Questions about solar voltaic and sustainable living

Factual Questions
1

Well, it looks like the Happy Wanderer is finally settling down. Some friends and I are being ousted from our cheap rental in Beautiful Midtown Burbank, because it seems that at this point in the residential real estate cycle the landlord thinks it is time to build condos :rolleyes:, and given the monthly outgo on a reasonable replacement rental, and that some of us still have jobs in LA, the only sustainable solution seems to be living outside LA in the Antelope Valley around Lancaster.

The plan is to outright buy cheap buildable property and put our talent and time into building the place, so almost all labor would be sweat equity,

We are looking at half an acre near California City. It has municipal water, phone, power and a septic field. We want to build an eco-friendly home out there and, while not being off the grid, actually being a net contributor. We figure if Solar can work anywhere, it will work there.

As the techno-brainiac of the group, I have been charged with designing the thing.

I was looking at solar panels and they seem to all generate the same amount of power per area and cost, and I was wondering if anyone knew if there was a reason to select one brand over the other. I was looking at the Sharp 200w panels in particular. Is there any objective data on longevity, reliability, etc?

The second question I am interested in is that is there anything that precludes using reflectors of some kind to concentrate sunlight onto the panels to improve the output? Or are they designed for a maximum output at full sunshine? What about hazy days where there is still some directional light but less than full sunlight? What about winter when even angling the panels doesn’t compensate for the additional atmosphere? Can some kind of passive/active reflector system be employed?

Anyway, the property is out in the Mojave desert, think Edwards AFB, dry lake beds, Joshua Trees, etc.

Our objective is to have the net excess electricity we generate pay the property taxes and water bill so we all have a home with zero cash going out.

Other features we want on the property include a grey water system, black water composting, year round greenhouse, etc. Wind power is also appropriate in the high desert and a good compliment to solar because usually the reason the sun isn’t shining is because it is stormy and blustery!

This will be a clean sheet design, so there is lots of opportunity for synergy. I also want to use the place as a test bed for some ideas of my own that I will choose to keep proprietary for now. :wink:

So if anyone on the board is a maven, please point me to some up-to date information, and maybe let me know some of the pitfalls. One I am concerned with is that we put a bunch of money into the existing technology when there may be a big breakthrough soon. Google power? Anyway, we will be dollar costing in as we grow the place, so we are sheltered a little.

This is a done deal, something that is going to proceed, as we are in the process of formulating an offer on the land, and have nowhere else to go!

Thanks for replies, and I will keep The Dope up to date as we proceed. May this thread outlive the darn wallet thread. (What ever happened there, yah I’ll look it up)

Be patient for the updates though, as the Internet service up there is down to 56k, cell, or dish :frowning:

2

Jesus Christ on a Crutch. My Dad owned land out there in CA City, and a more miserable worthless place I have never seen. He left me the land, some 5 acres and I was happy as hell to sell it for $500, cash. That was FIVE fucking acres, within CA City limits, and I had to work hard to get Five Hundred freaken dollars. I would have sold for a single dollar (The property taxes were a killer). :eek: That means that your half acre is worth somewhere between $50 and 10cents. :eek:

Dude, go out there and live for a bit, 1st.

3

I would be interested as to when that was. It is not like I am unfamiliar with the area. I lived in Wrightwood for many years and have been all over the Antelope Valley.

Currently, the entire high desert area is booming. It is the Inland Empire of the next ten years. California City is now coming into it’s own. It is one of the fastest growing areas that is still affordable and close to Los Angeles. They have a new Rite Aid and a Ralphs is coming and they just built a Taco Bell and a Mickey D’s, so the expert planners at those corporations seem to think the area has a future. But they don’t know as much as you do. I hope you are enjoying your mortgage out in San Jose’d, when I am not paying bupkis. Property taxes are going to be about $300 a YEAR thank you.

As far as what this has to do with my OP, which was about solar energy, I have no idea, so thank you again for that.

Someone asked Bob Hope “What’s the best way to get rich” and he replied “Go to the end of the freeway and buy all the land you can afford.”

I would love to buy some acerage like you wanted to sell for $50, but it does not seem to be on the market. Perhaps you had a bad realtor.

4

California City is the third largest city by area in California, so I’m not surprised your Dad was able to score some land within the city limits. Although I’ve only passed through it, I agree with your opinion. It gets hotter than fuck in the summer, fucking cold in the winter, and gets seriously windy, in an unpleasant sandstormy kind of way. It will be good for solar and wind power generation, though. It’s one of those places where people say, “Hey, it’s close to the Sierras”, kind of like Fresno, but without any of the conveniences. When the closest nightlife is Mojave, you definitely have to be able to amuse yourself.

It does not strike me as that great a place to grow a garden either.

