How Many Solar Panels To Power A Fridge

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I will walk you through a few examples to help you size a solar power system for your refrigerator and other appliances. We will work through the calculations to show how to power a standard home refrigerator and a smaller chest refrigerator that might be ideal for an RV.
DISCLAIMER: This video and description contain affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission.

[@donaldhoudek2889]

Do not forget that once every day or so the modern fridges go into a "Defrost" mode. My GE, runs between 84 and 108 Watts, but at least 1 time a day it goes into a Defrost mode which can last up to 2 hours and stay at 315 Watts for those 2 hours. On my BrulTech Energy Management program it shows a rather large spike for that time frame. Normally the fridge mostly stays in the 80-90 range. On days where we were not home (vacation) the fridge averaged .8kW and on those days where the defrost kicked on it was 1.4kW. I have about 5 years of data by the minute.... lots of data

[@markpaulin884]

Thanks for the data about defrost mode. Never thought about factoring that in.

[@n4mwd]

My fridge uses 600 watts to defrost, however I think it only runs for about 15 minutes. So you definitely need to factor that in.

[@matthewprather7386]

The 24 hour Kill-a-Watt data will cover the defrost operation.

[@gg-gn3re]

he ran a watthour monitor (which everyone should) for 24 hours.. I'd do 7 days though just to get a better idea. So it doesn't matter that it goes into defrost mode. You can buy many fridges without this mode and just deal with the ice build up. They are way more efficient, energy wise.

[@basspig]

My wife bought a modern side-by-side refrigerator and it uses about 104 W most of the time but in defrost it goes up just slightly over 700 watts.

[@donaldhoudek2889]

For anyone interested you can control the defrost cycle on a fridge. Unfortunately, it is not part of the fridge settings. About 5 years ago a fellow RVer bought a Frigidaire residential fridge for his RV, but noticed that the defrost mode was killing his battery setup when it would kick in. Knowing that I was into electronics he asked for my assistance and I downloaded the fridge's wiring diagram and set him up with a manual switch/relay to deactivate the defroster when on battery power. Still works like a champ. I even sent him a diagram on how to automatically switch the defroster mode off when dry camping.

[@everydaysolar]

That is a great idea 🤔 future video idea 💡. Thanks for the feedback!

[@mhughes1160]

@@everydaysolar it would be interesting to see how much of a power difference there is If the fridge and freezer were full

[@davidconner-shover51]

@@mhughes1160 Thermal mass, once the food chills down, they actually draw a bit less, not needing to cycle on and off as often

[@D2O2]

So a switch for the power feed to the defrost heater?

[@MrModTwelveFoot]

Did you just add a switch inline to the defrost heater coil (is that how a fridge defrosts?) to shut it off?

[@billsharp8992]

Refrigerators are much more efficient when they are fully loaded and have reached the desired temperature. The door of a fully loaded refrigerator can be briefly opened to access the contents without causing a measurable drop in the temperature of the thermal mass. There is less cold air volume in a fully loaded refrigerator (because the contents occupy most of the internal space). On the other hand, when the door is opened on empty refrigerator, the heavy cold air drops to the floor and the ambient warm (or hot) air takes its place and the refrigerator must energize the compressor to restore the desired temperature.

[@court2379]

It's mostly that air doesn't have a lot of mass and food does. So a tiny mass escaping isn't a lot of energy. What you have said about the volumes is certainly true, but even if the volume didn't change when full, the amount of energy lost via the air is relatively small and quickly recovered by the heat pump.

[@user-xj8wy4uu1q]

Source?

[@fauxque5057]

You also have to consider the temperature of the room/location of where the refrigerator is located. People with "garage" refrigerators or freezers are using a lot of power to keep those doing their job. It's a two prong problem. First the insulation can only do so much in a hot environment. And secondly the compressor works less efficient because it uses the air in the location to transfer the heat from the coil in order to cool. The warmer the ambient air the harder the compressor has to work to keep the inside cold

[@Tryp-j9d]

Refrigerators use MUCH LESS POWER when running with NO contents!!

[@MaritimeUnprepared]

You're correct! I also keep freezer packs in my off grid fridge. On very warm days I remove the freezer packs and place them around my food in the fridge to help maintain the cold.

[@shawnr771]

Others in the comments have mentioned the thermal mass of the contents. For both freezers and refrigerators freeze gallon jugs of water and use them to fill up empty spots. The thermal mass will help regulate the inside temperature and in the event of a true power outage or multiple days without recharging keep the contents cold minimizing the on/off cycles.

[@justinw1765]

Yep, and water is one of the best substances for this, as it has a insanely high heat capacity (takes a lot of energy to warm and cool it).

[@JeepinMaxx]

Scott - thank you for the discussion on consumption, watt hours, & capacity in detail that even a solar novice like myself can understand

[@dang495]

I'd recommend a sample of at least a week. One day is not going to accurately project weeks, months, years. E.g. On the weekend everyone could be home opening and closing the fridge all day.

[@bengorman5214]

Chalk it up to OCD-or forgetting I had the meter in place!-but I recorded the draw of a fridge I once used for over 500 hours. Then you can break down the total in more useful averages, e.g., by month or week or day.

[@whitetailhunter7202]

We've been off-grid for 7 years now. The best someone can do is shop for the most efficient unit. Smaller doesn't always mean it uses less power. Our chest freezer is 4x or 5x bigger than the one you have there and uses only 95 watts max! Not a typo, 95! I have the same plug in meter you are using to watch and measure power usage. ( That's the surge power. I was floored) Our 55" flat screen smart TV only uses 30 watts to run . (TV was only $300 at Walmart, still operates perfectly) Even when people come to me wanting to add/go solar to lower their electricity bill. I ALWAYS tell them to look at reducing consumption first. Even if they have to go buy new appliances to achieve it. Often spending a few $100 here or there can save several hundred in power in a year. Also we bought 5 100 watt panels off Amazon thru the past few years for only $50-$60 each. They work GREAT!!! They charge our 12v lighting in our house and 12v led strips in my shop.

[@GeckoHiker]

That's what we did on our off-grid homestead in the Ozarks... reduced consumption then sized solar panels for our needs. To reduce consumption we use LED lighting and chose to do without a dryer, dishwasher, and a microwave. Our earth sheltered home doesn't need HVAC. We use a woodstove for cooking, heating hot water, and comfort. We took it a bigger step farther in the reduction of consumption by using a small freezer and a straight refrigerator ( no freezer). Most of our stored food is in the cold room, cellar, and spring house. The dedicated refrigerator is for the eggs and produce that we sell locally. We have an indoor garden that provides a selection of fresh vegetables, year-round. I still remember how to prep and store meat and dairy without refrigeration. Venison and smoke cured ham hangs in the cold room and dairy is turned into salted butter and cheese. A cold room is pre-refrigeration design feature that modern homes no longer include. It is the coldest basement room that is vented to allow warm air to escape and cool air to enter. It can get to about 40 degrees and is safe for short-term storage of hanging meats and butter. We mostly can fish and meat for longer term storage and we eat a mostly plant-based diet anyway.

