PV Solar

[Fallguy007]

What are your thoughts on adding a grid tie solar setup to your household? Is there any rebates? Does not seem too common in BC. Ontario has all sorts of incentives and now you see panels on many roofs.

[g802]

It's very popular in the US, as there are incentives to move away from fossil fuel produced energy. Here on the Baja there many communities and individuals living off the grid, producing all their energy needs by Photo-Voltaic panels, with generators for the occasional backup needs. Mind you we have 340 days/yr of sunshine here. There is also a very large solar farm just outside La Paz , with plans to build more.
My boat has 200 watts of PV panels and most of the year that takes care of my domestic power needs (lights/all LED, radios, refrigeration, water pressure), I have a 2kw generator and the diesel 85 amp for days that are less than sunny. Batteries are always the limiting factor for energy storage. I have been reading about iron/soda batteries that will last 50 years but of course aren't suited for a boat, but in a house systems seems like the way to go.
Back to Canada, thinking off grid. I would think that a person would need several sources of energy generation to compensate for the changing seasons. Solar (PV) panels for most of the year, and I suppose tracking would be a concern. Maybe wind generation if your site warrants it, or a small water turbine if you have an active creek on the property and have the water rights. I have no idea of the pay back for a system install in Canada, but the prices per watt are coming down, as well as power inverter, storage etc. There are also wood and waste oil systems that will provide or supplement your energy needs, all depends how green you want to go.

What are the regs, regarding feeding back in to the grid for BC Hydro and Fortis?

[Fallguy007]

They will allow you to grid tie, i think they buy back at $0.09 a KWH. Kelowna is the second best city in BC to go with solar i think. for every 1KW installed you get around 1200KWH per year.

[g802]

They will allow you to grid tie, i think they buy back at $0.09 a KWH. Kelowna is the second best city in BC to go with solar i think. for every 1KW installed you get around 1200KWH per year.

At a $1 per watt, that would take a long time to pay back. I have also been told that my panels will degrade over time and I would be lucky to get 20 years out of them. I guess when you can feed back in to the grid, you don't need to worry about batteries, but you will still need and invertor and I assume some kind of transfer switch or feed in to the system. I know nothing about the system you are talking about as I have a two PV panels at 44 volts feeding a MPPT charge controller feeding three deep cycle house batteries. I have a 3kw and a 1kw (true sine wave) invertors for my microwave etc. It's great to have everything powered and working (except internet) while the city is black.

[Kalvin K]

I've looked into solar a lot and installed a fairly basic system at the family cabin.

Long story short - the return on investment isn't there. If you have other motivations (no power available, frequent power interruptions, just like the idea of being off the grid, etc) then it may be worth it, but it's not worth it based on cost alone.

Even in the US where they've got some pretty good grants available, a typical install is looking at 15-20 years to pay off the initial investment - at which point your system is near the end of it's lifespan anyway.

[Joe Public]

I live in Joe Rich, above Kelowna and usually above the valley cloud, so I fee that it would be a superb location for a grid tied solar array. If fact, when I designed and built my house, I ensured that the roofs were oriented in the correct direction, and at the correct angle, and that the trusses were stable enough to eventually allow a solar array to be installed. I even ensured that I allowed built channels in the framing to get the power from the array to my panel, where the appropriate equipment would need to be installed. Keep in mind that I am talking about a grid tie arrangements, with no expensive batteries, but also without the applicability to supply power in the event of an outage. In seven years, my hydro grid has proven to be extremely reliant.

So the issue is to determine the break even point at which solar supplied power is the same price as hydro supplied power. Once we reach that, then it is cost effective to install solar panels.

My plan is not to supply my entire household load with solar derived hydro, but to knock the punitive top tier off, for which I am currently charged 13 cents per KWH. I am an electrical contractor, so I intend to do all of the work myself, as well as have the opportunity to purchase all the equipment at wholesale prices. Currently, before the great oil meltdown of 2015, I could purchase a scalable system for 20 cents per KWH, the same price that the BC government pays for power from IPP run of the river hydro producers, but will not pay me. So at this time, there is a differential of 8 cents per KWH before I reach the break even point. With the projected hydro rate increases, and the constant reduction of solar power costs due to improved technology and increased production, I felt that it would take about 5 more years to reach break even. Having said that, the world oil glut and lower comparative energy prices, will slow that rate down.

