1/16
Just realized that my obsession with not burning all of my waste
which was largely inspired by my desire to build my soil and catch and store water on my property is equally a smallscale example of me not in a very direct way producing green house gases but rather putting the carbon back into the soil. Climate change is yet another in the list of reasons to rebuild soil . . .
1/24
Who Killed the Electric Car states that there are numerous scientific studies that say that the ecological impact of running cars on coal fired electricity would be better for the environment than burning gasoline and oil.
I contend that as we transition to electric cars, we hopefully will find more renewable sources of electricity consumption and develop public transportation infrastructure and lifestyle choices of conservation for driving.
This plays into the dialog of Energy from burning petroleum or from burning coal to make electricity to run electric cars.
2/6/13 Awareness
Our old batteries are probably not sufficient to run the pump through the night which justified my decision to get an 85 Gallon bladder and the 2" water line running to the house for more water storage since I may choose to cut the pump off at night and live each night with only 85 Gallons of pressurized water. I realize that how much maintenance and juggling you are willing to put into your scene directly informs how big the system needs to be. Unfortunately, cheap fossil fuels has made everybody want what they want whenever they want it.
2/10
The main problem with DC is that you lose a lot of power as you carry it over distance
With AC, one can use a transformer to boost the amount of energy 1000x to send over strong power lines then you use a transformer at the other end to make it 120V 60 Hz home use stuff. . .
This must be why we needed the closest transformer number to our house if we wanted to get ‘on the grid’ because one transformer must only be able to supply so much electricity.
3/1/13 -- Grid Tie
Grateful to be learning about tying our scene to the grid so that we can limp along on these batteries for another few years. Recommended low battery cut out is 22 volts but i'm thinking i don't want my batteries to discharge this low each night. I think that's recommended so that when motors surge, system stays on batteries. I am curious to explore the possibility of a timed switch to transfer to grid at midnight to run only the fridge through the night. I want to keep our batteries because ultimately, our inverter needs to run with batteries and I don't want to buy new batteries now that we are grid tied. When these batteries die, I'm gonna have to buy a new inverter. And I'm hoping this inverter has a few more years in it and that we can limp along on our batteries with back up grid power until then.
1/17
Rather than using energy to create systems that rely on heavy inputs of energy
we should use energy (renewable or non renewable) to design systems that are simple to maintain, designed for extended life, adaptable to multi uses,
2/3
We elected to put in a transfer switch. Although it would be fairly simple to remove the wire that sends electricity to the two houses and instead land it on the incoming main from the grid, we elected to have a switch so that family members uncomfortable with rewiring our electrical system could simply flip a switch and we can go from solar to grid. My ideal is to be on solar/grid with the inverter playing the smarts of running our scene off solar when the sun is shining and when the batteries are staying full. Then for the inverter to flip to the grid when the batteries are compromised/low.
2/8
does cheap energy distract our need for self regulation
I notice when I have more chocolate around, it is harder to limit my consumption. . ..
in some ways, trying to mandate stoic asceticism when there is such a bounty of cheap energy is a challenging road to hoe
It is difficult for me because it feels like the good husband can see that this commodity has value for our future selves and our children and grandchildren but to limit the now when there is a seemingly endless quantity is an interesting gruffy.
2/22/13 BreakDown
The family arrived and despite my best attempts to create a system that would function, my sister in law unknowingly grabbed a very high powered blender (1500 watt -- 12 amps) from the house that was running on the solar system batteries and made a smoothie at 7:00 in the morning in the house running off of solar. I am discouraged that having told her previously that she can't use the VitaMix before 9 a.m. because the batteries haven't recharged coupled with that I moved it to the house that has grid power didn't succeed in saving our batteries. The large draw early in the morning can knock an already old/weakened/drawn through the night battery lower than it wants to go and 1 of the cells in one of the batteries was completely shot (so i am grateful for more experience with the hydrometer.)
Continue to have realizations of power tools and high draw equipment running at specific times on a sensitive solar system. Again, how much awareness one is willing to have around a system directly impacts how big the system needs to be.
3/12
I see that there are so many ways to design a system.
I aspire to create an OP that gives a general version of a good way things can happen. This fully within the light of awareness that you could wire your house to accept DC or run on car batteries or just about any other manifestation. The imagination of the designer is the only constraint. That being said, I like the idea of giving a good overview of what a solar system entails.
1/20/13 - Batteries
I love the concept that roots are a battery for plant life.
Roots store energy for plants -- colder climates, they store energy below ground for perennials to reshoot.
2/4/13 Competence
Very gratified today convincing my mexican plumber in spanish that going with a 3/4 Horsepower pump and an 85 Gallon bladder was good design for our solar system.
I used a line loss calculator for the first time in a real life situation
I wanted to know the different wire size i would need to run a 1/2 hp vs. 3/4 vs. 1 hp pump the 50 meters from our electrical shed to the water pump by the cistern.
Basically a line loss calculator takes into account the voltage, the length of the run
This was very fun as the voltage could be 110 or 220, and the pump was variable as well.
The # 4 wire I would have needed to run a 1 horsepower pump drawing 20 amps on 110 was cost prohibitive. But when I reduced that to a 3/4 hp pump drawing 12.5 amps at 110 meant that I could buy #8 wire which was only 50 dollars more wire than the #10 that I would have needed to run any size pump on 220. I bought 3 #8AWG wire so that I could run 220 or 110 with a way oversized ground. The resilience and potential solar savings by wiring for 110 made sense to me because our inverter can only put out 110. Another option would have been to invest several hundred dollars into a 110-220 transformer.
Rule of thumb is to keep line loss in the range of 2-3%. Always a play between buying more wire (oversizing wire is NEVER a problem) vs. buying an extra panel to create more energy to not care as much about line loss
My plumber encouraged using a 1hp pump and it felt like a good validation of my electrical understanding and spanish to successfully explain to him the constraints of our solar system and wire size and amperage draw on 110 and saving those 7-8 amps by going to a 3/4 hp pump which should really only slow down how quickly we fill the 85 gallon pressurized bladder rather than compromising the motor on the pump (that being said, i took this info in and most people generally agreed not to try to fill an 85 gallon bladder with a 1/2 hp pump.
3/13/13
As I write simplify, simplify, simplify -- i realize how enlightened Thoreau was and i look forward to reading Walden again when i've got some leisure time.