The Dark Side: The Truth About Solar Power In Winter - SolarQuotes TV Ep. 6

[@johnrogers1423]

In June 2021 my all electric home in Melbourne with 13.25 kWh solar, 9.8 kWh house battery and 75 kWh Tesla produced 656.76 kWh (57%) and exported 279 kWh (43%). Of the 445 kWh consumed 377.19 kWh (85%) was produced by my solar panels and 68.21 (15%) was imported from the grid. I am home during the day on weekdays and part of the weekend. Solar is definitely worth it in my mind.

[@johnrogers1423]

As I upgraded my original 6.65 kW system to 13.25 kW, deducting $3,000 as an approximate cost of the original 5kW inverter, results in an overall cost for the system of about $19,000. As the original system was purchased four years ago & upgraded two years ago, costs would be lower now. As a result I have no gas, petrol or electricity bills and make a small profit of about $400 per year. More importantly my carbon footprint has been drastically reduced. My system has 19 Jinko 350w Mono and 20 Seraphim 330w BMB panels with optimisers, a SolarEdge 10 kW inverter and a 9.8 kWh LG Chem DC coupled battery.

[@stephenbrickwood1602]

@@johnrogers1423 can you do a benefit calculation/ total of where you would have been pre tax income on the original situation, including petroleum and power bills paid including GST. If you needed $14,000 income to cover your situation now then that is the real benefit. Say $3,000 petroleum per year $5,000 power per year $8,000 total with after tax dollars $14,000 income, say, roughly. Marginal tax is high. Say 40%+ If in the ballpark that shows a huge benefit and more should do it. Further more if the Government does not have to find more energy in an old grid, then the Government would be grateful. Further more you probably provided energy to the grid. Further more you UNLOADED the grid which means the government does not have to expand the grid capacity. Which is more costs.

[@johnrogers1423]

Your figures are definitely in the ballpark Stephen except that, as I am retired, I am not in the 40% tax bracket. The description of my system should have read 22 Seraphim 330w BMB panels rather than 20. Also, although my panels are rated as 13.25 kW, they actually peak at 15 kW as I delay charging my DC house battery until noon. See image at www.johnrogers.com.au/battery_charging_noon.jpg where the house consumption includes charging my EV. Re your comment about the electricity that I export to the grid, I have generated 56 MWh of clean electricity over the last five years of which I currently export approximately 63% to the grid.

[@stephenbrickwood1602]

@@johnrogers1423 additional panels and no battery could make sense. Long hours of feedin tariff would offset a few hours of night tariff. Battery expensive, panels cheap.

[@johnrogers1423]

Unfortunately where I live (Melbourne, Australia) there is a limit on how many kW of panels can be used with a given sized inverter.

[@barryhamm3414]

I'm in SE Queensland, on a sunny winter's day my panels can produce just over 40kWh but during heavy over caste this can drop to below 6kWh. Our only source of energy is electricity with a solar thermal hot water system and my bill for the winter quarter is looking like it will be below $20. Solar works in winter.

[@MatthewBayard]

We've almost made it through our first winter in our Reservoir, Melbourne home. We've only just got wall insulation pumped in yesterday. We got a 6.27 kWh system in high summer this year and have almost managed to pay for our gas bill over winter with the credit. New stop is getting off gas for indoor heating and hot water. And maybe upgrade our portable ikea induction cooktop. Solar certainly works in this Melbourne winter!

[@randyclement2687]

Hey Finn! Great presentations, entertaining, wide ranging and very informative! Just getting ready to get a 5kw system put in here in Canada and your info really helps sorting through the options and considerations. Cheers for that.

[@glutenfreeFamily90]

This was so good :)

[@yggdrasil9039]

I don't think air temperature inside the sauna you were in was 76C or 105C for that matter otherwise the nature of this show would be very different.

[@SolarQuotes]

Have you ever been in a proper Finnish sauna?

[@Ineluki_Myonrashi]

He's right, a Finnish sauna usually runs 80-90c.

[@grahamhutton1633]

What are your thoughts on roof top wind turbines as part of a solar / battery configuration?

