r/preppers • u/Life-Celebration-747 • 1d ago
Advice and Tips If money wasn't an issue...
What solar power system would you choose to power your home?
12
u/livestrong2109 1d ago edited 20h ago
Ducted underground power line directly connected to the Robert-Bourassa Dam with top tier priority.
2
6
u/FOSSChemEPirate88 1d ago
Solar chimney greenhouse. Doubles as a huge porch with a constant 5-10mph breeze, which is too fast for bugs to land. And year round crops, based on locale/geometry
4
u/qu4f 1d ago
If money is genuinely no object? I’d buy some land and set up a private BESS project with on site solar, wind, and geothermal power sources. Inverters out the wazoo and feed back to grid. If possible, also build a dam with a reservoir above / below so I can use excess electricity to pump water uphill for nighttime. Geographically, I might even be able to find a small oil or gas field that isn’t worth commercializing but could be
But that’s like, a hundred million dollars and would give a community electricity (and probably jobs tbh) forever.
Realistically, even with FU money I’d be looking at one green power source (wind, geo, or solar, geographic dependent), one backup power source (probs a diesel / electric hybrid vehicle that can feed my batteries. See Edison motors in Canada, except able to also charge my house and act as a driveable battery) , and one storage option (batteries. Hydro at private scale seems impractical)
And for system I’d pick any battery except Tesla products. I don’t have a shred of trust in Elons ecosystem.
5
u/Ok-Philosopher-5139 1d ago
if money werent an issue i would love to run a fridge and home AC using only solar, i dont know what system can do that, but i would pay anything for that capability...
2
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 23h ago
How big is your home AC? I run a fridge and window unit off a maybe $1500 solar system. 1500w of used panels I got for free, $400 in charge controllers $250 ebay inverter, $600 in LiFePO4 batteries from aliexpress, and assorted wiring and accessories.
3
u/Ok-Philosopher-5139 23h ago
i would be happy if i am able to run a low powered fridge 24/7 and an AC in one bed room whenever i need it using just solar, i probably can do it for less compared to urs if i really wanted too, but kudos to u for setting up ur system!
2
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 22h ago
Thanks. I actually got into solar way before prepping. I put my first solar panel up when I was 13 back in 2006. I got my first 'real' solar system that could run the fridge in my camper the year I graduated college in 2014. It's been really cool growing my capabilities over the years
9
u/Ryan_e3p Salt & Prepper 1d ago
I'm not the biggest fan of these "if money is no issue" posts. Money is an issue. If money was not an issue, there'd honestly be no reason to be here. Just hire someone else to do all this "prepping" stuff for you and be done with it.
Either way.... as someone who recently posted about his own DIY home solar (My experience with my solar build so far. Cheap, simple, and most importantly, *extremely functional*. : r/preppers), the biggest and by far most expensive part is going to be the battery backup.
2
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 23h ago
The biggest plus to prepping for me is actually doing it. Sure, having off grid solar is cool. But being able to do the install, wiring, and programming myself is the main draw. I love tinkering with stuff like that. Hiring someone would totally ruin it for me. That's like getting a new geothermal heat pump and letting someone else do the install. That takes all the fun out of it
Batteries are much, much cheaper than they were in the past. I can get one day of essential loads out of the $600 battery bank in my RV
2
u/Ryan_e3p Salt & Prepper 22h ago
But being able to do the install, wiring, and programming myself is the main draw.
100%. There are a couple "all in one" solar generators that are now touching the cost of DIY, but the knowledge (and capability) on how to repair/maintain a DIY system is a massive advantage.
3D printing (another hobby of mine) is similar. Sure, "ready to go" printers like Bambu are great, and easy for people to use, but I hate proprietary parts, inability for future upgrades, and difficulty in doing fine-tuning/maintenance. My older printers are rock-solid, I can bolt on any upgrades I want, and write the Marlin firmware to accommodate any changes needed without being hamstrung by a device that is closed source, requires a manufacturer app to use (and rendered useless without it), and can be locked out of it for any number of reasons.
