I have been thinking about getting a solar panel to keep a fridge runnning and keep a battery charged while camping. Has anyone any experience/opinions?
Also with energy prices being the way they are has anyone gone further than this and installed solar in the home? Likewise with wind, a local electrical supplier reckoned he could get me a 2kw turbine for approx £1500. At one point I would have thought alternative power was prohibitively expensive but now it looks as though it may sense.
We have a solar panel in the caravan which keeps the leisure battery topped up. We're very happy with it, got it from Maplins, about £10. We got another to keep the scooter battery topped up because it's only used for very short journeys.
We haven't a pv array although we're considering it but we do have a solar dhw panel which is brilliant.
We looked into that but all the suppliers have told us that there are too many buildings and trees around us for it to be efficient. Spouse would still like one!
Yes, people have mocked us about our investments but we're having the last laugh :-)
They also mocked us about signing up to keeping our gas prices at the (then) current level. I bet they're eating their cynical words now!
Installing any alternative energy gadgets doesn't just give a financial return (which isn't the reason most people do it anyway), it makes one aware of helping the environment in other ways - by not squandering our resources.
It'll have to be a *big* (expensive) photovoltaic panel to run a fridge =
even under bright sunlight conditions. Battery top up is practical again= st self discharge and light use.
Does that include the control gear, grid connect, invertor, etc etc. Bea= r in mind that even well sited turbines struggle to produce more than 1/3 = of their rated capacity over a year, so think of that 2kW as more like 600W= , if your lucky.
=A31500 buys 18750kWhr of mains lecky at 8p/unit.
18750 / 0.6 =3D 31250 hrs, 1300 days, 3.5 years assuming a good site wit= h wind strong enough (and not too strong) to have the turbine generating it's rated output for at least some of the time. You'll still be buying =
mains power when the wind doesn't blow as well, you might be able to sel= l a bit to the grid but not much.
Recovery of capital takes a long time, but not paying utility companies =
for their (mainly) fossil based energy should not be ignored.
Do not assume a wind turbine will run maintenance free forever. I wonder how much fossil fuel is used making a turbine? Will it need planning permission? I believe solar panels might have a bit more going for them. If only there were a cheap way of storing some of the heat we have today.
Also, caravan fridges are often adsorption or peltier mechanism (for dual fuel or dual voltage operation), neither of which are as efficient as a conventional compressor fridge.
If you're running this batteryless it'll have to be a peltier type, as compressors can't be run off variable output panels.
Ammonia absorption fridges may be a better bet, as despite being horribly inefficient they can be run off a thermal panel instead of electrical, giving you a working system at a fraction the price. Flat panel plus reflectors. Coldness storage is achieved by packing the icebox with tetrapak cartons of milk, which being sealed and sterilised won't spoil, and the freeze/thaw cycle gives good latent heat (cold) storage. Means you cant use the frozen bit for anything of course - and best label the cartons clearly in case some silly thinks they're drinkable.
Yes. At our last house (SE Wales) we had solar panels in the roof for heating water, and they were fabulous. It didn't need to be hot; it just needed to be sunny for a couple of hours. The water was piping hot and we rarely had to supplement the panels with the immersion heater.
Installation was expensive, and it would probably have taken us 5 to 10 years to recoup our outlay. We moved before that happened, and the solar panels were a major selling point.
How many solar panels would you need in addition to the deep cycle batteries to run it and how much would it cost?
Some bloke down south spent an absolute fortune installing a wind turbine for his house and he doesn't generate enough electricity to power a shaver.
You would have to calculate where you live, how much wind you're likely to get (realistically) and whether that would generate enough electricity to repay the costs of the turbine within a reasonable timespace.
I read a post from a bloke however who did install a solar thermal system, where its only used to heat water. He said he noticed a big drop in his bills, maybe as much as a third. It did cost a heck of a lot to install though and that's when he still did a lot of the work himself and got a grant. Plus he will have to stay put for 20 odd years for it to repay itself and have been worth it.
Have listened to the advice of another bloke regarding a solar photovoltaic system and he said you may as well just burn £50 notes.
Maybe if energy prices go sky high a solar thermal system may become an option for a lot of people. But you'd have to hope that the climate isn't going into a cooling period and we start getting less sunshine, and that it pays itself back a bit quicker.
If you're staying put for a long time in the same home I'd say to go for it (solar thermal) if you have the money. In seven to ten years though we may have more Nuclear power stations and prices will start to fall again.
My personal opinion is that it's not worth it and the costs are just too much at the moment for what you'll get back and how long it will take to recoup the money.
Would be interesting to know the total costs for making a solar panel not just for its useful life but from start to scrapping, as well as how they are made and if that's good for the environment?
There will be a big shift in the next ten years to power stations that don't damage the environment are clean and generate enough electricity for everyone i.e. Nuclear Power.
At the moment with rising prices for utilities and fuel people are stuck between a rock and a hard place. We might have to cut our electric and gas consumption in the next few years until more Nuclear Power stations are built and prices come down.
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