[@marktiller1383]

I have a really crap insulated Melbourne house, with the worse windows on the planet . It's really hard to keep my house warm or cool. Just the window would help. Secondary double glazing won't do it, as my bedroom has that and needs to be cleaned inside the 2 glazing, pain in the ass. I really need full euro quality double glazing . But I have heard that the price can be really frightening. I've had 5kwh of solar for 6 year's and a powerwall2 since August 2017 and a sanden heat pump water heater. If double glazing is to expensive, I might as well go up to 6.6 sunpower maxoen panels emphases system, under 7k would do it and I'm pretty sure a quility double glazing would be double.

[@FischiPiSti]

Regarding heat pumps: Almost everyone I'm asking says that if your home doesn't have under floor heating, heatpumps are not worth it, because the radiators require much higher temperature water where heatpumps are not efficient. However, according to websites of reputable companies making heatpumps like Panasonic there are heatpumps that work well with only heating with radiators at high temperatures. I'm guessing some models are better for radiators, others are optimised for efficiency with floor heating. The question is: Is this true? If so, what should I be looking at when choosing a heatpump for radiators? Is there some specific technology, or coolant used or something?

[@yggdrasil9039]

Interesting solar stats. Getting from between 5kWh to 12kWh per day here in Sydney from a 6.6kW system.

[@mtpaley1]

30 KWh per day! OK I live on my own but either the computer or the TV is on most evenings and I run at a average of 5KWh/day with 2 freezers and a fileserver running all the time (while in all day during pandemic this was pushed up to 8). Got no AC here in England and I know that it is power hungry but a extra 25 KHw/day - wow.

[@paul1979uk2000]

Yep, we use around 16KWh per day in my house in the UK, its likely be a bit less since we change the induction hob and dryer which use a lot less energy now, but either way, it's quite low. The problem is, if you go solar, you're going to want to change other things that use gas into using electric so you can save on that, that would bump the energy need up quite a bit. On the plus side, our house rarely needs any heating even in winter, heating is probably on for 2 or 3 days of the year but summers get really hot here, especially upstairs. If the design of the house is done smart, you can more or less have a house where you rarely if ever need heating or air con for the house, we've got the heating done right but not the cooling lol, but to me, that is far more effective than using a lot more energy to heat and cool a home and if battery tech was a lot cheaper, I think I could generate all my energy needs with renewable, the problem is, winter energy generating by solar is not likely going to be enough unless I put an excess amount of panels up and summer generating is going to be too much.

[@rimasmeleshyus9486]

Very important to know about solar panels

[@ChrisLaNauze-Author]

Fin its hard to work out but from your hot water heat pump segment, (I have a gas boiler hot water system) I understand heat pumps are better than traditional electric, but how do we figure out if its cheaper to generate the hot water with gas or electric. Currently I'm with Amber Electric as my energy provider and price per kwh is not so simple, prices fluctuate every 30 minute, ie today I haven't been able to turn the heater on all day, and its a chilli 11deg here in Melbourne. My current live price right now is 45c kwh. Gas seems to me to be cheaper to run per day over switching to an electric system. Or should I look at going greener by switching my boiler to an instant gas hot water system in stead, and concentrate all my dollars on saving for that solar system i want to put in.

[@barryhamm3414]

I'm not able to answer your question. I have an old fashioned solar thermal HW system. Last winter we had to use the electric booster 3 times and so far for this winter only twice. Certainly the running costs are lower than the alternatives but capital costs were higher.

[@Nobody_Famous]

What made you go for Amber if it means electricity is too expensive for you to use when you need it? Surely there is a tradeoff at other times meaning you pay less overall? A fixed rate plan may be better option.

[@ChrisLaNauze-Author]

