd get strings of six 2-Volt flooded lead acid cells from a fork lift company, or I'd look into nickel batteries which are less energy dense than lead-acid but Nickel batteries can literally last forever. There are electric cars from the 1920's still working on the original nickel batteries with a cheap refurbishment every 10 years.

[solon]

Ugghh!!

The video started out great. Reducing dependence on electricity, living smartly, etc. But then it devolved into pro-climate change propaganda.

Can we just learn about smart living without being bashed over the head with climate change?