BC data suggests that the current commercial rate to purchase and have solar installed on your house is currently 25 to 30 cents per KWH, and there are no subsidies because BC power is clean hydro generated green power. Ontario does have subsidies for low scale solar power on houses, currently at about 13 cents per KWH, but that is because most of their power is dirty.

Lots of good BC information here;

http://www.bcsea.org/solar-pv

So unless you want grid tied solar, for the sake of having solar, and you are willing to pay extra for it, there is nothing to do but sit and wait until solar power pricing comes down, and local hydro rates increase until the break even point is met. A BC 2012 study states that solar parity for residential installation will be met in 2027, twelve years away.

The one issue that may change all of this is that once the smart meters are all installed, there is no doubt that TOD billing will be invoked, and with daytime power usage penalties of 25 cents per KWH, at the same time that solar production is at it's maximum, there is a potential for break even earlier, if the government was to force the hydro authorities to operate net metering in real time, but I doubt it.

[Fallguy007]

What side of setup are you looking at?

I was looking at some packages online. 15kw with miro inverters for ~25,000usd. No that's no racking or hooking up. (I do electrical work for my own projects) so I'm sure there would be a few extra K to get everything going. So the payback would be at the rate o around 2,000$ per year in a setup like that. These panels have warranty for 25 years I belive.

[Glacier]

Go look at their net metering pages if you're interested in grid-tie (net metering) PV power. You need to fill out the paperwork, go from there. Because of the crash of the Canadian dollar, the price of panels have gone up about 20% in the past year, but it's still quite good. You can get them for as little as $1.50/watt.This means you could sustain your house for $3000 worth of panels. Smaller houses would likely be net sellers of electricity. You'd also need a grid-tie inverter, which will cost you another $1,500. If you do the work yourself, you're in for $5,000. At that rate, it's going to take you 25 years to break even. Yes, the panels should last much longer than that. You could get 50 years out of them, though production slowly drops off over time. My mom has the same panels on her house that she had 20+ years ago, and they still work.

It's not really critical to face south. You can be 45 degrees to the east and lose less than 5%. It's better to shoot east than west if you have to chose because solar panels are more efficient in colder weather, hence morning sunshine is more efficient than afternoon sunshine.

One more thing, the comment that Kelowna gets the second most amount of solar power in BC is untrue. Places like Cranbrook, Fort St. John, and even Victoria get more. Same goes for Kamloops.

[Randall T]

Cost / efficiency of power generation:

#1 is water, #2 is wind, #3 is solar. The cost of solar in these parts far outweighs the benefits in a monetary sense. Unless you're off the grid, then it might be a necessity.

[I Think]

Having built about 600 small wind turbines in the 80's, and having lived on a boat and in rv's for more than 20 yrs, and now with 400 + watts PV and an electric/battery powered garden tractor, we have a little experience.
If you buy a pallet of PV panels you should be able to get the cost well under $1/watt USD.
Allow a few thousand bucks for the grid intertie and inspections/permits.
You will only need the invertor necessary for the grid intertie, unless you go off grid.
IMO this far north you will not get sufficient power to pay the system off in any reasonable time.
PV panels have a best before date of about 20 years, but they will continue to produce electricity for much longer, just not quite so much.
A wind turbine is not a good choice, you would not likely want to live in a place windy enough to pay for it & you need to manage the maintenance & operation.
BTW The batteries mentioned above are known as Nickle Iron and they are a fantastic choice but pricey for a house bank, I saw a bank of them at Scotties Castle in Death Valley that were installed in 1920's and are still in good operating condition today.
Tesla's new battery plant will be producing Lithium batteries for house banks, we will have to see what the prices will be.