@@Nobody_Famous Hi, thanks for your input, it is food for thought. I thought that at the beginning, but I was prepared to try something new. The benefit from the app from amber with the realtime price, is it forces us to consider what we will have on, and shift our habits to a cheaper more green time of the day. We have no kids so we can shift our habits. The current higher than normal prices have been explained to us, with a flooding at one of Victorias coal power plants forcing it to go offline, and last month the explosing of the coal powerplant in queensland meaning power being generated for interstate causing higher prices, Amber Electric has insurances which cover them whenever the price goes above the victorian default offer, normal big energy providers usually pocket this, but charge a fixed or tarrif rate, but amber chooses to credit us what our insurance was for this portion, im essentially on a time of use rate every 30 min, so by shifting my consumption i can potentially save. I could have had my heating on, but chose to consume less based on the price. Each day I can see yesterdays consumption on price. So Yesterday we consumed 4.96kwh and it cost me $1.85 with an average price of 37c (in summer this average price was 7-12c). But i just got my bill for june and its come in at $45 (37 for useage +15 for membership - 7 for insurance). we used 169kwh for the month. So far this year my bill (which is monthly) has come to $318.50, I'm in a 3 bedroom house, last year i was in a 2 bedroom rental with origin on a monthly, and same time jan to jun cost me $651.08 so you see I'm gonna stick it out, cost overall it is cheaper than the spike im seeing in winter. Plus if I get solar & a battery, they give extra on top of the vic fit default, so If i get west facing panels, I can make money back when the demand is at its highest.

[@johnhiggins8280]

@@ChrisLaNauze-Author 45 cents a kilowatt that’s insane,we pay 18 cents per kilowatt in Melbourne.

[@ChrisLaNauze-Author]

@@johnhiggins8280 it's wholesale prices. And it's only for 30minutes it fluctuates with the demand. In summer it's been -68 cents we used our aircon and got paid credit back. Our Xmas bill using aircon lots of home Time etc cost us $40 for the month. I'll stick it out want to reach a year so I can blog about it. I've got an export of my usage of for every 30 mins and the price of every 30 mins for the last 6 months which comes from my smart meter, plus I have the powerpal which I can export data from to compare. I haven't found anyone do a full write up online as a customer so I need a full year of data first. I record every bill in a spreadsheet from the last 10 years the only thing I didn't record was consumption. So I can only sort of compare to someone line origin. But basically this last 6 months I've used just over $300 for electricity in a 3 bedroom house, yet last year 2 bedroom unit same time of year cost us $600 and in both cases we had had appliances and heating. Although last year I was on a standown so there was more of me at Home.

[@ausguy4385]

Can't be so sure when it has a 10kwh gas gen set 🤣 they are not cheap.... would double your 10kw inverter system size to 20 easily...

[@davidwatkins8016]

You need a new thermometer if that's centigrade.

[@SolarQuotes]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sauna

[@SolarQuotes]

"Air temperatures averaged around 75-100 °C (167-212 °F) but sometimes exceeded 110 °C (230 °F) in a traditional Finnish sauna."

[@markpurcell4507]

Thanks Finn, very useful. Wish I understood hot water heat pumps last year when I had to replace a failed system. I successfully used SolarQuotes this year to install at 13k system in Canberra. Do you have any recommendations for companies to help with improving the thermal performance of our house.

[@Nobody_Famous]

Have a look at Efficiency Matrix on KZbin for some ideas.

[@pangit9999]

Wow, what an impressive Dad bod!

[@samalj313]

The adjective form of "hygge" is "hyggeligt" or "hyggelig" Cheers from Denmark :)

[@FT4Freedom]

Solar is supplemental. Winter is a huge problem.

[@stephenbrickwood1602]

Just my strong thoughts in general. My fears. Cost of doing little on the climate front maybe far beyond the country can bare. Australians can't migrate to the cooler latitudes of the Great Southern Ocean. Australians do not have a clue how bad the old Australian Government was with new technology. Polluting ICE vehicles are welcomed. Australia will be the first continent to burn 🔥. Desertification is the next step. The Sahara desert is in Australian latitudes. We are a joke and can not speak up for ourselves about the climate destabilisation. Every building is connected to the grid. Every building has a roof for rooftop solar PV system. Every building can connect EV to the grid. The EV big batteries are the solution. UNLOADING THE GRID as the electric future expands is critical. The electric world means a ×5 fold increase in electricity generation. 5 new power plants is STUPID. 5 new power grids is STUPID. Half of the grid is home supply. Half of the grid, the homes can supply themselves and industries. The ends of the grid can supply the grid. Central power plants are background power. We have been in this position since Adelaide got it's big.

[@TheGuruStud]

Only thing dumber than buying a power wall is buying a Tesla car. Throwing money away is stupid. Stop it.

[@terryschutte3946]

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