DevSomeBiz

Senior B2B Sales Guy.

Question for anyone who knows residential solar.

I'm interested in getting solar at home, but I want it to have whole-house off-grid capabilities. Is that realistic? I need about 21kW to run everything. It seems that most of the battery systems are like 1.5kW, which means I'll need a ton (literally, a ton) of batteries.

Is what I want doable, or no?

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Mobi85

Politicker

Regional Sales Manager

First step is that I would verify that your state regulations don't have any caps on the amount of battery back up allowed to be installed at your house. I know that there has been some legislation going on in different state governments being lobbied by the electrical companies to put caps on battery capacities being installed.

Also if it is possible do a few different ground mount arrays that are oscillating to capture as much energy during daytime hours so that you are not solely relying on your back up battery power.

I can't say that I am super knowledgeable on the install side but sell into the solar industry pretty heavy on their safety side of things and so I have been able to learn some basic understandings of battery back up.

antiASKHOLE

Tycoon

Bravado's Resident Asshole

It can be doable, but I only know basic stuff about solar. I'm not sure who in here has the ins and outs of the industry though. I'm looking to learn

Pachacuti

Politicker

They call me Daddy, Sales Daddy

You can, but I don't know how smart that is or if the ROI is really worth it financially. Of course you may not care about the financial aspect.
But what if your batteries stop working? What if something else goes wrong and your system stops working? I totally get wanting to be off grid, but its very tough to do.

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

Off grid capabilities all the time, or just in case of an extended blackout?

Hopefully a solar rep can chime in and you can figure out cost/benefit.

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

I thought we had a few solar peeps in here. 🤔

TennisandSales

Politicker

Head Of Sales

where they at????

DevSomeBiz

Valued Contributor

Senior B2B Sales Guy.

Extended blackout. I lived in stupid weather areas for too long!

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

Yeah, so most of the people I know who ended up getting generators, etc., can only power a portion of the house in case of blackout - and only for limited times. That said, waiting for that solar rep to show up and inform us all.

Disclosure: when we installed solar, we didn't consider the power bank, because our property is exempt from rolling blackouts, and because our lines are underground, we very rarely lose power for longer than an hour or two (someone runs into a power pole on the main drag downroad or a vault goes poof). We were also not included in that massive PSPS in CA that was going to shut down a large part of our town, but not us, because we weren't at risk. And then some idiot at PG&E shut ALL OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA down because I guess there was a big red "EASY" button that they decided to push instead of the prescriptive shutdowns they promised. And instead of being the person who could have people over to recharge batteries and store cold items, etc., we were also out...and PG&E itself had no idea we were affected, because they hadn't planned it and had been telling us for days we were exempt. This was frightening, as then we had no idea when we would be back online. IDIOTS. So, because there are idiots, you are taking a wise step that I didn't. Yes, I'm still irritated, and this was three years and one PG&E CEO ago. So definitely look into the power bank. Even if it "only" powers a portion of your house, you'll be far, far better off.

Angusmacg

Valued Contributor

Territory Account Mgr.

First, most municipalities or states (in populated areas; i.e. northern Maine and places with no grid its the Wild West) require you to be connected to the grid regardless of your solar capacity.

Second, How big is your roof? Does it face South? You will want to determine how many panels you will need. Based on your 21kw and the newer panels produce (in ideal conditions) up to 400kw you would need roughly 53 panels just to meet your needs under ideal conditions. To be safe I would say 60 panels because nature isn't consistent.

Third, do you know how much power storage you want? You may want to look at a system that will store enough to run your critical infrastructure of the house (fridge, stove, washing machine, hot water heater, etc.) for a certain amount of time (i.e. 5 days)

Fourth, Technology advancements. Most solar panels last up to about 10 years as their efficiency will reduce over time. Will your system be able to be upgraded without changing connections or supports, etc.

My suggestion would be to look into hydrogen fuel cell generators. If we could only have small nuclear reactor generators at the residential level then no one would need the grid at all.

DevSomeBiz

Valued Contributor

Senior B2B Sales Guy.

I live about three miles from a nuclear reactor, and my neighbor is a senior engineer over there. Maybe he can hook me up.

Fenderbaum

Politicker

Retired Choirboy🪕

TennisandSales

Politicker

Head Of Sales

following for sure.

i have been thinking about trying to incorporate solar into our home.

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

DO IT.

Really a good investment these days. The technology has gotten good, and less expensive than it was years ago.

Though maybe with the recent supply chain issues, it might be higher than I think...I bet it's still a good investment.

TennisandSales

Politicker

Head Of Sales

yes! thats all i need is one person to tell me its a good idea. im already incorporating rain barrels to catch rain water to water the lawn. solar seems like a logical next step.

SADNES5

Politicker

down voters are marketing spies

Get the Tesla power wall or one of the knock offs. They're actually really cheap when you compare them.

Kosta_Konfucius

Politicker

Sales Rep

What does Elon not do!

DevSomeBiz

Valued Contributor

Senior B2B Sales Guy.

The new PowerWall seems pretty potent. Still about $70k out of pocket....

DungeonsNDemos

Big Shot

Rolling 20's all day

My wife and I were just talking about this. I wonder what functionality we could get, or if it's even possible, to run the whole house off solar alone. (I doubt it)

GDO

Politicker

BDM

Why would you totally want to cut the electricity cable? Seems that the batteries cost way more

DevSomeBiz

Valued Contributor

Senior B2B Sales Guy.

I don't really want to cut the cable, I want it as a backup. Think of it as a whole house generator, but solar.

Gasty

Notable Contributor

War Room Community Manager

+1 (following & learning)

extravaganza

BDR (Business Development Rep)

Reading through some of the comments it looks like you’re [intelligently] revising your request from “off grid” to a reliable backup system for when the grid goes down.

Did you get the answers you were hoping for yet? Let me know I’m happy to help. (I’ve designed/sold both off grid and grid tied battery systems.)

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DevSomeBiz

Question for anyone who knows residential solar.

22 comments

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