Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Ok thank you on your thoughts about going solar, can you expand more?

You are right about huricans blowing away the system, but I have never seen a hurrican the last one to pass through was in the 60s I think. If one does pass it will take out the grid for sure then you will need to be looking at on site power generation, looking at other factors besides cost of running would change the agurment to if we as a race need to change to remewable energy or not, for me the a sew is a big yes, but this is about making money from AP so I will go with the most cost effective.

Lets look at the back generator option. Going that rout mean you will have a generator that is sitting there doing no then, and you will have to have storage of fuel for the generator onsite sitting doing nuting as well, could go 3 years without needing to use it, a compromise could be using a water pump that works off the same fuel, while your at it your delivary trucks that way you could save on buying fuel in bulk, I suspect you would need to design a solar system that can be removed and stored quickly, we do get a warning time in witch to prep for oncoming storms. Score 1 more for using shipping containers, they are strong and could take a hurricane. During a hurricane I would rather have batteries than 1000gal of gas that may explode or worst leak all over the place, then there is the question on if that is organic or not, the scale factor come to play again. Most commercial AP is small scale, I am talking about large scale AP, like 10 uvi systems together. At that size solar is more atractive

I might still need a generator in case solar fails, in contained farming systems of land based protines they differ from fish when it comes to dependantcy on power, a chicken farm without power has way mort time to compleat failure of crop, with fish we need to keep oxygen dilivery going just to maintain life of our fish , increaseing surity of oxygen dilivery is a step in the right direation. Why exactly is it not profitable to buy energy by the year as opposide to the month? A comertial AP farm will need a brake even point, lets say it is 6 years, for those six years would it be wiser to invest in solar or pay the bill?

Damian please understand that I don't intend to be rude. What I'm going to say is said with the intention to help.

When I started down the commercial road I did not know what I did not know (I still don't) but with the help of a host of people some on this forum but mostly consultants, researchers, producers and component and materials suppliers I have developed an extensive body of knowledge with the express purpose of developing commercial aquaponic systems of 1ha or more. Statements like you have made below in my opinion just reveal how much you have to learn and how much people like your self need help.



In Australia this would just be throwing money away. First of all you don't want to have to use your backup systems so if it sits there doing nothing who cares. Apart from regular maintenance and running it for a hour or two a week it should just sit there as a backup. In Babados it may be different because it is an Island but in Australia running pumps on diesel is only economical when cheaper energy sources such as gas and electricity are not available.



So what you want to do is pay people do uninstall the panels and then reinstall the panels? Apart from the increased labour costs of such a strategy do you really want to have a contingent labour force on hand to take down the massive number of solar panels you would need to have installed to run a commercial system on solar?



This statement reveals that you also may not know a lot about the poultry industry. To give you the benefit of the doubt it may be different in Babados but in Australia, America and many other places around the world chicken sheds not only have a backup generator but another generator as well backup to the first. If both generators fail in warm weather the producer can only minutes (<10mins) before they start to lose birds.

In aquaculture and aquaponic systems an emergency aeration system should be able to supply oxygen to the fish for quite some time as long as they are not fed. If they had just been fed prior to the power outage then a relatiely small fuel pump could ensure just enough water exchange so that TAN levels did not get too high. Such arrangements while not ideal should keep fish alive after an adjacent poultry operation has already started losing a substantial number of its stock if for some reason the power is not restored and backup systems have completely failed.

If you are trying to develop a commercial proposal to put before a number of investors then you have a lot of work to do but first a lot to learn.

If you have a number of investors that are prepared to back you, then you and they would be better served employing some expert assistance.

Since you don't appear to have the technical knowledge what other skills do you have? Not many engineers, consultants or other technical people will tell you that the their aspect of any enterprise (designing, building and operating) is less important than other aspects. In particular marketing.

Pay the bills...

Do the maths, it's far cheaper to pay your power bills. This was my point, you really need to go right back and start again with a business hat on if you want to be commercial.. Things are "fit for purpose" a sea container is a sea container, brilliant for storing and carting.. Yah you can turn them into other things but using a sea container that's 8.5 feet high, for 1.5 -2 feet of fish tank in the bottom of it, and you'll have to seal it, and figure out access, and piping? It's just added complications trying to make something into something it's not.

You talk about turning them into fish tanks and drilling through the bottom of them? How do you then plumb that up? you have to dig holes under the container and run pipes and fittings underneath?

This would be a far cheaper easier way to make similar sized/shaped tanks..



Lined roofing iron.

Exactly.

EBs picture shows how cheaply things can be done. In Australian prices the metal is about $11/m2 and the posts about $10/lm. Compare that with $65+/m2 for a modified container. The labour costs would possibly be less for a container but only if it was only minimally modified and probably not even then. Plus how do you look after your fish? You mentioned draining the tank for grading and harvest but how do you get to the back of the tank to fish out any mortalities? Climb in? What about OH&S risks for having to climb into waist deep water in a confined space (Worksafe's definition not mine).

