After a LOT of starts and stops we are finally up and running with our Solar system. We learned a LOT over the last few years trying to get to this point with most of the learning coming at the very end of the process. We have been up and running 98% off grid for the last 30 days. We are putting a Lot of power back on the grid for free as we don’t yet have our Net Meter. I am told 2-3 Months. Bottom line is we are probably supplying enough clean power to run several homes in the area.
The system also tracks grid outages which has been incredibly interesting. Over the last 30 days we have tracked over 23 outages ranging from 14 seconds to 8 hours. Haven’t had to reset the microwave clock once :-).
We are setting up a tablet in the house that monitors real-time usage as well as daily and weekly as our most recent renters have been very interested in how the system works and how much power things consume and how easy it is to conserve.
The “15” Rule. I suspect this is a Puerto Rico thing as the amount of sun we get doesnt change much between summer and winter however it assumes that you need enough battery to get you from dusk to dawn which is 15 hours. A single Tesla Power Wall 2 can get you 1Kwh sustained for 15 hours, we have 3. Usage roughly: Full Size Fridge .2, High Efficiency Bedroom AC .3, Large Common Area Inverter AC .9, Misc Lights .05 (all Led) Computer/Security .2. Then there are there are the Heavy Loads, Electric oven 4Kwh, Washer 3Kwh, Electric Dryer 5Kwh. We will be converting some of our ovens to gas and have already converted one dryer to gas.