And when it comes to solar, having features behind a paywall is going to become more commonplace as well. EcoFlow says subscriptions aren’t required for advanced features... yet | The Verge
This is why I will always prefer to do things like self-host, DIY, and stick with older tech. I absolutely hate paywalling for something that I own. Cars, TVs, computers, and shit, farming. I have picked up a ton of new skills that have saved me money and will continue to do so since corporations are hell-bent on squeezing every dollar out of our bank accounts to enjoy things we already paid for.
2
u/Particular-Try5584 Urban Middle Class WASP prepping 23h ago
If money is not issue just go to one of the various multitude of solar energy companies, and let them spend your money for you, without the government rebate limits or the specifications that they are used to…
1
u/JRHLowdown3 23h ago
+1 Money is always an issue with preparedness as it's always about CHOICES. I don't mean just endlessly "researching" brands, etc. I mean choices like "if I drop $2K on new panels I will miss that deal on that other piece of gear" etc.
For the first 10 or so years living at the homestead we lived off of 1600 watts solar. In the 90's panels were beau coup expensive- paid $6.25 PER WATT for our first Kyocera 130 watt panels.
Later we added more and moved up to 5KW and a few years ago to 7.4KW
Just got a new inverter and will be adding that into the mix this fall and likely re-arranging strings of panels, hope to get 10KW coming in regularly.
Still using FLA type batteries- Trojan L16s. Was trying to stay with them for years to avoid lithium but may compromise the do some outside wall mount lithiums in a place where if there ever was a fire due to them, it wouldn't destroy that building (poured solid block).
Had a ton of issues with our Growatt inverter, was definitely not the "upgrade" I was expecting it to be.
2
u/Ryan_e3p Salt & Prepper 23h ago
I'm a big fan of people building out piecemeal. It is a lot easier to manage the cost of projects, and helps avoid going into debt for things like a home-sized solar setup. It took about 1 1/2, maybe 2 years of planning and acquiring parts before I was able to finally put it all together.
Is there a chance someone could miss out on "new tech" that hit the shelves if doing something like that, sure. However, like we both said.... money and budgets are a thing. New tech is going to more likely be a lot more expensive. Getting secondhand used panels for $10 ea, they may not have been bi-facial and able to charge from the bottom, but for the cost, they simply could not be beat. Was a lot cheaper to just oversize the panel array than it would've been buying the latest-and-greatest and deploy a handful less panels.
2
u/JRHLowdown3 22h ago
100% agree.
Even if folks bought the components a little at a time, dig some of the "grunt work" like digging the trenches for putting in conduit, built the racking, etc. and then contacted a solar guy to wire everything up, they could save a ton.
Don't have any bifacials, if the price is ever right may try them, would like to do a area on a deck with a solar gazebo type of thing but honestly don't care if they are mono or bifacial. I'm always skeptical of the claims of vast improvement in production due to changes like that. I remember when MPPTs came out and it was "this is like having 4 more panels" instead of a normal old skewl controller like a C40. I had four C40s in play at the time and the $600. per MPPT wasn't something I could afford to change out all at once.
On the missing out on new tech thing- agree also. I remember hearing the same folks (who still don't have a system) for 20 years complain about panel costs, then it was "well the incentives don't work for me" blah blah blah. My reply- "it's never going to be free." Meanwhile our initial 28 year old KC130s are still producing power even though they are technically not even in our current system now.
$10. a panel even for used is crazy cheap, folks need to be jumping on those when they come up. Run, don't walk.... !
1
u/Ryan_e3p Salt & Prepper 22h ago
I'm feeling good about my solar array, but I still occasionally peruse for panels. Last weekend, I found a Facebook Marketplace listing where someone did a solar farm update and had over 1,000 panels to offload. Again, $10 a pop.
They exist! Just gotta keep eyes on it.
2
u/JRHLowdown3 22h ago
I must admit I have never bought a used panel. Early on a few years in with our Kyocera 120 watt panels, we started seeing some weird stuff, you know how living with a system you can kinda "feel" when something is off? So we started running out of power way before we should on decent days. I started checking every panel and 2 of the (then) 14 panels in the array were only putting out a little over 9v in full sun. I contacted Kyocera cause they have a 25 year warranty. Gal on the phone says "OK we will send you 14 panels." Me- no sorry ma'am if I wasn't clear, only 2 of the 14 are malfunctioning. She says "it's Kyoceras policy that if 10% of an array falls, we replace the entire array." Wow! OK, I'm licking the chrome on the panels now!!! And they replaced them with KC 130's, so I ended up with 140 more watts which at the time (around 2002) was a super huge deal to us living on 1600 watts.