[@someoneelse7629]

The cheapest watts in a offgrid/solar system are the ones you remove from the drain side. If you remove a drain of 100W per hour, you can reduce your solar panels with 500W and your battery with 1000W, atleast. (simplified for sure) And inverters are lossy as fuck, not if you look in the datasheets, where they often are tested at their most efficient point in the loadcurve, but in real life where I live, the loads are never constant, so they will never stay at that point. So start with redusing usage, removing parasite loads, and run everything you can on DC

[@simon359]

My experience has shown after building three systems, it’s best to have at least twice the amount of panels, batteries, and inverter just in case! Especially in the winter.

[@robinflory6109]

I purchased a unique 13 cubic ft fridge freezer fridge dc power. It is running on 2 battle born 100 ah batteries and 2 200 watt solar panels. 40amp victron controller. Completely off grid. Works awesome.

[@johnoudin5646]

Excellent video! I'm in the "crawl walk run" phase now with solar so this info hit the spot! Thanks!

[@fookingsog]

A chest freezer/cooler is ALWAYS going to be more efficient due to the fact of opening the lid (cold air sinks!) You don't have the outrush of cold air like you would on the upright fridge/freezer, so less airspace turnover on the chest. Additionally, you have to consider "thermal mass" as a buffer. It's NOT efficient to keep a completely empty freezer or fridge. Augment the thermal mass of the chest freezer by adding in 2-liter bottles of frozen water to keep the temperature variance at a minimum...keeps the system from working so hard and can also tide you over for those sunless days!!!

[@davidconner-shover51]

Truth, the chest freezer in my RV draws 250-1000Wh per day depending on ambient temps (40-120F) the smaller dorm style fridge in the same conditions draws between 750-2000Wh per day I run it on 700W collection, 12V300Ah battery and 3000W inverter. The Panels sit flat on my RV and present an issue with snow in the winter, December seems to be the only month I have issues

[@glitchr8r]

We have a chest freezer from the 80's that was in the basement when we moved into our house. I've replaced the thermostat twice, but the compressor still sounds like it could run for another 40 years. Anyway, besides how well-built older chest freezers are, I wanted to mention that we have always had about a dozen four liter milk jugs filled with water and two pieces of half inch plywood on top of them to provide a much easier to reach "false bottom" and provide several days of security for the contents in the event of a power failure. Thermal mass can definitely prolong unpowered storage time.

[@fookingsog]

@@glitchr8r Also could keep several frozen bottles on hand to take out and put in the refrigerator to keep it cool if necessary!!! Having those extra bottles of frozen clean water also provides something to drink when they thaw out!!! 👍🏻

[@jerrywiese9722]

@@davidconner-shover51 Hi, could you refine your comment on "dorm style fridge" to include cubic foot of the unit? I'm looking to buy a 10 cubic foot dorm style refrigerator for my RV. Size matters.

[@davidconner-shover51]

@@jerrywiese9722 5.1 cuft, nothin special, a Wal Mart purchase

[@qapla]

Nice video. I liked the calculation tutorial. One thing to work into another video like this, besides running the test for a week or two, is to make sure the appliances are plugged into the EcoFlow units with 25' to 50' extension cords since most people will not be able to place their fridge right next to their EcoFLow.

[@markfrye9178]

I've been looking for a reference like this. Great job in breaking it down so neophytes like me can understand it.

[@RCTVAccount]

Your videos are always excellent. I am not sure why you have not broken through the algorithm game and have 500K subscribers. Well done. Just a suggestion, no one has really attempted to use a 12/2 UF-B at 250 Ft (at less than 20 amps) as a replacement for PV wires to see the voltage degradation and compared that to PV 8 or 10 gauge. It would be a cool experiment.

[@Tumbleweed5150]

I don't have quite that long of a run from my solar arrays to my solar controllers, but I used 4AWG wires and don't see any Voltage drop to speak of. If you are talking about solid core wiring, like in housing, it is less efficient than multi-strand wires of the same guage. As I understand it, because the electrons run along the outer surface of the wires, rather than inside, the more strands in the wire, the easier for electrons to travel, thus more power/Voltage transmitted.

[@RNGwhydoihavetoregis]

after looking over the hourly electric meter readings (exported from the electric company) of our home for the last 8 months, we've got about ~650W of constant draw at any given hour, I'm still taking kill-a-watt readings of some appliances but 158W from 3 out of the 5 of our food/drink appliances.. minus some other stuff around the house, I'm still short 200~300W being accounted for. I made sure the temps were ~37F or ~0F inside them to cut down any unnecessary draw but the biggest unknowns are the [newish] central air system with an electric filter. I think the biggest surprise was the HEPA filter on fullblast was ~150W (two fridges or three freezers worth), but on minimum it's still as much as our fridge. We buy cows/pigs from a farmer, processed by butcher, stored frozen here (some risk on our end but we count maybe 3 days a year for power outages, fixed within 24h). I was considering solar+battery to cover this constant draw to potentially minimize the electric bill (rates increased ~30% this year), the pattern of our usage is 'food needs to be cold' so it's not really going to change for the next 10~20yrs, so thank you for mentioning that bit about the inverter needs to cover its own cost of operation and how much it may need. perhaps I'll have to start flipping breakers overnight to find the last bit unaccounted for, it's harder to do that with so many appliances already deployed on different circuits.

[@jetah50]

did you forget an electric water heater or electronics being charged? anything outside that runs from an extension cord?

[@cokeacolasucks]

I use the emporia meter inside my breaker panel to get readings from any circuit, including water heaters, dryers and the AC. It only monitors 16 circuits, so some breakers I had to omit. I was surprised with how little some appliances used (living room TV), while my kitchen light (while in use, which is most of most days) uses a bunch. 4' fluorescent bulbs suck lol. (But equivalent in brightness LEDs are only about 15% more efficient, so I can't justify replacing until the bulbs fail). Also, when using a thermal camera I was astounded to see the heat generated by every wall wart power brick....

[@m.o.f8720]

I would like to see a national campaign to advocate for inexpensive soft starts to Blunt the inrush. I know there are some relatively inexpensive ones for things like circular saws but the ones designed for a normal AC circuit are obscenely expensive period just my 2 cents

[@Dangrousfreedom_peacfulslavery]

3-phase to every home!

[@Strike_Raid]

Yeah, like some have mentioned, you need to include the thaw cycle if you have a frost free refrigerator. On mine, it's about 400 watts for about 30 minutes. Not completely sure how often it happens but it's at least once a day. And the start current on my fridge (which runs at about 120 watts) peaks at about 1800 watts for a fraction of a second.

[@matthewprather7386]

The 24 hour Kill-a-Watt data will cover the defrost operation.

[@donaldhoudek2889]

Maybe I should build a "Soft-Start" unit for my fridge. Naaaa, to much brain power. I recently installed a "Soft Start" on my HVAC for running on my portable generator during power outages. The inrush dropped after installing the Soft-Start from 94 Amps to 24 Amps. Not as harsh on the compressor as before, the HCAC is 20 years old this summer. Trying to keep it running.

