Oh very cool. Next spring will be my first year with my array.
Yes that is correct, I have a ground mount setup. Around 15kw split between two homes.
May build a second 15-30kw ground mount array in the future, as I have a second inverter now bringing panel capacity up to 30kw. Then I would leave the existing 15kw array for my other house.
That would be great, if that would be fun for you.
What's your battery?
I have two battery banks, one for each home.
Array A:
Battery Backup = 48 3.2v EVE LF280 LiFePO4 280AH batteries
Battery Management system = Daly Smart BMS 16S 48V 500A
Battery Capacity = 45.696 kWh (840AH)
Array B:
Battery Backup = 48 3.2v LiFePO4 290AH batteries (unknown brand)
Battery Management system = Daly Smart BMS 16S 48V 250A
Battery Capacity = 47.328 kWh (870AH)
Here is a picture of one of the banks
That is very good. Much better than Tesla Powerwall. Currently Powerwall 3 is only 13.5 KWh each. The 100KWh is the car battery.
Since space is not an issue with you, you don't need powerwall. I say your two battery arrays are plenty.
Thanks.. Yeah this was built on the spot by my friends from Alabama. I bought the batteries, and buss bars. They wired them all up into a 48V array, tied the BMS into the groups of cells. Batteries took a month or two to get to me from china the first time. Second bank I bought in the US and got them pretty quick.
Honestly if I did not have the help from my friends, I would have gone with a power wall or EG4 modular setup. Putting all those buss bars together looks scary..lol
Yes they have handled us well. I also have propane generators for both homes. So the batteries are really just used for the first few seconds until the generator kicks on. We also draw power from the batteries at night, around 1000w depending on the SOC at the time. So during the day the panels are always recharging the batteries, if not they are powering the loads.. So I try not to waste any of the generated power.
For you propane would be cheaper if I have to guess. Great to have both. I say you are way more prepared and off the grid that most people I know.
Its a large cost up front.. each generator was around $12k I believe. But I plan on staying at this home for a long time so I am sure it will pay itself back storm after storm.
Yeah it feels good to have options when the power goes out. About a month or so ago the power did go out and we ran on the generators for around 8 hours without much issue. Just need to adjust the hertz so the inverter did not trip. All and all it worked well.