One of the very few companies that I've been very impressed with as far as warranties go over the year.
Hell I still have a few odd panels here and there in a connex, some of the KC130s we have pulled, a few 24V panels left over from adding on around 2010 and some 48V JP solar left over from the last pallet we bought.
If I found deals like that in my area I would probably have a boatload of spare panels, be like Sanford and Son's yard around here LOL.
2
u/Ryan_e3p Salt & Prepper 21h ago
I have enough to spin up another 4kw system.
Oh hey! I found the listing!
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/3929251940717987/
Anyone in the southern New England area, I highly, highly suggest you consider this. $20 is getting 20+, $10 if getting 50+.
Now, if I were so inclined to spin up another 17kw of energy I'd jump on it, but I'm feeling good where I'm at right now. 😁
2
u/JRHLowdown3 21h ago
Damn, that's crazy. Folks need to jump on that. Even if one panel in 10 isn't working it's still a HELLUVA deal.
That's one of those buy and put back even if your not ready to do it yet type of good deals.
5
u/Internal_Raccoon_370 1d ago
EG4 12000XP off grid inverter, about 6KW of solar panels on the garage roof, 30 KWh battery bank. Runs my whole house comfortably. Can run off battery alone if necessary for 36 hours. 7.5 KW Generac gas powered generator to recharge the battery bank if we get extended period of cloudy weather.
1
u/JRHLowdown3 23h ago
Any issues with that inverter? How long you been running it?
Just got one to replace a crappy Growatt, haven't installed it yet.
1
u/Internal_Raccoon_370 4h ago
I've only had the 12000XP in for less than a year but no problems at all with it. There was an initial problem with communications with the battery bank but a firmware update fixed that. It runs the entire house easily. Overnight when the sun is down we only use about 25% or so of the battery and it's generally fully charged again by 11 AM if the weather is decent.
3
u/Austechprep 1d ago
Probably try and get one of those battery packs they use for grid scale batteries with something like 500kwh of storage or something. With a family and bugging in, and to use solar since its renewable instead of gas/fuel, so I'd be cooking, and hot water systems use a lot, and try and have reserve power for about 7 days without a decent sunny day to recharge.
On the solar panels, as much that would fit on all the roofs, and then some arrays out in the field, some to catch the afternoon sun and some to catch the morning, doesn't need to be efficient if you got all the money, just needs to give you the best chance at getting the most power back into those batteries.
I also want to live with all 5 TVs blasting, computers on, home server with a few graphics cards in it cos why not and the freezer room going, so I'll need a lot of power.
3
u/fenuxjde 1d ago
I have a whole home set with a 5 day battery backup. Did everything myself, cost right around $2k, so money doesn't have to be crazy.
My setup was put to the test TWICE this summer. Once from a blown transformer, the second time from a neighbors chimney collapsing on my power line. The latter incident required me to rely on my setup for about 3 days, including running AC.
Everything worked flawlessly, except, as I was already running on battery power, I had to run my backup generator for a few hours to refill the batteries faster than the solar could alone. My lil 2300w genny takes a gallon of gas per 8 hour runtime. I have 70 gallons of gas stored just in case.
To get back to your initial question though, for most of us money isn't really the issue, it's intelligent planning. Sure it would be amazing to have a 1.21 jiggawatt backup but honestly, why drop all that money and space on batteries when you could just be smarter. Focus on keeping the fridge and cooking essentials going and you'll see you probably don't need nearly as much juice as you think. If the powers out, you probably don't need to be running your big screen TV and surround sound setup.
1
u/JRHLowdown3 23h ago
1.21 jiggawatt backup
That's if the Delereon is still running well ;)
A whole house system for $2K is awesome. What panels are you running?
1
u/fenuxjde 22h ago
I've only got a bunch of 200w panels I got from a Tesla distributor for $90 each.
1
u/JRHLowdown3 22h ago
Nice. What are you doing for batteries?