It sounds ambitious though, and I admire Happy Wanderer’s sense of adventure. Start up a blog about it and let us know what happens. I wish you the best of luck. Make sure you buy a couple of 747 fuselages for living quarters.

5

There’s nightlife in Mojave? You must have a pretty sad idea of nightlife!

6

First of all, subscribe to Home Power magazine. A goldmine for off-grid living.
Secondly, solar PV modules are built pretty well, so going for the best $/W is OK, as long as the warranty is good.
Third, planning to sell excess power back to the utilities to make money is a bad idea. PV power is expensive, and the utilities are not going to pay you what it costs. You are better off sizing your system to provide your average power needs. Any money you make from net metering is gravy. I use the example “Sure, I’ll sell you this $5 bill for $1”

7

Solar power can’t compete with fossil fuels and nukes yet. You are going to have a HUGE up front cost to install the solar panels. From then on out, over the life of the panels, you’ll just happily collect a check from the power company.

However, when it is time to replace your solar panels and you total up all of your checks from the power company, even if they paid you the same rate that they charge you for electricity, you’ll find that they only paid you maybe 1/4th or 1/5th of the cost of your solar panels. Factor in the fact that the power company does not pay you what they charge you, and that number gets much worse.

This is a huge improvement over the cost of solar panels from just 10 years ago, but it still has a long way to go before you can even break even, let alone make enough profit to cover your property taxes and other utility bills.

If the cost of solar panels continues to drop as it has in the past couple of decades, in 10 or 20 years your idea just might work.

8

There are several things wrong with your post.

The first is you are overlooking California’s Solar initiative that will help pay for the costs. Happy Wanderer start here in your quest for solar and go for it.

NJ had a similar plan and it paid for 70% of the cost of my panels. My system will pay for itself between electric savings and carbon credits in 7-8 years and should be good for 20 to 25 years.

engineer_comp_geek: I think you are underestimating the life and payback on panels. As they will last 20 to 25 years, and as electricity keeps going up and probably will continue to do so, the pay back at full price should at least breakeven. If electricity sees a sharp rise in the next 20 years, which is somewhat likely, then the panels will actually save money. Additionally the cost of replacement in 20 to 25 years should be cheaper. Also the electrical generation in
The Mojave Desert should exceed what I can generate in NJ with rain, snow, and cloud cover and partial tree obstructions.

Happy Wanderer, follow this idea up with experts, engineer_comp_geek is supplying you with some outdated or wrong information.

Jim

9

I work with 5,000 other people for a company that makes glass, then coats, laminates & insulates it. With the residential construction market on the downturn for the next few years, we’ve turned to making solar panels. Most of our forseable product will be used for solar farms, but in time a growing home market will be serviced.

As a residential producer of solar energy, you could have an energy bill as low as ten bucks a month. But your installation costs can be at least five thousand and much as thirty thousand, depending on how ambitious you want to get.

As a Californian, you have some advantages, along with the prevalent sunshine. Arnold is on your side, and you might see some tax breaks for your efforts. And if you’re selling in LA and buying out in the tulies, your profit margin might allow you to lay out those big installation costs.

But what kind of windstorms do they have up there in the high desert? You’ll want to assess the weather for it’s potential to destroy your investment.

(Lancaster/EAFB area? What about skinheads & air force brats with nothing better to do than throw rocks? :stuck_out_tongue: )

10

Would the sand etching the top surface cause the surface to be less transparent over time?

11

Not in your lifetime.

12

Go sign up at the *Mother Earth News* forums, lots of folks there who’ve got hands on experience with what you’re trying to do.

13

FYI, this month’s issue of Circuit Cellar has a couple articles on PV-based energy generation for the home.

14

You might also want to look into solar thermal power generation, as it’s a bit cheaper than solar cells (especially if you build it yourself).

15

Other than DHW, there aren’t any home-scale solar thermal power applications that I know about…

16

It’s also used for home heating (not really a problem in California, I’ll admit), and I’ve got a DIY guide for using it to run a refridgerator. Happy could conceivably offer his new place as a test bed for one of the solar thermal companies, or build his own.

17

Oh. Heating, not power . Passive Solar design is the way to go. Active is so 70’s.

18

You could do power as well. Get yourself a steam engine (plenty available if you google for 'em) and hook it up to an off-the-shelf generator. Working it out so that you can generate power after the sun goes down is another matter.

19

I think that location would also be suitable for a wind power generator, too.

But I think they require an even bigger upfront investment than solar panels. And possibly a city permit for a tower.

20

This map should show if it’s a good area or not. What with Governator having so many high powered friends getting into green living, I don’t think permits should be too hard to get. Leno’s garage is going green. He’s pretty logical in his thinking too

:smiley:

These books (as well as others published by the same company) probably will come in handy, now that I think about it.