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I didn't think there was any savings between CFL and LED. Just that LEDS didn't have mercury in them.
I removed the CFL's from my off-grid house and replaced them with LED's.
The LED's are much more efficient that CFL's. My observation is that CFL's use MORE electricity than what is on the package, while LED's use much LESS electricity.
The quality of light is much, much better on on the LED's. There is also the advantage of instant-on which is really a pain with CFL's
BTW I found the same issue with thin-film solar panels and silicon panels. The graph specs did not show much gain for the thin-film panels under low light conditions. In real life, there was a big difference for the thin-film panels.
BTW I found the same issue with thin-film solar panels and silicon panels. The graph specs did not show much gain for the thin-film panels under low light conditions. In real life, there was a big difference for the thin-film panels.
If you look at the spec chart for similar wattage panels under low light conditions it does not look like there is much difference in electricity generated.
When I was working we had solar drinking fountains in some of our campgrounds. They were fairly heavily forested so direct sun light on the panel, even with a 20 foot pole, did not happen very often. The Forestry Tech was swapping out the silicon panels for thin-film in one of our campgrounds. The silicon panel would not drive the water pump, however, as soon as he hooked up the thin-film panel it started pumping water.
Who has one and does it work well? Have you needed repairs? Did you size it properly or wish it was larger or smaller? Has it continued to work well year after year?
I was told to buy an 8KW system based on my electricity usage over the past 12 months. It should be enough to power my whole house.
I am considering buying a system and would like to hear what people who own them have to say.
I've posted a lot more detail than you might be looking for in our local forum here on this thread:
So far it has not needed any repairs. I used as much of my roof space as feasible, but wish I had more power (current capacity is 10.5kW at max output). If I didn't have a pool which is running for 8 hours a day, plus another 1-2 hours of robotic cleaner, and solar heating for the pool, I could be at zero net usage with this system or maybe even better, but with the pool running I need more capacity).
Thanks for posting your link. That was interesting.
Is your house all-electric??
Virtually, now that we've switched to geothermal HVAC, but not quite. We still use gas for heating our hot water and also for our 2 outside grills, plus our fire pit by the pool. Nothing else as of now is gas powered in the house.
Our house is all-electric in eastern Washington. 2400 square feet with 3 bedrooms 2 baths. The house is 25 years old with all the original heating and cooling appliances. They are pretty inefficient. No significant trees around the property.
We have sunny days spring and fall with temps around 60 degrees during the day and 30-40;s at night.. Sunny, hot summers with highs 95-100 lows 50-60 throughout the summer. Winter is cloudy with temps 30-40 highs and 20 low.
The house is 25 years old with all the original heating and cooling appliances.
My Annual Kilo-watt usage is 35194 at a cost of $950.24. Yours is 41711 at a cost of $4,421.94!!!!
The interesting part is the different seasons....
winter (dec, jan, feb) I use 10,5522 kilowatts while your at only 4029.
summer (june, july, august) I use 3836 kilowatts while your at 9300!!!
spring we are pretty close at 4604 versus 4557.
and fall 3894 versus 4984.
I am surprised at the summer difference since I suspect your up to 95-100 degrees just like us. I did cover my south and west facing windows with match-stick blinds on the outside. Wonder if that accounts for much of the difference. My house faces due south and is almost all glass on that side.
When we moved and switched PUD's I called to complain about my electric bill since it was about 30% higher....after seeing your bill I will quit complaining.
winter (dec, jan, feb) I use 10,5522 kilowatts while your at only 4029.
summer (june, july, august) I use 3836 kilowatts while your at 9300!!!
spring we are pretty close at 4604 versus 4557.
and fall 3894 versus 4984.
I am surprised at the summer difference since I suspect your up to 95-100 degrees just like us. I did cover my south and west facing windows with match-stick blinds on the outside. Wonder if that accounts for much of the difference. My house faces due south and is almost all glass on that side.
If this was meant for me, I have an explanation.
Winter: the kWh usage numbers shown in my detailed thread were from before solar and geo, so they show my usage when heating was all done by natural gas. Now that I have geothermal, it's all done with electricity, so my usage has gone way up, but used to be tiny during the winter because the bulk of my monthly utility cost was at that time in gas, not power.
Summer: Our summers here are very long and hot. We begin getting into the 80s and 90s often in May and it lasts until September with July and August expected to be above 90 every single day. The air con is on constantly. The pool also runs more hours during the day in summer to filter/clean/sanitize and if its warm out, it jumps up in pump speed to run the solar water heater to heat the water. We're talking 500 kWh/month just for pool usage alone in summer months.
For spring and fall, our weather is temperate and we discontinue use of heating or cooling as soon as feasible to save power and enjoy the outside weather, so it's similar to yours.
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