[@torainbowsend]

The defrost cycle on modern refrigerators are timer initiated and temperature terminated. The timer normally cycles every 8 hours. Defrost is terminated by the temperature of the evaporator coil. Although the defrost cycle might run for 20 minutes the actual defrost heaters located in the coil may only operate for 8-12 minutes, depending upon the build up of the ice. When the defrost cycle is operating normally, it only operates as long as necessary. Defrost heater cycles are longer in high humidity environments or when the freezer door is left open or does not seal properly. I've run my GE refrigerator, off grid in the Colorado mountains, for almost 20 years now on 8 ea. 130 watt panels and a 1,100 watt wind generator..... Occasionally I require the use of a gas generator back-up.

[@donaldhoudek2889]

@@torainbowsend Back in 2022 our 14 year of fridge died. My wife wanted a GE Profile fridge, so I purchased her the one that is all decked out with WiFi, remote access and well if it was available that fridge has it ($$$$). I am surprised that it did not have StarLink on it. Since she does all the cooking and all fridge related topics, I figured go for it. A happy wife is a HAPPY LIFE!!!! I read your reply and I can only speak for the model that we have and for one, there is no timer initiated defrost activation and or deactivation. I pulled up the Energy Management dB for when we were up in the mountains for 3 months last summer and there was no sequence of time spaces between the time and days it was activated. Also, there was no rhyme or reason to how long defrost mode ran. There were times where there were 2 days between defrost mode and a couple with 4 days. There was no set block of time morning, afternoon or night that the defrost mode was activated, it was more random. As for the fridge's environment, the house indoor temperature was a constant 80-81 degrees per the ecobee dB that I download each month (for the last 5 years). The humidity in the house for the time we were away was 37 to 42%. The fridge doors were never opened during those 3 months. No clue as to what triggers the defrost mode on this model and with the 14.3kW EG4 battery that arrives next week it should not be an issue.

[@bigdaadio.K2WW]

Thanks for the video! I didnt realize those portable power sourses were so inefficient

[@NitePHX]

Thought I would add somewhat related info describing what I have going on at the moment. I have two Ecoflow Delta 2 Max units. Each one has a 2048 Wh capacity with a 2400W continuous output and a surge of 4800W. Following are the specs as measured by my PN2000 watt meter for my fridge and my stand-alone freezer. The meters were on the units for over a week to try to catch all the intermittent cycles. Café Energy Star 27.8 Cu Ft Smart 4-Door French-Door Refrigerator = Average KwH 0.0664 / Daily KwH = 1.5944. Frigidaire 13 Cu Ft Upright Freezer = Average KwH = 0.0376 / Average Daily KwH = 0.9014 The Delta 2 Max will run the fridge for approx. 21 hours with no input and the freezer for 38 hours with no input. (I’m guessing the missing 0.4 KwH on the fridge is being used by the inverter.) I just had two GSD7G72M-550WT panels delivered and hope to get them set up this weekend. These are 550W Bifacial panels with a VOC of 49.92 and a ISC[A] of 14.00. The Delta 2 Max will accept up to 60 volts and 15 amps on each 500W input (1000W total PV input per Delta 2 Max) so I should be able to keep these boxes running even under less-than-ideal conditions. Oh, I’m in the Phoenix, AZ area.

[@Nanan00]

I did an energy consumption survey on my house two years ago, my Samsung side by side refrigerator pulled a peek of 460w when in defrost mode, 380w in-rush on compressor motor start and average around 80w running with the door closed and 100w with the door open and lights on. All in all, my 2.5hp grundfos well pump is the largest load in my house after putting a soft starter on my 2ton ac unit.

[@snoopdogie187]

a 2 hp well pump isn't completely normal. I'm guessing you have a fairly deep well or extremely high water usage.

[@OurNomadicStory]

You did aq great job presneting the information. This video is very relative to our situation. We went through a similar method when we sized our solution. We used a battery monitor system like the Victron BMV-712 to understand the power needs of our system in real world situations prior to upgrading batteries or adding solar. We have a class A RV with a residential refrigerator. The original lead acid house batteries were challenged by the refrigerator. We replaced the four 6V lead acid batteries (Serial/parallel configuration) that had around 200Ah of usable power or up 2400Wh. Of course we would never get to 2400Wh because of Peukert's law. Our initial upgrade was for four 12V 100Ah LiFePo4 batteries. This reduced the weight from about 240lbs to 120 lbs., improved the usable power to over 5kWh, and reduced charging time. (LiFePo4 has a much better charging profile than lead acid). The additional capacity deduced stress about needing to charge the batteries because of the refrigerator. The next upgrade was to add solar. We added six 200W solar panels to the RV. We working with a budget and decided to create a design that would allow us to add two additional panels in the future to increase from 1,200W of solar panels to 1,600W. This was in a configuration of four on one solar charging controller and two panels on another solar charging controller. The panels are wired in series to increase the voltage and permit smaller cabling. The other change is we upgraded the inverter charger to permit the entire RV to be powered. Originally the inverter was used for the refrigerator and a couple of outlets through the RV. Combined with adding soft start devices for our RV AC units, we now can run anything in our RV off the batteries. The goal was to be able to run the AC units overnight when we need a little cooling while dry camping or a couple of hours during the day while we were a way to keep our pets safe. (We also have an auto gen start if the batteries run low as a precaution.) One additional consideration is the power draw of Starlink. We use Starlink when we cannot get cellular internet service. As it turns out it draws more power a day than our refrigerator. Starlink also has a continuous draw. We reduced the daily use by putting it in sleep mode about 5 hours per night. To fully realize our system we added an additional four LiFePo4 100Ah batteries to expand our power capacity to over 10kWh of capacity. This is the configuration we used to travel to Alaska this year and spend over four months traveling through Alaska and spending a lot of time try camping. The only time we had to use our generator to charge is when the weather did not permit effective solar charging. On good days we would be fully charged by early afternoon. We also purchased a Ecoflow Delta 2 as a portable power source so we can have the flexibility to permit me to work if the RV is located in a location with a lot of tree cover. We can take the Ecoflow way from the RV in camp and setup the Starlink and charge my laptop while I work through the day. If required I can pack all of it up in the car and drive to a location to work. It is not uncommon for people to stop and look or ask questions when I have the Ecoflow, Starlink, and my laptop setup on a picnic table working. The 1kWh or battery provides enough power for me to get through a workday with Starlink, laptop, and charging my phone.

[@thorodinsun7140]

This is the most incredibly insane video I've ever seen in my entire life, Bravo

[@D2O2]

Not All fridges operate the way you described with short duration peaks followed by longer periods of low/no load. Newer inverter driven compressors will run longer durations at lower power as this is more efficient.

[@mikespangler98]

One comment about solar availability, a heavy overcast winter day results in the solar panel putting out 1/14 of its official power rating. The good news is that keeping food cold in the winter is easy. 😉 the covered porch runs about 20 to 30 F.