Having said that, note that while the system hasn't failed (at least not in the picture) the engineering (if any) that was done prior to construction was inadequate. The structural support for the relatively shallow tank is not strong enough to resist the water pressure and the posts and consequently the tank walls are being pushed out.

In this out door system it is probably not important but if such a mistake was made in a glass house it could be a major problem because if the posts splayed enough to touch the glass the bottom glass panels could be cracked. Fixing the problem after the fact would not be fun.

Even in a poly house this could cause a problem because the plastic film rubbing on the posts could cause the cover to fail. At the very least it would could create a weak point.

I think even like someone mentioned earlier in the thread, the use of poly tanks would fair much better in comparison to sea containers for numerous reasons and would still be cheaper and easier to manage in the short and long term.

Yes but if he is set on having a rectangular tank/GB then there are cheaper ways of making them than using shipping containers.

Absolutely.

I grow fish, and I do it well. This is what I know, I also don't have any formal training in anything but I have been running AP systems for a while.

Lets look at the choice of a shipping container closer, first thing, I am only really altering the slump container, the fish tanks will have 1 inch wire mesh screwed to the walls to form a partision 3 feet tall, the drain pipes will be conected here, there fore no changes are made to the fish tanks.

No changes means less labour, and you can resell easily. I want to go 3 levels with this system as well, I believe that the containers can take it. By going milty level will give me more room for plants and help with heat. I like the look of 40's it makes it look industrial as well, that is the look I am going for as well.

I just came off a project to design a system for tropical domestic use, the system works but sadly the market is to small on my island, our cultures are different, the goverement uses pestiside fog for mosquitos that will wipe out your fish, then the seasonal cane fire that dumps a half inch of ashes in your system in minets, dust from the saharia, so you see air quality in a big concern of mine. Our roads are small too, a 40 is the biggest thing that can be shipped without much hassle, some one has to push up low hanging power lines for the container to pass. I have detirmined that if AP is going to be apart of my culture there must be a comertial system for everyone to see.

For the record I love constructive critisium it only makes you better. By using 40s for the first system I can raise money easier and ask for donations of shipping containers from local businesses. If i get 1 single that is $5000 I don't have to raise. In our quest for the cheapest lets not forget that businesses have brake even points, once its atrative investors will not mind. Honestly I haven't even looked at the cost of a conventional fish tank, the 40's just work so well for me.

About removing the solar panales I would have staff on the job, moving solar panels would just be the days work, 158 panels can't take 3 men a day to remove. Natural gas is a option I need to look at as well, I am honered you are looking at my system, I have to put in some work to wrap my head around the idea, these hard questions are making me think.

I have a 20' container half buried (completely at one end tapering down to none at the door) in the ground here, and it gets extremely hot in summer, even with one of the doors open. When closed it goes over 50C when ambient is ~35C. In humid weather when it cools down at night, water condenses on the ceiling, and drips. I would not even consider putting an AP system in there.
I can see you are set on using containers, but I honestly don't see the need for them in an AP system, they are an unneccessary and expensive addition. A fish tank can be constructed with a frame and pond liner, plus a shade cloth roof over a system for a tiny fraction of the cost of a container.

And that's why this is destined to fail. If you get hung up on something just because you like the idea of it, when it's not an efficient economical idea, then you're just wasting money..

I reckon you could make 10 of these fish tanks for the price of 1 sea container..

Ok some asumsions from the pic, the tanks are 6 feet wide with about 4 feet tall, (1 blue drum is 2feet across) making these tanks ruffly 475 galls, my current system has 12 fish tanks this size so I should be close. My estemate is it would take 8 of these to equal the volume of 1 forty. Taking up about a 70 foot run. adding all the time to set up that underground pipe work, labour for that concret etc, that is a permanant AP system costing a pretty penny, 1 forty in that space resting on cinder blocks would cost around the same at the end of the day.

Come to think of it, at that large volume the cheapest container you can find would be a forty, that is what they are design to be, cheap mass produced disposable containers. I will do I well thought out explanation of my spific benifits latter this week but I suspect a forty will never get the OK on the forum, about the heat, I have a 40 in direct sun and fish in a 100gall breeder tank that are doing fine, I know about the water beeding up on the inside when it is humid, some better vents may be needed?

I will like to leave the forty and solar part out of it, this is a early different system in terms of the pipe work and filtration, what are your thoughts on that part?

Pic of fish tank

Here is the slump. What do you think of the design.

Hey, it's your money you put into it. Do as suits you best and see how it works. If it doesn't work out the way you want, you can use the containers to start up a container transport company, or refurbish them for housing or little workshops and rent them out to locals. Or foam them full with PU and make a marine docking system for sport fishing. Dump them at about 20 meters just of the coast to create a artificial reef and charge people fore diving trips to it. I've even seeing them used as a STCW fire fighting training setup.

Containers can be used for many things, but if it works economically for AP?

So you want to leave the system design out of it, but what do people think about the design?

7m diameter mesh ponds, 1.2m high. Capacity 46000L each...





No concrete, no mucking around, simple cheap quick to erect, way better than a shipping container.

Me thinks I should just leave this alone now, it seems that you are more after someone to agree with you, rather than the best advice..