Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

watch this video on renewable energy in Bangla Desh:
http://microenergysummit.com/

frank

Toys came in the mail. Solar cells as well as the solar pieces. (Solar pieces... bad idea) as well as the inverters. The papers inside described it as a 4K watt not 6 as advertized on ebay. But it does appear to be a nice grid tie inverter. But I think it is solar only. Still going over paperwork. I will need 5- 48volt panels as well as some diodes to make it work because it is 220 volt dc input 110 ac output.

BRB

Looks really solidly built , wonder why they did not put the display so you could see it when the lid is closed?

I think it was to protect it from vandels. It was originally built for and owned by the city of Sacremento, and the e-bay seller bought a large quantity of them on auction. There is a tag warning that it and the solar panels on the building were owned by Sacremento municiple urban development. So I guess they were in the city. Cost me $200 each in shipping. They weigh 150 lbs each. I'm still trying to figure out how to use the other for the wind turbines without spending a fortune in batteries, diodes, and or a transformer configuration.

"I think it was to protect it from vandels", figures.

If it was designed for solar it should have a fair tolerance on input voltage. I take it your wind turbines put out ?ac.

Well that is what I was planning because from what I understand it takes less wind power to produce watts with 3 phase ac than dc and I just do not have much wind. Winter time gives me wind zone 2 the rest of the year its only wind zone 1. That is why I was thinking I would need 20- 12volt batteries in series yet the wind turbines would only be producing between 12 to 36 volts. So they would have to get in on the 12 volt level, and then be steped up to 220 volts dc to get in the inverter. That is a lot of batteries I wouldn't mind 10 batteries but would have to step up from there. I'm still thinking thru this one.

4k watts is going to need a bit of grunt to drive it (amps) take it you will have to have batteries on the solar cells, why not use the wind turbines as auxilary chargers esp during winter and sell the other inverter. Or if big enough batteries run both inverters off the same battery bank.
Haven't thought this through properly but maybe give you some ideas

I run 4000 watts of solar and 800 watts wind. One system is straight grid tied or 1440 watts PV. Another system is 1140 watts and 800 in wind to charge a battery bank for deep well pump and circulating water pump. The latter also powers an inverter to run the refer and back feed the grid. The rest are in stand alone (no grid) systems.
I installed all this myself, no permits, no utility interference, no BS.
Two weeks ago the utility took out my old meter because I used so little of their power that they thought that the meter either failed or was tampered with. The new digital meter only counted forward. That meant that when I had surplus power and was sending out, I was being charged for it. I called and raised hell, ready to disconnect altogether. So they installed a "net meter" which will count how much sold and how much purchased and how much net. They now have a rebate program that will pay up to $4.00 a watt, but it has so many strings in the contract that I opted to pass.

Before anyone goes for a utility rebate read the fine print in the contract. It will require refundng some or all if you fail to show the required amount of power agreed to. If an inverter fails or lightening takes out a string of panels.....you would be in default. Should you elect to go off grid within 20 years you will be liable for the whole rebate. amount.

Spiritrancho. I was also thinking of bootlegging the system in myself but I guess I would eventually run into the same type problems. I guess I should call for a net meter. From what I read in the La. laws I have to put in another meter pan and the power co. would supply the meter. This sounds plenty simple enough.
That $4. per watt rebate, is that state, Federal, or just something the power co. is offering. It sounds like Federal. They like that 10 year figure.

That is the way they used to do it. today they use a digital meter that records delivered kw recieved kw and net kw. It is to the utility advantage to do this because the reader can scan it from the street. The local utility co. offers up to $4.00 a watt. All the feds will do is tax rebate so far. The only give away is to large banks and Bush's peers.

Looks like the price of solar products are coming down since people have so much less disposable money. Here is an ebay add where the seller has been selling panels for $2.60 per watt... new panels if you drill down into his feedback he has been selling quite a lot of them at that price!http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=220367841763
There are still a lot of them not coming down off their prices (which are totally inflated) but a few are coming down into the $4 and $5 per watt for total systems!

What I'm reading on the new tax incentives I do not want to tell until I purchase my system! I will talk to my CPA next week when I do my taxes, but this shit looks awsome! Kind of like what you guys down under are getting possibly better between federal grant and state rebate! This will be for 09 and 2010 but needs to be purchased before Dec. 31 2010.

Bill, I got a healthy rebate for the added solar from both feds and Arizona. Also got a $750 carry over for next year. That was for the charge contoller and inverter with battery for running pond pump and freezer. I studied your link to Windblue and this year purchased one of their wind gennys to upgrade my old air 403. It is a fine machine and supplements the solar for my AP green house. It uses wild three phase AC down the pole to a rectifier to battery. Their load control dumps excess to a 12volt element in a hot water heater for fish tank. My total cost (less the tower) was less than $700. She starts spinning in about 5 mph breeze and that gives about 25 watts. We had 50 to 60 mph last week and she was quiet. Unfortunately I failed to check the output.
I souped up my other air 403 by replacing the 48 inch three blasdes with six 60 inch blades. It starts up even before the Windblue but does not put out as much and is still noisy in high wind. It is a DC 24 volt machine. The problem with the design is that it has a built in card controll that opens output when battery voltage is up. So I put the leads to three six volt batterys so that it wont open. The power will equilize from those three to the other nine batteries and when the whole bank is full will spill over to the grid thru the inverter. During that blow last week is the first time I ever got up to 300 watts on that machine.

I didn't get a positive response from my cpa over the phone but what I'm reading is $1.49 per watt from the state as a rebate and 30% tax credit,... not deduction, the difference is a deduction is only worth that portion off the top of your gross income while a credit is dollar for dollar off of your tax liability and as spiritrancho said if don't owe that much the difference will get rolled over to the next year. My cpa may be getting a little behind in his tax law understanding. What I understand is part of President Obama's stimulus is you won't have to wait for the money. You fill out the form and 60 to 90 days later a check comes in the mail. I understand this legislation isn't signed yet, But I prefer building wind turbines and solar panels in the desert over giving the money to bankers for bonuses. President Roosevelt started the TVA which built roads, levees etc. which worked very well as a stimulus to the ecomomy and we still have this infrastucture. Reagan built aircraft carriers and bombers. Not as noble to peace lovers but it did help win the cold war and we still have the equipment. We got nothing from the bankers but another kick in the rear. Hopfully Mr Obama will build the green infrastucture per his campagne promise. It will stimulate the economy building it and in the end we will still have something real, the equipment. Even more financially wise is the equipment will be producing for us long after it's built and reduce our dependence on foregn oil. (Hopefully I won't derail my own thread by going off topic with my political rant )

Oops, the 30% tax credit is Federal.