[@frommatorav1]

The porch probably doesn't take very much wattage to run, either. lol

[@bladerunner1458]

Back in 1994, I bought a I4.5 cubic foot cycle, defrost refrigerator with the freezer on top for $ 175.00. The refrigerator had an evaporator coil and during the off cycle the coil in the refrigerator would defrost from the ambient 38° temperature. A small resistance heater on the evaporator coil would turn on when the compressor was off to make sure it would defrost in a hot humid environment. I disconnected this heater. I insulated the outside of the Whole refrigerator and consumption dropped to 0.750 KWh a day. After 30 years, this refrigerator is still operating only to replace the start run relay and the thermostat for $ 50.00. The top freezer of this refrigerator has to be defrost 3 to 4 times a year but not the bottom refrigerator, therefore cycle defrost naturally. Refrigerators don’t last long today about seven years. By modifying this refrigerator, I probably saved over $10,000 in 30 years which translates to $30,000 when invested in an index fund. Back in 1994 I did put in a 240 watt Solar system. Used batteries, then went to Trace micro inverters. Thank you for your video and information.

[@jacobs.9696]

Know where someone could get a good fridge like yours nowadays without paying 3-5K?

[@thetinker]

Cool. You mentioned maybe wanting to use worst case numbers for solar radiance to be safe. That's smart especially for some places, but one thought I had is; many places with low solar radiance in winter are often cold enough that, if you have a power outage, you can just put the stuff outside in the snowbank or porch. So you might not always have to use the lowest numbers there.

[@timcat1004]

I have been load shedding my full sized fridge with my Delta pro since Oct 2023. It snows where I am. I did have to go back on grid about a dozen times. (just for the night while I was sleeping) This spring in 2024 I added more panel wattage and two extra batteries. The rest of my house has been consuming about 76 kWh's from the grid per month. Right now they owe me just under a grand Cad on my combined power and gas bill. My 9000 watts of diy with permits solar has been harvesting 10 MWh per year since 2015. I now have an off grid array for the load shedding. It's a fun hobby.

[@TofuInc]

The most interesting thing to me is all the refrigerator power consumption numbers from both the video and the comments! 😅 I have an older Whrilpool side by side fridge and it average between 2.4 and 2.9kwh per day in the summer. We use a lot of ice and I've noticed on days we don't use much ice the power consumption is noticeably lower. It uses 186w while the compressor is on and 5w when idle. The defrost runs every 6 hours of compressor run time and last 10min. It's a 500w element which equates to around 83wh per defrost. Another thing to think about, the way we have our thermostat set we can have a 4-6°F difference in the house between summer and winter. Just that difference in ambient temperature is enough to reduce the fridge power consumption by .5kwh in the winter. Newer fridges use inverter driven compressors which have a much lower starting current. The older style compressors usually need 5x the running wattage to start.

[@Ulbre]

One big difference between summer & winter is the amount of times the fridge will be opened......at least double in our household...that's a whole heap of extra cooling

[@obiwanbenobi4943]

The more modern refridgerators/freezers are much better in power use and likely have smaller and more efficient compressors. It is often well worth replacing an older one with a newer one before you even look into solar panels and battery storage. The same for many other older appliances and of course insulation for the home. Same for hot water heating. If you can put in a hot water pre-heater to use the sun light directly for the heat then you can avoid a lot of expense and I would do this before putting in solar panels, but if you size the hot water system right and leave expansion room to add more panels then you've covered both bases. During the last spring we had a power outage for some time and I have a battery backup unit for my computer. I was worried that some things in the freezer would not be very good if they thawed too much so after an evening of no power I took the backup unit and plugged the fridge into it. The power draw was low enough that the fridge was able to run for half an hour on what remained in the battery backup unit. The battery backup unit has a power meter built into it which told me how many watts were being used. The most important thing was what you noted, don't open the fridge/freezer as much as possible. Another good things to know was to have the freezer as full as possible before the power outage. So if you commonly have a lot of empty space in the freezer you can put containers of water in there to add to the thermal mass until you need the space for other things. I cannot put up solar panels at the moment, but someday I hope to put some kind of system in. To remove a lot of the drain of running just a refridgerator/freezer solar and battery system you could put it on a timer which would cycle only enough times during the day to run the system but would avoid some large fraction of the drain of the inverter being on continuously.

[@pasheatsi]

I just did a test with a Bluetti AC180 with a single Bougerv 180 watt solar panel running my full sized fridge. I used the fridge as normal and was able to run it for 24hrs with 20% left on the Bluetti. I don’t have much space for solar panels, so I plan to replace single 180 with 2 200w panels, then use multiple power stations, swapping them out as needed. I will eventually have 4 power stations (or extra add-on batteries) of at least 1000wh each ready for an emergency. I think this would keep me going for a while. For now I also have a small inverter gas generator for charging the stations if too cloudy. It will also keep a small window ac going during the summer. Yeah, get a gas generator and window ac for summer and a propane heater like a Mr Heater Buddy for winter. It’s also good to have a transfer switch to easily connect your power source.

[@pasheatsi]

Update: I did a second test with full sun on day 1 from 11am - 5:30pm, and the Bluetti maintained near 100 power all day. By 6am the next morning it was at 26%. Under mostly cloudy skies on day 2, it was getting an average of about 50 watts out of the 180w panel, which was enough to keep the battery at around 15% all day, until it finally died just before 8pm. That’s roughly 34 hours running a full sized fridge. With a few sunny days straight, it could run for quite some time. Fascinating!

[@surfguy777]

Just a thought..instead of getting multiple power stations, pick up a 48v server rack battery with 5100wh and plug it into your solar input on your AC180. Unless you really need more solar power stations of course.

[@pasheatsi]

@@surfguy777 Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll have to look more into that.

[@casnimot]

Good introductory exploration of sizing. Illinois is a reasonable testing ground, too, since their policies will make power expensive, as it is in California. Your costs in Illinois would be good for beginners, too, especially since prices/costs are always changing.

[@harryniedecken5321]

Nice video and testing. The department of energy actually has standardized testing methods and requires a label in every fridge. Most of them come in at average 2 - 2.5 kw-hr per day.

[@vevenaneathna]

i have a 54quart 12v dc fridge which i got for 100 bucks. turns out it runs fine on 28v and hooked it up to a high efficiency gan 140w power adapter through a pd 3.1 trigger board at 28v. with some additional modifications like covering it in aluminum foil tape, I got the power usage down to 150wh/day lol. no inverter needed and if your pulling from a power bank you dont even need the gan adapters which loose about 6-7% efficiency. by your math i only need like a 50w solar panel lol. 100w would probably be more ideal. i think those are like 30-40 bucks now. i should probably make a video about my setup. aint no body never heard of a usb-c powered fridge.

[@adambatchelder4121]

More , the answer is always more solar and more battery s. You have to figure for cloudy days and stormy weeks.

