1kW solar grid interactive - update

Ross Herbert · 2009-05-15T01:56:17+00:00

My Sharp/Fronius 1kW system has been pumping around 5kW/hr back into the systemon a daily basis since it started running on the 5th May. Perth is experiencingan extended Autumn with sunny days in the mid 20's and no rain, so that is quitegood performance. It should do a lot better in full Summer. Our 2 personhousehold averages a consumption of around 7kW/hr per day and it is now down to2kW/hr per day.Today's West Australian reported on the state budget released yesterday and thissort of news me feel a whole lot happier still.In the budget it was also announced that WA would adopt a gross feed-in tariffof up to $0.60 per kW/hr for renewable energy sources so currently I stand tomake a profit of about $2.60 per day. Of course, as the price of electricityincreases, the profit margin will drop - unless the FiT also increases (which Idoubt). I am now considering increasing my PV array by 4 x 175W panels to takeit to the maximum capacity for the existing inverter.

May 15, 2009 23 Replies

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Davo 17 years ago

Someone gives you a statement based on fact and you reply with a statement based on a generalisation. If you're going to be critical you should at least put some factual data behind your argument.

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terryc 17 years ago

Yep it was definitely the physicist/engineers view. Practically, I want to hear from the techo that services these things.

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Adrian Jansen 17 years ago

If you set the angle to peak winter output (latitude + 22.5), you will get a 45 degree off axis angle in mid summer. That will reduce your summer output to cos(45) = 0.71 of peak ( assuming cosine law holds ). But if you set say 20 degrees higher than that ( ie a few degrees lower than latitude), you will get an off peak of cos(20) in winter, and cos(45-20) in summer, which is a much better compromise. Other values are possible, depending on exactly what you think the winter/summer sun ratio is, of course the cloud cover effects come into this too.

Regards, Adrian Jansen adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net Design Engineer J & K Micro Systems Microcomputer solutions for industrial control Note reply address is invalid, convert address above to machine form.

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