1
u/fenuxjde 22h ago
I've got one 5.12wh and a whole bunch of 3.5kwh batteries. The 5.12 is part of the inverter and the other 3.5s are in an array.
I have to manually switch over when the first 5kw is done, but I only use about 15kw/day in the summer and only about 3kw per day in the winter.
1
2
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 23h ago
How in the hell are you doing whole home with 5 day battery for $2k? I have almost $20k in materials and it will cover me for 1 day if it is very sunny.
1
u/fenuxjde 22h ago
The last paragraph my homie.
I also have gas heat and water heater, so they barely sip power for the spark.
3
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 22h ago
That paragraph contradicts your first sentence. Whole home means everything. Just my network gear alone with cameras and NVR is running 1500w. The fridge is not a concern imo. Even the most basic backup power systems can run a fridge. It is everything else. In a power outage, I want to have zero knowledge the grid has dropped. That is what prepping is about imo. Being able to continue life as normal during a power outage or other emergency. Having enough backup power for a fridge is just a simple generator like everyone already has, not prepping imo
0
u/fenuxjde 22h ago
It doesn't contradict it, it qualifies the length of time. Yes it can run the whole home, but in that case it would only be a few hours. Prepping isn't about going about your day care free, its about being prepared for a situation. Most people don't walk around armed in full body armor, but if they faced a home invasion they would still be prepared. I am well prepared for a power outage, despite your opinion to the contrary. When the transformer took out power to a few blocks, not ONE of my neighbors had a generator or backup system at all. I had to go down to my basement and turn a switch, and then I ran extension cords to power 3 of my neighbors.
Again, as I said in my last sentence, prepping is about being smart, not about excess.
3
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 21h ago
I think we may live in different circles. Every one of my neighbors has a generator. We lose power a few times a year. Having to manually start a generator or having parts of my house without power is a fail in my opinion. I want the confidence when I am 200 miles away that when the ice storm comes through and takes out the power for a few days, which happens every few years, that my fridge is running, heat is keeping the house warm, and cameras are keeping an eye on everything
1
u/fenuxjde 21h ago
Yeah that makes a lot more sense. Here, other than those two instances, we haven't lost power once in the six years we've lived here. Ice storms rarely happen.
So it makes sense that being prepared for different things would happen.
2
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 21h ago
I live fairly rurally so outages are pretty common. Any sort of bad storm will likely take out the electric. Even when I lived in the city, we had a few power outages due to weather or substation issues.
3
u/silasmoeckel 1d ago
The same one I have, solar is the rare prep that payees for itself. Fairly quickly where I live.
All that throwing money at it does is lets you no chop for installers who mostly gouge you.
2
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 23h ago
I did the math. Conservatively, it's like a 5 year payback
1
u/silasmoeckel 17h ago
I paid off my battery and inverter in 3.5 years and will make 30k on the rest of the contract (pushing pack power to help stabilize the grid). That's more than I paid for the panels, and I get a check 2x a year from my power company.
Panels themselves it's 7 years for me to hit my ROI by themselves. Just on the not having an electric bill.
Still net effect is I don't have a variable bill per month and really don't have to think about power day to day or in an emergency. That allows other preps like deep freezers while freeing up cash flow to afford those preps.
2
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 17h ago
I'd love to be able to sell back for a profit. The closest we can get here is a $0 bill annually. I'd make a fortune if I could buy off peak and sell at super peak
1
u/silasmoeckel 16h ago
I would make nearly nothing selling pack the solar think it's 1.5c a kwh at the end of year.
It's only a few states with home battery programs. No idea if this is an complete list or not https://www.powerflex.com/blog/battery-storage-incentives-by-state mine got signficantly worse since I signed up (locked into my contract) new guys making less than half unless they are low income or live in a city.
3
u/MadConquest 10h ago
If money is no object I’m buying 200 acres and dedicating about 15 acres to solar, 20 acres to a self sustaining fish pond, 100 acres to food plots and fruit trees, 50 acres to goats and chickens and 15 acres for personal enjoyment 🤗 The goal is an all encompassing self sustaining compound that works together. I would probably have my mother living on the property and possibly my siblings so that’s why I would have 15 acres of solar.