[@ActiveTravelWestUSA]

Exactly, we had last winter in the north east Nevada only about 10 days of sun out of 68 days..need a 400 watt wind turbine too!

[@perunut4656]

We chose a smaller fridge with manual defrost, and its only drawing 100w when running. Get sun most of the time, so 2 x 300w panels is sufficient for us.

[@tomc.4860]

Powering anything with solar is possible. The problem is the cost. When someone says they spent $10,000 to power their air conditioner it's not too impressive. When they say they spent $1,500 on a solar system to power their air conditioner then that is quite impressive. I do appreciate the education on how to add up the requirements for wattage.

[@scott1artgmail]

1. If your delta pro wastes half a kw idle per day then that's a crappy product. 2. If the delta pro is that inefficient then run 1 not 2. And plug bith the fridges into the single inverter. 3. 1000w x 5 hrs a day is 5kw... What you are lacking is battery storage. 4. Mine will make power even in the rain... Not as much but some. Your numbers seem off and needing way too much solar to power 2 fridges. 3.

[@frommatorav1]

Why is it looked down upon to spend $10k on solar but nobody blinks an eye when people spend $5k on a generator. You can use the solar every day for 25 years but the generator is only needed a couple of times a year.

[@johno4238]

For a system that has been running for more than 6 months. My refrigerator will use 1.5 k Watts hours in a day. 1200 W of solar, 48 V 100 amp battery. Average 4 to 5 1/2 hours of sun per day. We'll run for 2 and a 1/2 days.

[@PatrickKQ4HBD]

Thank you. This is what I was looking for.

[@konstantinlozev2272]

Overpannelling is just so much more cost-effective. Even in cloudy weather, you continue to get enough power, rather than worrying whether you have a big enough battery.

[@stevenjohn350]

YES exactly. When you want to balance the budget. So what is the sweet spot in overpannelling.? $$ value..?

[@konstantinlozev2272]

@@stevenjohn350 I am by no means an expert. I just recently built a home emergency backup system. It consists of two solar panels with 400 w each connected in parallel so 800 w in total. The panels are just propped against the wall of our house facing direct east. Panels costed EUR 100 each from Amazon. I connected them to an inexpensive power bank with maximum solar input of 200 W (so, 1/4 of the panel W) and capacity of around 400Wh, for EUR 300 from Amazon. On a really cloudy day I get solar input of around 40 to 60 w and I get that throughout the day. If it's sunny with thin clouds I easily get 200 Watts solar input. In full direct sun (which we rarely get), I have two black plastic bags that I can flip down and cover partially the panels to get the input W down to 180-200W. If I have to double the capacity of the power bank, I am looking at a cost around EUR 800-1000 for a bigger and heavier power bank. And with this setup I am not worried at all about cloudy days (most days here are cloudy) whatsoever. The amount of Wh we get in cloudy weather from those 2 panels is not huge, but is perfect for an emergency backup system for us.

[@tedhamilton2362]

The Whirlpool pictured is VERY efficient (I have). It uses under 1.1Kwh per day. I had an RV fridge that consumed nearly 5Kwh/day. THAT was a drain on my 1500watts of solar. The Whirlpool effectively uses well UNDER 7% of my 15Kw battery capacity and allows me to run other systems. Now, mini-split still uses too much energy on COOL. DRY setting uses about half of COOL but I have to add electric fans to move the air around the RV. Having 2500watts or more of available solar would allow me to run the mini-split on COOL and replenish fully each day.

[@Bob_Adkins]

Long term, you'll probably want to double or triple the solar panels, and make sure the power station can run the fridge for at least 24 hours in case you get a lot of cloudy days in a row.

[@johnbarron4713]

A more complete calculation than CHATGPT gave me. Thanks.

[@Steven-cx9pf]

Great info, i have worked out my fridge daily power usage but never factored in the inverter loss.

[@gooseknack]

Running a conventional household fridge from solar isn't the wisest use of solar in general. The compressors aren't the most efficient. I do understand the premise of your video is keeping food cold or frozen during a power outage with pre-existing refrigeration. I can contribute information based on portable 12/24 volt compressor fridges, as have been running such from small scale solar for the last 7 years in a 12 volt system in Australia. (Apologies in advance for using amps and Amphour ratings. This is how we calculated off grid solar up until the lithium entered with "watthour" ratings. I still prefer Amphour calculations). Was able to power 2 x Endgel fridge/freezers totalling 140 litres in capacity. A 60 litre and an 80 litre, respectively. The average daily sun was close to 8 hours with 5 peak hours in summer in Australia, obtained by keeping the panels pointed towards the sun. Running both as a fridge, 2 x 160 watt solar panels and 4x175AH AGM(two batteries would have sufficed) powered these two without issue in 40 celcius heat. Average power usage per day was between 30 to 40 amps combined, dependant on overnight temperature. There was amble power to spare running as fridge's. Running the 80 litre as a freezer instead, was a different story. It required two additional 160 watt solar panels for a total of 4 to maintain the batteries in that same 40 celcius day time heat(the nights rarely dropped below 25). The 80 litre Engel was set to minus 11, which is enough to maintain frozen foods(vegtables, sausages and kfc chicken) for the 2 to 3 weeks that it was in there. Meat was placed in the bottom. During the heat of the day the 80 litre Engel as a freezer ran continuously to maintain the minus 11 in that 40 degree heat. The compressor did not begin cycling off until roughly 9 pm. It continued to cycle on for between 40 and 50 minutes out of every hour until the internal temperature stabilised The power usage was around 70 to 80 amps per day. Hourly current draw was between 3.5 and 4.5 amps at 12 volts. Winter is far less of an issue here in Australia. 2 x 160 watt panels can run both, using one as a freezer. I obtained power usage data by using inline watt meters between each fridge and the battery bank. The watt meters were for 12/24/48 volt solar/battery systems. The advantage of a portable fridge like the Engel(popular in Australia), Bushman, Evacool, Waeco(terrible company), Companion and many other brands of varying quality and price, is they can run direct from a battery bank without an invertor in between. This system can be operated from a power station. That route is very costly compared to a diy solar batter system of similar capacity. The 4x175AH AGM cost 1000 bucks australian. Lifepo4 of comparable capacity at 12 volts, is 2000 buck australian. Please note, 7 years ago, AGM batteries were the best in sealed lead acid batteries for off grid solar systems. Today, these batteries have been replaced with Lifepo4 in favour of their lighter weight.

[@InimitaPaul]

My fridge freezer has been running on my Delta Pro, Powerstream inverter (the AC is never on, the PS inverter uses 16W), an EF smart plug and 1600W of solar for over a year now. For an entire year it used 339.78kWh and that’s using it normally, opening the fridge 10-20 times a day as a family fridge freezer keeping cool what’s in it, cooling what we put in it and regularly freezing pots of ice cream made in our Ninja Creami. I now have another couple of smart plugs linked to the system providing power to the main bedroom and lounge for an Apple Mac mini, 32” monitor, a 55” TV, a 32” TV, a couple of iPads and iPhones along with the router and other vampire power draw devices. I also have the inverter set to provide 30W of power to my home circuit. Only in the very depths of winter do I need to top it up at night with half price power from the grid, my power bills are essentially just the standing charge, the cost of top up and whatever we use in the kitchen for cooking. Well worth the investment imo, especially given the now proven longevity of Lifepo4 batteries.

