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Are you sure, I belive it's a 1:1 ratio subtracting the amount you pump back into the grid from how much you take out of it.
Now if you are putting more into the grid than what you're taking out of it and they actually owe you, it may be different.
It is highly variable depending on the state where you live. Ranges from 1:1 to zero. You need to find out what your state requires the power companies to do. Some allow the power companies to refuse to take your power completely, others require a 1:1 exchange and everything in between.
Solar will never take off until the basic materials are much more cost effective. There needs to be a 5 year payback before large numbers of people will invest in it. Batteries are expensive but the grid-tied systems will be more palatable to the vast majority of people IF it can be made cost effective over the life of the average ownership of a house.
Until large numbers of houses are solar generators, there will be little impact on the overall energy costs and environmental benefits. Our only hope is in the newer, lower cost thin film technologies.
Would you consider this method to be worth the price to have it installed?
ohh defiantly. It is all in what you want, with the grid connected solar systems, you will still get away with no power bill if you size the system right, and possibly get a little check from the power company. you will be helping the power company from having to build a new power plant as well if your system is a tad oversized.
Solar Panels 'Take 100 Years to Pay Back Installation Costs'Solar Panels Take 100 Years to Break Even, Say Surveyors.
SOLAR PANELS are one of the least cost-effective ways of combating climate change and will take 100 years to pay back their installation costs, the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) warned yesterday.
In a new guide on energy efficiency, Rics said that roof panels for heating water and generating power are unlikely to save enough from bills to make them financially viable in a householder's lifetime.
Patrick Pinhero, an associate professor in the MU Chemical Engineering Department, says energy generated using traditional photovoltaic (PV) methods of solar collection is inefficient and neglects much of the available solar electromagnetic (sunlight) spectrum. The device his team has developed – essentially a thin, moldable sheet of small antennas called nantenna – can harvest the heat from industrial processes and convert it into usable electricity. Their ambition is to extend this concept to a direct solar facing nantenna device capable of collecting solar irradiation in the near infrared and optical regions of the solar spectrum.
The thing about this is that it currently gets a lot more efficient than most others. But the guy is going to have to watch for new developments on the road.
From the Wikipedia:
A nantenna (nanoantenna) is a nanoscopicrectifying antenna, an experimental technology being developed to convert light to electric power. The concept is based on the rectenna (rectifying antenna), a device used in wireless power transmission. A rectenna is a specialized radio antenna which is used to convert radio waves into direct currentelectricity. Light is composed of electromagnetic waves like radio waves, but of much smaller wavelength. A nantenna is a very small rectenna the size of a light wave, fabricated using nanotechnology, which acts as an "antenna" for light, converting light into electricity. It is hoped that arrays of nantennas could be an efficient means of converting sunlight into electric power, producing solar power more efficiently than conventional solar cells.
I wonder why somebody does not back up a PV array with a heat collector to keep the PV cells cooled and capture the heat for domestic use? That seems obvious to me.
I have an opportunity to build a small home in Northern New Hampshire. The land is not currently connected to the grid and the neighbor simply refuses to allow overhead wires to be installed. I will either connect to the grid with an underground cable or, as this house will not be used during the winter, power it with a small stand alone Diesel driven generator with the waste heat collected and used to warm the house. The cost of this installation would be similar to installing underground cable. I would use filtered waste vegetable or lubricating oil as fuel. In addition the house would be designed to maximize direct solar heat in the spring and fall and reject it during the middle of summer.
I have heard that in Scotland they chant to the SKY DEAMON because they see the sun so seldom. That far north and with constant cloudiness of course solar does not make economic sense. But I’ll bet windmills do.
Actually much of the east and west coasts of Scotland get as much, if not more, sunshine hours as parts of the northern UK and midlands.
Parts of the West coast of Scotland are well known for their mild winters.
Need to remember that even though the British isles are very small , but because of their location they're subject to many different weather influences which can affect hugely different temperstures and conditions.
There are lots of wind turbines off the east coast of the UK.
I wonder why somebody does not back up a PV array with a heat collector to keep the PV cells cooled and capture the heat for domestic use? That seems obvious to me.
There are several manufacturers of Hybrid Panels out there, and they are more efficient. I am not sure how they compare cost wise.
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