Simply setting up an off-grid solar system with inverter and batteries connected to the primary side of an automatic transfer switch. With the grid power connected to the ‘reserve’ side on that automatic switch. Whenever battery power is available, the whole house will run on that, when/if the batteries run out, it will automatically switch to grid power. And automatically switch back to battery power when it’s available again.
(My power company is not very friendly toward grid-tie solar systems. So fuck 'em. I’ll go mostly off-grid and only use them for backup power.)
How much do you have to pay for the ability to have a backup, or are you lucky enough to be charged more or less nothing if the batteries don’t go out?
What do you mean by not friendly towards grid tie? Do they charge you more for having solar (supposedly some places in California may have this)? Did they tell you you can’t sell solar power back?
How much do you have to pay for the ability to have a backup, or are you lucky enough to be charged more or less nothing if the batteries don’t go out?
$10/mo service charge just for being connected. Might eventually replace it with a backup generator, but for now, $10/mo is a fair bit cheaper than buying, maintaining, and refueling a generator big enough to run the whole house.
What do you mean by not friendly towards grid tie? Do they charge you more for having solar (supposedly some places in California may have this)? Did they tell you you can’t sell solar power back?
A) You have to apply for permission to have a grid-tie system (with $100 application fee), and that application can be arbitrarily denied if they decide they don’t want any more grid-tie houses in this area. No way to tell if they’d approve it or not; either way, they’re keeping the fee.
B) Part of that application is permits and inspection, and there’s no way my house is passing an electrical system inspection. It was originally built in 1910 and has been added onto and modified many times by many owners since. Some circuits are completely dead, absolutely none of the breakers on my four service panels are labeled … it’s a nightmare. Getting all of it up to modern electrical code would probably involve just ripping out every inch of wiring in the house and redoing it from scratch.
C) They never let me ‘sell’ solar power back. They’ll never pay me cash for it under any circumstance. They give a 1:1 ‘energy credit’ which can be applied toward future power bills and that credit arbitrarily expires and resets to zero once a year, no matter how much you’ve built up. Not a great deal.
I already had my gas connection cut off. Use 4G for internet because the wired ISPs here are shit for various reasons. The only things going in/out of my house that I use are clean/dirty water and electricity.
Solar/battery possibly with a petrol generator backup would allow cutting off the mains electricity too. The daily service charge just to have a mains connection costs as much per year as buying a petrol generator. As long as you don’t need to use much petrol then it rapidly becomes a pretty reasonable choice.
I suppose it depends what export tariffs are like, if they pay you a decent amount for sending energy back then it might cover the service charge for having a grid connection. If it doesn’t, get fucked. Disconnect me, I ain’t paying.
I’d like to hear more about this.
Simply setting up an off-grid solar system with inverter and batteries connected to the primary side of an automatic transfer switch. With the grid power connected to the ‘reserve’ side on that automatic switch. Whenever battery power is available, the whole house will run on that, when/if the batteries run out, it will automatically switch to grid power. And automatically switch back to battery power when it’s available again.
(My power company is not very friendly toward grid-tie solar systems. So fuck 'em. I’ll go mostly off-grid and only use them for backup power.)
How much do you have to pay for the ability to have a backup, or are you lucky enough to be charged more or less nothing if the batteries don’t go out?
What do you mean by not friendly towards grid tie? Do they charge you more for having solar (supposedly some places in California may have this)? Did they tell you you can’t sell solar power back?
$10/mo service charge just for being connected. Might eventually replace it with a backup generator, but for now, $10/mo is a fair bit cheaper than buying, maintaining, and refueling a generator big enough to run the whole house.
A) You have to apply for permission to have a grid-tie system (with $100 application fee), and that application can be arbitrarily denied if they decide they don’t want any more grid-tie houses in this area. No way to tell if they’d approve it or not; either way, they’re keeping the fee.
B) Part of that application is permits and inspection, and there’s no way my house is passing an electrical system inspection. It was originally built in 1910 and has been added onto and modified many times by many owners since. Some circuits are completely dead, absolutely none of the breakers on my four service panels are labeled … it’s a nightmare. Getting all of it up to modern electrical code would probably involve just ripping out every inch of wiring in the house and redoing it from scratch.
C) They never let me ‘sell’ solar power back. They’ll never pay me cash for it under any circumstance. They give a 1:1 ‘energy credit’ which can be applied toward future power bills and that credit arbitrarily expires and resets to zero once a year, no matter how much you’ve built up. Not a great deal.
I already had my gas connection cut off. Use 4G for internet because the wired ISPs here are shit for various reasons. The only things going in/out of my house that I use are clean/dirty water and electricity.
Solar/battery possibly with a petrol generator backup would allow cutting off the mains electricity too. The daily service charge just to have a mains connection costs as much per year as buying a petrol generator. As long as you don’t need to use much petrol then it rapidly becomes a pretty reasonable choice.
I suppose it depends what export tariffs are like, if they pay you a decent amount for sending energy back then it might cover the service charge for having a grid connection. If it doesn’t, get fucked. Disconnect me, I ain’t paying.