[@aprilla2crash]

Not turning on the inverter constantly will save a lot of energy. if you ran it on a timer where it was turned on for 5 minutes every 15 minutes or using a temperature gauge and an arduino microcontroller and splice into the remote of the inverter you could do some interesting things like turn on before the temperature drops and then wait for a minute after the temperature is reached.

[@danburch9989]

A final thought. It would probably be good to have a gas generator with a 3 day supply of gas in case the outage lasts longer than the 3 days that you'll be depending upon the battery bank especially those in the hurricane areas and maybe tornado alley. In the 40 years I've lived in AZ, I can remmember only two power outages and they lasted less than an hour each, neither caused by storms. That's not to say that we in AZ don't have storm problemss; we do and some outages do last for more than 1 day. I do have a genertator just in case.

[@abelincoln3261]

Suggestion to interested solar array / photovoltaic power seekers. When considering or setting up... consider going dc to dc when ever possible DC ACs DC fridge etc... DC powered appliances are available... going dc to dc will create an almost lossless system.

[@justinw1765]

That's what an intentional community called Living Energy Farm in VA does-they power most things directly off the DC.

[@Robert_H_Diver]

Just ordered the delta pro 3, looking forward to using it and maybe “saving” some money on our power bill

[@everydaysolar]

That is a pretty nice unit. Compared to the Delta Pro the increased solar is a very nice addition along with the 240V out capability 👍

[@xlerb2286]

Where I live the solar irradiance numbers are horrible in Dec/Jan. The good news is that a refrigerator isn't needed from Nov-March ;) Another thing to consider in your numbers is if you're putting new items into the refrigerator.

[@1over137]

If you take control of the fridge power youself (more recommended for basic fridges), then instead of the fridge turning off it's compressor, you just shut the invertor off entirely, you will save a lot more power. You will need a bit of "integration code" to link the invertor smarts to your own tempsensor though.

[@charlieodom9107]

I have a 30qt fridge/cooler that I run in my truck, and a 220wh battery lasts between 8-12 hours sitting in the seat of my hot truck in Florida, with the temp set to 37°f. If I let it run all night on that battery, it only uses about 40% on average. I have connected a 100w foldable solar panel to it when at the beach, and that panel keeps the battery at 100% with the cooler set to 34°f. This is with the solar panel laying flat on the ground or leaning up against the cooler.

[@y2ksw1]

For a 200 Wh fridge (15 minutes on) + 25Wh consuming inverter, and a 250W panel, you need one 24V 100Ah battery, if you have every day 10 hours sunlight. I have it running 6 months now and with 2 panels, I also can run my PC for 8 hours daily. For the winter however you may need to double up 😅

[@shmehfleh3115]

The biggest challenge a fridge faces isn't the amount of time it's open, it's the amount of time it has to spend cooling something down that's just been inserted. If you want a good stress test, take a bunch of water jugs at room temperature and stick them in the fridge at once. Then measure the amount of energy it consumes trying to get everything cooled down. If you just want an idea about how long you can go during a power failure, let the jugs cool to the fridge's temp first, then run it on batteries. I find that having an RV-style chest freezer designed to run on DC is a handy thing to have around the house. It's built to be as efficient as possible and to also limit the inrush current it requires to spin up the compressor. It's also smart enough not to run the compressor at full speed when it doesn't need to cool a large mass down. Normally I run mine off just regular AC. But during power failures, I can keep it running for hours using relatively small power banks. And since it uses DC, there are no inverter losses.

[@donh4750]

In a long term power outage I'm going to "turn on" my grid tied inverters (with the main breaker OFF) and use the 24KW solar panel array to charge my delta 2 power plant and offset the power consumption of refrigeration. And in the winter I have a dual fuel generator that I can fire up to charge things up.

[@everydaysolar]

Hmmm, what type of setup do you have where you can use your grid-tied inverters when the power is off?

[@donh4750]

@@everydaysolar you need to consult an experienced electrician. I got a pure signwave inverter and 2 batteries along with loose solar panels to charge the batteries. Then with the main power breaker OFF I plug the 220vac inverter into the house 220vac plug. Then to get 110vac I have a step down voltage adapter. And use that to power refrigeration, tv, and solar generator when the sun is up.

[@markbernier8434]

Something to consider in your calculations is that some appliances are designed to run on DC. If that is the type of load you use, then an inverter and its associated loss (parasitic drain) is not needed.

[@RandomAccountHolder]

Using a dedicated smaller inverter and charge controller will be way more efficient than an Ecoflow. Those things have such terrible idle consumption.

[@bloepje]

My fridge runs at 37W (That's max!), as it is only a half size class C energy fridge. Average in summer is between 9 and 30W.... depends on how many liters of water I put in it to cool it. Temperatures are like 30..37 degrees celsius outside. In the winter (have not tested yet) it would probably be on the low side of 9W average. This is totally different from my small car coolerbox doing 56W non-stop and never being cool enough. It is rated for 87kWh/year in normal use which I can confirm from real measurements that it probably is lower. Class B or A full size split freezer/cooling fridges are about 120kWh/year in use. What I am trying to say is: just upgrade your fridge. Class C is not spectacular, but I needed a cheap fridge quick.

[@aussie2uGA]

Inverter and Energy Star labels on appliances suddenly jump out at you when you start thinking about solar and ecoflows.

[@everydaysolar]

For sure, I was going to mention it but the Energy Guide was about 2X - 3X the energy consumption as compared to what I measured. They might open the door a lot more during their tests.

[@uproarink]

I enjoyed your video. I would like to see a calculation for the breakeven point for these battery systems. Thank you.

[@everydaysolar]

Thanks for the feedback!

[@1over137]

My "rule of thumb" is to power a load with a 24h averaged load of N you will need N*10 watts of solar and the number of days of storage will depend on your climate. In Northern Ireland you would be looking at maybe 2 weeks of storage to make it through December/Jan. If you over panel the install, so to a factor of N*20 then the storage requirements come down a little, they wont halve. If you want to power a fridge which consumes 2.4kWh per day, it's 24h average load is 100W. You would need a kilowatt of solar and about 30kWh storage. If you live in California or Spain, different storage figures entirely.

[@Junior-k6k]

Great vid. The Most In General Data Info.on The Needed Combined Calculated Minimums of Varibles Required According To System & Size " Well Done !" Thank You Friend !"❤

[@sobeit1927]

I’m off grid and decided to use a gas fridge freezer . It costs me around £1 per day to run and means I can be really comfortable with a much smaller solar electric system . An electric fridge got a bit silly when I did the calculations .

