I’m trying to figure out how to calculate how much money I will save each month, to figure out if it is a good idea to get a solar panel now or wait until until next year.
Say I have a 150 watt panel, I get 5.5 hours of peak sunlight, and I pay 5.8 cents per KWH.
What is the equation to figure out how much that will be?
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
150 watt x 5.5 hours x 365days/year x 1kw/1000w = 301kWhr/year
301kWhr/year x $ 0.058 = $ 17.47/year
Hope that helps!
(5.8 cents per KWH is an awesome price! Where do you live?)
My short answer is that the panel will never pay for itself, for several reasons. I don’t know if you are already involved in renewable energy, have other panels working for you and the various support equipment, such as an inverter, a rack, disconnects, batteries or charge controllers. You can’t take a solar panel and just plug it into an outlet to make electricity unless it also has a microsine controller installed in the back. If it does, it will be a fair amount more expensive than just a panel.
Ericnuts is exactly right on the numbers, all that assuming the sun shines those hours each day, without any clouds to speak of, and you never have snow sitting on the panel either. You do have an awsome electric rate too, do you live in the pacific northwest?
We have a home that is completely powered by a solar array, and we have made plenty of mistakes setting it all up. Even with some grant money and tax write offs, I don’t think it will ever pay for itself in offset electric bills, but that is not the reason we installed it. While it reduces our electric bill, it also provides our power without burning any coal, oil or natural gas. And since we have the power company as a backup, in 10 years, our home has never been without power for even a minute. Those are hard things to put a price tag on.
What I would suggest is you do more research than asking guys online for an answer, there are lots of places to get information on this, I will include some below. You might decide later not to get involved at all, and that’s fine, but at least you will be well informed. Good luck, and take care…Rudydoo
Assuming 6 hours on the average of useful sun radiation, the 150 Watts panel will produce 900 W-hr every day and 328.5 KW-hr every year (0.9 KW-hr times 365 days). Depending on the price you pay per KW, you can calculate the annual saving. Even if you pay $ 0.2 per KW-hr, the saving is $ 65. The price you’d pay for 150W solar power generator (panel, inverter, charge controller and a deep cycle battery) can amount to $ 900.
So, if saving is what you are aiming at, I don’t think it is a good investment. If you however live off grid, or you want it for your RV, your boat or your camping site – this is a better option than a small diesel generator. To get more insight look into http://www.solar-energy-for-home.com/offgrid-solar.html