If my house uses 22.1kWh per day. this information is off my last electricity bill.
More Pages:
- Solar Lights: How Hard And Expensive Is It To Install Solar Panels On A House That Is Already Built? (11/19/2011)
- Solar Power: How Much Would It Cost To To Build A Solar Power System To Power My House @2500kwh Per Month? (10/16/2011)
- Solar Power: Are There Alternatives To Electricity To Power Your House Primarily Im Curious About Propane, Not Solar? (9/10/2011)
- Solar Lights: How Much Solar Panels Would I Need To Power Up Our Whole House? (7/25/2011)
- Solar Power: How To Solar Power For My House And Where To Get Eqipments In India? (9/16/2011)
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Depends a lot on the location and surroundings. First…for any system to work you’ll need 100% sunlight with no shade from trees, adjacent buildings or topography on the panels. Next … remember that the panels only generate power when the sun is shining. You’ll still need to be on the grid for those little inconveniences like cloudy days and night time. Lastly although your daily use is 22 kWh, your usage is not continous and constant, but surely has large peaks and valleys during the day. A system to power the peak load will be far too expensive to be practical…. so your best bet is to get enough capacity to handle average usage. On a yearly basis, figure maybe 10 hrs of daylight/day, which means you could get by with maybe 2.21 KW of panel capacity. There will be losses from dust, rain and bird droppings and clouds and system losses, so the more capacity the better. For a practical system, you might get away with 3 or 4 KW. If you are in the Southwest desert, a well designed and professionally installed system could have a payback of perhaps as little as 7 years. In the Northeast…. the economics are still a dream… as the paybacks go out 20 years or more. The federal and state subsidies help out quite a lot too. good luck.
A 1 kW system will generate 3-5 kWh per day (annual average), so you would need about a 5 to 7 kW ‘grid connect’ system to offset your usage. If you are off the grid there are probably other factors to consider like peak usage.
When I went through the process of getting bids for my solar system they wanted to get 2 years worth of usage. I was able to contact my electric company and they were happy to fax me the info. In most climates the home will use more energy in one season or another. Another consideration is how many hours of sunlight you get. I was using about 45 kwh per day and my 3.75kwdc system took care of at least 35 kwh per day. I didn’t get a system that would zero out my bill, I just wanted to maximize my rebates with the intent of adding to my system at a later date, hopefully to power an electric car. Now that we have had a few rainy days and the days are getting shorter I’m producing less energy, we had a cloudy day today so I only produced 13kwh.