[@haroldh3863]

The defrost is a heater.. so you can turn it on / off via external switch, or just manually defrost. You can also schedule defrost for noon when solar production is highest

[@ivantodd4330]

Digital temp control relay. Made to switch on and off your inverter. Can save you most of that 1/4 parasitic draw. From the fridge idle time not needing power. They are cheep now days. I just maxed my fridges built in mechanical thermostat. So that ot would always be on. Put the digital relay probe in the in the fridge. Wired to activate the inverter. 2 things happened it saved me the parasitic draw of the inverter. And the fridge ran more efficiently with the tighter control window of the digital relay.

[@shephusted2714]

an easy hack is to add 4 inches of foam insulation to your fridges and freezers - massive reduction in amount of power needed and simple as going to home depot or lowes

[@justinw1765]

I've learned how to make my own vacuum insulation panels, which are even much better than foam, but unfortunately the wife will not allow such modification as it is "ugly". So I've decided to build a back up (from scratch), small fridge using a combo of TEC's with VIP's, and using unique heat pipe style thermal exchangers for the hot side to boost efficiency. A compressor would be more efficient, but this is a budget build. Also, I'm building it in a way that should also cool it with IR sky window radiative cooling, and not just solar panels. (Downside is that it will have to be placed outside to be cooled when using the sky window IR radiative cooling, and our climate/area is not the best for this form of cooling. Desert and near desert like conditions are best-not the humid and somewhat often clouds that we have).

[@P81OS2]

What an informative video. Nice job, sir!

[@everydaysolar]

Thanks!

[@jameskohnke6239]

Power Factor can have a significant impact on the power actually needed vs. the stated watts.

[@david78212]

True off-grid people are leaning towards the chest refrigerator just because every time you open the door, you won’t lose all the cold air that just flows out of a regular refrigerator. A property insulated chest refrigerator will outperform a regular refrigerator any and every day of the week (for power consumption). Pretty much everything is made for convenience NOT efficiency which is why so much of the market is having an issue with renewable energy. ***years ago I read a study about solar power and a solar array the size of Montana could easily power this country IF we actually had efficient appliances, but we don’t.

[@justinw1765]

There is an intentional community in VA called the Living Energy Farm that primarily runs Solar directly in DC for most of their application/uses. They do have a small battery bank + inverter-controller for nighttime lights etc, but most of the appliances have either DC or universal motors. Plus they made and modify stuff as well. It's a much less expensive system than how most people do solar. The downside is that there is less convenience and they have had to learn when to use energy and when not. But definitely things are not made to be efficient.

[@david78212]

@@justinw1765 yeah, we are being told by power companies and appliance manufacturers that solar is expensive. The people making profits off 50+ year old technologies are telling us that they don't want to change. High efficiency appliances are out there, they don't have the market needed to make it cheaper is the problem.

[@AkosLukacs42]

When you talk about fridges, the ambient temperature should be noted. Looks like they are in a garage maybe? What is the low, high, average temperature during your test?

[@donaldhoudek2889]

Scott, you may be interested in doing a video on the following subjects that are going to be modified. I believe it will affect those with Solar batteries and other things. look at IFC 25 (International Fire Code) and NFPA 855. May have an effect on us all, although there is a slight chance that I could be incorrect... probably wishful thinking.

[@MuzixMaker]

Answer: A roof full of panels and a serious inverter.

[@flutini1]

All good - as long as you have (and are allowed to have) a battery bank to store the power so you can use it when it is dark or cloudy.

[@flutini1]

If not, you are at the mercy of THE GRID.

[@opera5714]

I have a chest fridge that runs only off a car battery. Compressor only runs in the day and only when the battery is full. It will run for 10 minutes and then check the battery voltage to see if it continues. Otherwise it waits 15 minutes before it will try to start again. Inverter only runs when fridge is on. Water canisters store cold overnight. A small computer fan runs all day to circulate the air and prevent stratification. Never buy a chest freezer with cooling coils on the bottom. I can go for days in the rain and this still works.

[@surgepro322able]

Your review is on 120v refrigerators. Aren't there 12v refrigerators available? I would like to see the same review on some 12v refrigerators. They are becoming very popular in RVs today! Thanks for this great review!

[@miguelsalami]

I have a mini fridge with a separate door freezer section I'm going to try running on 200 watts of solar & one 100ah battery. Thanks for the info 😎

[@johncameron2241]

I run both a refrigerator and a freezer on solar panels. Make sure you have a high enough wattage inverter to handle the surge if they both decide to kick on at once and yes it will happen.

[@Tumbleweed5150]

The first advice I give anyone looking to use a solar system is to look for an economy refrigerator and/or freezer. I have an upright freezer that pulls around 75 Watts when it is running, and near zero, (0.4W), when on standby. My 7.5 square foot Vissani refrigerator pulls a tad over 110W, (with normal start-up being 378W), and 0.8W on standby. I understand that most people will need a larger sized refrigerator and freezer. According to data tag: Time aprox. 20m @ 86 ambient temp.; normal use:140W Defrost function: 230W

[@todddunn945]

NREL has a calculator that allows you to get solar input data specific to your address, panel orientation (which way they are pointed and the angle they are mounted at. That calculator also has average weather data built into it. Yes, do use the December results if you want an adequate solar array to provide the power you need all year. You also need to take things like shading from trees into account. I am in Maine and my 1,000 watt solar array does not provide enough power to run my fridge and chest freezer in Winter. To get around that I have a 20 Kwh battery bank. Also those all in one units are terribly inefficient. I have a 4,000 watt continuous, 6,500 watt surge split phase inverter and it only consumes 18 watts at idle for 204 watt-hr per 24 hour period. Finally, when sizing your solar array for one of those all in one units be mindful of their maximum solar input. I think the maximum solar input for the Delta2 1,000 watt unit is about 500 watts.

[@estyria777]

Not all fridges are created equal. Check the energy efficiency and if you're going off grid try to get the most intensely efficient one you can. It'll cost more, but you'll be super grateful when it still runs on cloudy days. Mine is running right now and not draining my system despite being on day 3 of cloudy weather and rain. We're in high eco mode, aka, mobile devices, wifi, and fridge only.

[@Michael-ug3uv]

Super. Notes. On kill switch. From. Mail. Good. Technically. Info yes👍

[@glasslinger]

Cheap inverters and cheap fridges have those horrendous efficiency ratings. It might cost you an extra thousand or two to get the energy efficient models but you will certainly get the money back in run time savings.(My 26 CUFT Whirlpool fridge uses what your little chest unit does!) It was expensive up front but has repaid itself many times now in running costs, even in Houston TX where electricity is cheap.

[@fredterranova3376]

What an awesome video, thanks for posting, it was informative and easy to follow.

[@MrMeasureTwice]

Excellent explanation of the figures and power analysis - Audio was glitchy every time your turned towards your whiteboard - probably on the edge of BlueTooth range to your camera. (if someone commented on that already, then ignore mine).

[@matthewwakeham2206]

My fridge freezer runs on 80-90 watts but pulls at least 1200 watts on start up. That's going to be very hard on inverters. I went for a victron 1200 VA unit for that reason as it's a low frequency inverter with a 2400 watt surge capacity. You can hear the transformer buzz when the fridge kicks in.

