Tag: solar power

Getting top value from rooftop solar

A social media post from Ergon, our (only) local electricity retailer, caught my eye a couple of days ago:

Ergon: Sun’s out? Turn it on! That’s what we call ‘solar soaking’. Dishwashers, washing machines and clothes dryers can have built in timers that let you control when they come on. Set them to run when the sun is out to get the most value from your solar system. To find out more go to www.ergon.com.au/solarsoak.

It attracted a few comments and I joined in.

Ann: If you were lucky enough to get the 44c you are supposed to use it all at night after 8pm to get the most benefit back from input into the grid or so we were told.

Malcolm: True – but only if you’re still on the 44c feed-in tariff. Not many people are, these days.

To expand on that:
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Time capsules: Energy in the 1970s

Every book is a time capsule, preserving knowledge and attitudes current at the time of writing, as I said in my previous post.

The NQCC garage sale donations which provided these time capsules were particularly strong on the nuclear debate. It was an urgent issue in the 1970s, with Peak Oil on the horizon and the dangers of nuclear technologies very much in the public mind from Hiroshima (1945) and the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962).

Renewable energy was so paltry that the energy debate was simply nuclear vs fossils. CO2 emissions did not figure in the energy debate at all, either. Why not?

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Off-grid but not by choice

Power blackouts can happen any time. When they do, we have to do the best we can with what we’ve got, and this post is mainly about using a camping fridge, power station and PV blanket, as described in my previous post, to keep ourselves safer and more comfortable off-grid.

If we have PV solar and a home battery that we can use off-grid, we’re fine. (They are not common, though.) Or if we have an EV with V2L (vehicle to load) capability (not common either), all we need is an extension lead. If we haven’t, here’s a plan.

But first, some useful basic emergency information

Power outages that are long enough to be problematic are usually due to cyclones and floods, so these key sources of safety information are worth noting. For the Townsville area:

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Going a little way off-grid

Portable power stations based around lithium batteries are relatively new on the market and I was tempted by them as soon as I saw them, on display at Eco-fiesta in June last year.

power stations display
A range of power stations

One neat, integrated package contains a Li-ion battery with an inverter, outlets for all sorts of appliances and inputs for 240V AC and the optional-extra solar panels. They are sold as direct replacements for the little portable petrol generators which campers have been using for years; but they are clean and quiet, and amazingly flexible in terms of how they might be used.

After thinking about that flexibility for a few months, and going camping at Bladensburg and wishing we had a camping fridge instead of eskies, and contemplating an approaching cyclone season with its possibility of power blackouts, I settled down to some serious research.

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How long do solar panels last?

Solar panel lifespan is an important question but its answer is only gradually becoming clear.

The first point to make is that some of the first PV panels on the market are still out there, pumping electrons, after 35 years or so. That tells us we have yet to find an upper limit to their lifespan.

The second is that the output of any panel diminishes gradually over the years, so ‘how long a panel lasts’ may depend on what percentage of its original output we can tolerate losing.

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