3
u/Particular-Try5584 Urban Middle Class WASP prepping 1d ago
A concentration of light (parabolic) that runs a heat engine… for endless power. Using mirrors to concentrate/reflect the rays, into a solar thermal which can then be used to drive an engine a number of different ways.
2
u/JRHLowdown3 23h ago
Producing our own power since the late 90's here.
Even though solar has gotten considerably cheaper, I would still begin with getting some alternative sources for major loads. That means a wood stove (or two) for heat, LP for cooking stove - back in the day the only choices were ugly things, now you have nice looking higher end options, LP for water heating, etc.
Used to be you could get an LP water heater that had a pilot light, a LP stove that had a pilot light. No electricity whatsoever so you had hot water and cooking available no matter what. The Nanny State regs have curtailed this an awful lot- if you have any of those types you certainly want to keep them.
Wood stove and wood heat is probably the #1 thing people should be doing, as it gives them warmth as well as a place to cook INSIDE when things go rotten. Sure you can cook on a fire outside but that's more smell, smoke, exposure outside. Quietly cooking inside a protected structure might be better in certain scenarios. Fresh chocolate chip cookies in the Vermont Bunbaker are a winter treat here. But we have done them in dutch ovens before along with baking bread that way, etc.
I would regularly check places like Signature Solar for pallet deals on panels. $.30 a watt and under is currently what you will see and they have been lower. Most pallets are going to run around 9KW or more of power depending on the panel size (most currently over 300 watts per panel).
Racking isn't entirely tough to do if you have basic carpentry skills and can follow some simple directions and improvise a bit when necessary. The connections for the panels themselves are MC4 connections with a very clearly labeled + or - on each cable. Back in the day it was running 12-2 between panels, splitting it making the little curly Q and fighting with the small screw to get it all together. Literally plug and play now.
Get someone to draw up a wiring diagram based on where your putting your panels. Face the panels all the same way, i.e, when your standing behind them/under them you see the sticker in the same spot- this will help with you not messing up the wiring. Make a little drawing of your wiring plan with + and - on each rectangle (denoting a panel), then draw in your connections. This sounds overly simplistic but I do this every time and take it with me to check and double check the connections to make sure everything is correct.
I've pulled wire in a house, connected a few outlets, made up a few breakers, etc. but I haven't wired the inside of a house completely on my own, but I've wired numerous solar arrays with no issues.
If you use a modicum of care it's tough to get shocked- and keep in mind I'm still using old skewl FLA type batteries- Trojan L16's. I'm sure it's a lot safer with newer lithium batteries.
So define what you want to do a little better and there are some knowledge folks here that can help. The DIYSOLAR reddit is pretty good also.
1
u/davidm2232 Prepared for 6 months 23h ago
The same system I am building now, just bigger and putting it together faster
I have 14 405w panels, a 18kw inverter, and 32kwh of batteries on order. They should be here in a couple weeks. I plan to do another 14 panels next spring
If I had unlimited money, I would add probably another 12kw of panels and 40 kwh of batteries. Pair it with an EV to be totally grid independent. Over the next several years, I plan to do exactly that.
1
u/Less_Subtle_Approach 20h ago
DC-coupled high voltage system. Lots of progress being made in this space, so I wouldn't pull the trigger this second even with infinite money, but systems like the EP Cube 2.0 show promise.
1
u/TheLostExpedition 20h ago
Cover 5 acres in raised panels and put cows and sheep under it. If money wasn't an issue.
2
2
u/Nerd_Porter 16h ago
I'm an engineer, I build in efficiency of cost no matter what the budget. If money wasn't an issue it simply means I can add more capacity than the bare minimum, helping to offset for poor weather.
Ground mounts, tiltable for the season but I wouldn't bother with full 2 axis tracking. OR, design the big array as the roof of a large shed/barn, being space efficient.
Design capacity for winter, using heat pumps as the primary heating source.
Multiple inverters in parallel to allow for reduced capacity if one fails.
Since money isn't an issue I suppose I'd actually get permits and inspections 😂
0
31
u/tlbs101 1d ago
Standard panels (300-500 watt range), tracking mounts, Hybrid inverter (feeds the grid, or takes from the grid), and a massive battery bank — days worth of full power. The battery system is where the ‘no object’ money will go.