[@everydaysolar]

Yeah, I know many off-grid guys caution using high-frequency inverters for loads like this. Thanks for the feedback 👍

[@danielrodding8522]

Comment on number 3: It Is NOT sufficient to calculate with a factor of 3, especially if you're working with a very small solar installation. Also, keep in mind that effective power is not all of it. There is also reactive power which has to be considered. The output capacity of power stations is sometimes measured in watts, and sometimes in VA. The effectively usable watts are less that whats specificed as nominal output power in VA.

[@yurishnirman3847]

In the math part, seems like solar system size meant to recharge the battery in one day for 3 day usage.

[@everydaysolar]

Yeah, it is a bit of an aggressive example of trying to regain all the usage in 1 day. This would be for the examples where you have a string of cloudy days, 1 with sun, and then another string of cloudy days.

[@Jokerwolf666]

If you have enough panels and you live in a sunny enough place it's not an issue for most. You would definitely want a solar-friendly fridge if you're in a camping situation.

[@PeterMilanovski]

I think that your wh measurement for the larger fridge could be off by a bit, you mentioned that you opened the door about 5 times to simulate normal use, if I'm not mistaken, the defrost cycle is triggered by a counter which is activated by the light circuit! By opening the door between 7 to 10 times will trigger the defrost cycle and that's when the fridge really begins to draw some current.... My fridge run's 24/7 from solar plus battery, I have caught it running the defrost cycle and the motor at the same time and the defrost cycle on my fridge consumption is 450w alone.... The chest freezer doesn't have a defrost cycle and therefore should consume a lot less energy than the upright fridge.... I would suggest that you should re run the test on the larger fridge, either open the door at least 10 times or you can open the door and push the light button a few times which should trigger the defrost cycle.... I think that you might get different results from that test... Possibly more than 900wh of consumption.... There's really no comparison between the chest freezer and the upright fridge when it comes to power consumption and efficiency.... I think that it's long time overdue for a kitchen redesign to incorporate chest Freezers instead of the upright fridge.... The chest freezer could double as kitchen bench space....

[@user-po3ev7is5w]

It's a mistake to use a "normal" fridge with off grid solar. You want to go with a VERY insulated 12 or 24 volt DC top opening reefer and freezer. Use the right tool for the job

[@five-toedslothbear4051]

I have a Dometic cooler that runs on 12 V or 120 V that I use for camping. I keep it cold all the time on house AC, and use it as a drink cooler. When I run it on 12 V from batteries, uses about 12 amp hours per day, and I have portable lithium iron phosphate batteries that I use for amateur radio, about 160 amp hours worth. I have definitely kept this cooler cold on camping trips when we don’t have electric by using folding solar panels that I use to charge the batteries during the day. The cooler is capable of freezing temperatures, and they do make versions that have two sections, so you can have a freezer section and a refrigerator section. So my strategy is that if we have a power outage I move a decent amount of perishable food, and my refrigerated medicine to the cooler.

[@66gtb]

Well done👍

[@plinble]

You'd think an electrical engineer would have made a zero standby loss inverter by now. After many years of development phone chargers have no measurable standby current. Class D amplifiers, also, it's what I use for audio at home, all the energy goes to the speakers.

[@__GALLANT__]

Neither refrigerators nor freezers run constantly at their maximum power rate. Any method of calculation that does not consider the compressor(s) will not always be running, will result in overkill. Also, in times of great emergency, when you're using your solar battery (or even gasoline or dual fuel generator), it is possible to use timers to stop the demand for power for anywhere from an hour to two and 1/2 hours. In other words, if you're relying on your solar battery to sustain your chest freezer (for example), depending on the efficiency of the freezer and the amount of food in the box (more is better because it requires less energy to keep a full box frozen than a partial), you can set a time to have that freezer only draw from your batteries every hour and then off for an hour. That will preserve your precious solar resource until you can recharge.

[@everydaysolar]

Thanks for the feedback!

[@MrPir84free]

If the power is out, and it's warm out, ice consumption tends to go up; reality is you may not have hot showers nor HVAC either. If the power is out, well, you certainly will be eating out less, meaning you'll be cooking your own food more. Shortages of food is normal during extended outages; if you aren't shopping for food to restock your refrigerator on day 1, well, you may find it harder to source food that you desire to buy. Your power measurements should take into account a trip or two a week where you purchase food, to replace what you ate, and that resulting load that ensues when you put that food into your refrigerator. If you haven't experienced an extended power outage, like 10 days in a row, you may not completely understand. But it's something you should try to consider. Other things to consider: How do you plan on cooking that food? Do you have other power needs beyond that refrigerator ? Medical needs that require power or consideration ? Powering a fridge is one thing; but the conversation should go a bit deeper.

[@petermilne9598]

Our Digital Inverter Samsung full size fridge uses so little power - its a joke I was stunned I was also angry I had wasted years or paying for LPG gas for our old fridge (it used 500grms of LPG per day at a cost of about $3NZ for day

[@everydaysolar]

Yeah, I know many people are leaning towards the inverter refrigerators to bring down the energy consumption. Thanks for the feedback!

[@newporttom]

@@everydaysolar I was Today Years Old when I found out about Inverter Refrigerators

[@PatrickKQ4HBD]

​@@newporttom And there are inverter microwaves too. Very handy.

[@anomamos9095]

Refrigerators are now mostly using inverter technology. I’m not sure of the details of this but I assume that they are using some sort of motor that can be controlled using pulse width modulation for speed control. This is likely a 48 volt dc motor . I’m guessing that it wouldn’t take much to add a second DC power input circuit to the inverter so that it could run directly off battery power. But even if the circuit is already printed on the board and mostly populated the DC option will probably add hundreds of dollars to the purchase price.

[@MM-ix5nf]

I was trying to get a 12v DC/24vDC refrigerator to avoid some of the losses by cutting out the converter but those things are surprisingly expensive for their size.

[@K2teknik.]

If you have the refrigerator already then you can get the compressor replaces to a 24V DC one. It is for sure the way to go if efficiency it what you aim for, the idle looses when using an inverter for a refrigerator is a bit on the high side.

[@frankmaze1972]

Go with atleast 2.4 kw of panels to ensure that you're getting a solid 2kw, run a 48v system. A 48v 400ah battery bank will work great with this, and pair it with a n efficient inverter. That's enough to power my small house 9 months out of the year, and I have grid power to fall back on. Panels are cheap, batteries are expensive, and guess which one you need more of..

[@MrFredsDIY]

Great video, lots of data!

[@JeredtheShy]

I want to know how much solar panel will keep a deep freeze going. Those are notoriously efficient.

[@abelincoln3261]

I suggest you either use kwh or also mention kwh to watt hours... more viewers will understand your math that way without needing to do the calculations...

[@KismetBP]

Wow, what an amazing and concise overview. +1 Sub ❤

[@everydaysolar]

Welcome to the channel 🙌