the Otherpower.com Discussion Board || power consumption

Front Page - [Homebrewed Electricity-- (wind) (solar) (hydro) (steam) (controls) (storage) (mechanical)] - Classifieds - Site News
Everything - Newbies - [Remote Living-- (housing) (heat) (light) (water)] - Rants & Opinion - Diaries - Our Products

power consumption
By bob g, Section Homebrewed Electricity Posted on Sun Jul 31st, 2005 at 12:30:14 AM MST
how much power do you use?

rather how much power have you trimmed down to?
first some parameters
for instance
a: 2 to 3 bed room home, small under 1000 sq/ft
b: refrigerator, freezer, small
c: washer, such as the staber unit
d: drier, propane heated, and close line
e: well pump, to pump to holding tank, low pressure pump on demand
f: electronics, tv, stereo, dish, computer
still working on my planned construction of a small 2 bed home of under 1000 sq/ft
with an attached 2 car garage/shop, offgrid, no grid tie.
i am coming in at around 3.2 kwatt/hr/day for non scheduled loads, ie, lights, electronics, smallest microwave, fridge/freezer, medium tv, dish and laptop that will be battery/inverter supplied, and
all other loads, pump, washer, drier, shop tools and other large current draws to be supplied on backup genset (diesel cogenerator).
i am trying to get an idea if you will of how close i can cut things and still maintain a reasonable (wife agreeable) plan.
anyone within similar parameters? how much power do you get by with?
i would set up a poll but don't know how to do it
bob g

power consumption | 9 comments (9 topical, 0 editorial)

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#1)
by bob g on Sat Jul 30th, 2005 at 06:32:26 PM MST
(User Info)

i guess i should add

dont really care about retrofits, or high consumption all electric home responces

i am mainly after what others have accomplished by means of careful planning and implementation

thanks

bob g

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#2)
by halfcrazy on Sat Jul 30th, 2005 at 07:14:16 PM MST
(User Info)

1400 sf home radiant heat with a wood boiler, all flourescent bulbs, 240 volt well pump, kenmore fridge, tv computer etc all power tools and even a small window ac for those real hot days when we have extra power. staber washer clothsline for dryer. using about 3.5 killowatt hours a day we have 1280 watts of pv panels 16 u2200 golf cart batteries and a pair of sw plus 2524's

[ Parent ]

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#5)
by PaulJ on Sun Jul 31st, 2005 at 05:57:48 AM MST
(User Info)

We use between 2.5 and 4 kWh/ day, more if its windy and we have a use for it.

1600 sq ft 3 br home, 2 adults 3 kids.

Normal TV maybe 4 to 6 hrs a day, 30 yr old fridge, microwave, laptop, all lights are fluoro/ compact fluoro, at least one load of clothes washed per day in an efficient Fisher + Paykil washer.

Dishwasher is kind of a discretionary load depending on how much power is coming in, sometimes I use my discretion and fire up the backup generator to run it. It uses about 700Wh per wash.

We have 450W of solar (on a tracker), it's only just enough in winter if it's sunny, which fortunately is fairly often here.

We also have a windmill which peaks at over 1kW, and averages over 500W if it's windy. It complements the solar quite well, we can go for weeks without running the backup generator sometimes. On the other hand, sometimes we have to run it an hour or two every day for days on end.

The only "sacrifice" we've made is turning off all phantom loads at the power outlet (why does every appliance have a clock?), and not leaving a light on all night.

Paul.

Off-grid 5 months and stil married.

[ Parent ]

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#8)
by Frank Lussier on Sun Jul 31st, 2005 at 05:38:53 PM MST
(User Info) http://www.junkyardsolar.com

Hi Paul

How big is your batterie bank?
I average the same and by December I would like to be off grid, can you describe your system - I'm trying to put a system together.

Frank

[ Parent ]

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#9)
by PaulJ on Mon Aug 1st, 2005 at 05:34:12 AM MST
(User Info)

My battery bank is made up of used 12V 36Ah Sonnenschein sealed wheelchair batteries. I have 40 of these wired in series/parallel to make a 48V/360 Ah battery bank, although the actual Ah rating is probably a bit less than that .

Apparently it's not ideal to have so many parallel strings of batteries, but I get one or two dozen of these for free every three months or so, and most of them are good, so I'm not complaining.

Personally, I would consider this to be the bare minimum to run a full sized house; I think 600 to 800 Ah at 48V would be much easier to live with.

The rest of the system:

Solar panels - 2 Sharp 24V 165W panels mounted on a tracker, plus 120W of old solarex panels. I think I said this just keeps up on a sunny day in winter, now that I think about it the windmill probably has to chip in a bit as well.

Windmill - 9' dual rotor. If it's windy we can run the house and still waste anything up to 5kWh/ day through the shunt load.

Regulator - Plasmatronics PL60, made locally here in Australia,it can simultaneously series regulate the panels and shunt regulate the mill.

Inverter - SEA Everest 48V 3.8kW continuous/10.5kW surge, 240V 50Hz full sinewave output, again made locally. This was the most expensive part of the system, and I don't regret a cent of it. It can cope with almost any combination of normal household loads, such as running the 2.4kW element in the dishwasher while the fridge, TV and laptop are on, without even getting warm.

And of course the backup generator, the less said about that the better. I really need a nice diesel cogeneration setup.

Paul

Off grid 5 months and still married.

[ Parent ]

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#3)
by OPEC BUSTER (corduroycutting@aol.com) on Sat Jul 30th, 2005 at 07:32:01 PM MST
(User Info)

I would just like to say, you may want to use the drier and backup generator both on the propane fuel! Sounds like you have a real good plan.

Good Luck & let us know more as you progress!

Otis
Brake wind, Save the Planet!

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#4)
by bob g on Sat Jul 30th, 2005 at 07:45:59 PM MST
(User Info)

sounds encouraging!

perhaps i am close in my estimates

thanks
bob g

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#6)
by wpowokal on Sun Jul 31st, 2005 at 06:27:47 AM MST
(User Info)

In my experience you are spot on, domestic wise my consumption is around 3.5kw/day.

I have many phantom loads but accept that they are needed so I will live with them. I cook on gas, hot water is Gas in winter. Use electric cooking as required. Electric cloths drier as required but this is infrequently.

alan down under
A life lived in fear is a life half lived.

Re: power consumption (3.00 / 0) (#7)
by Sunour on Sun Jul 31st, 2005 at 02:59:15 PM MST
(User Info)

I lived without any electricity at all for twenty years.
Which isnt saying much. All of mankind had lived with out electricity (as we know it today) for well over seven thousand years. Its only been in the past one hundred years that mankind has come to the point that it cannot live without it.

Anyway, I kept things cool in the creek, would freeze jugs of ice in the winter and store them to keep things cold most of the summer, root celar, burned wood for; heat, cooking, and heating water, pumped water with a pitcher pump up to a twelve foot tower with a tank on top (I,ve got some nice biceps, triceps and latisamus dorsi as a result). I could go on and on but all us know how to live without electricity. We just choose not to.

Amount of electricity used over that twenty years 0 kWh.

In the past 10 years we have gone to PV modules to harvest 100% of our electricity from sunlight. Propane now heats the water as well as freezing and refrigeration, wood still heats the home, about one half cup of gasoline moves about eight hundred gallons of water up to the top of a thirty foot water tower once a week. Sometimes I miss living without electricity. Especially when certian bills are due. Life seemed so much simpler back then. If I couldnt make it or trade for it, I just did without, its that simple. But its not about just me these days.

Over the last ten years;
Electricity - about 10,000 kWh. (thats less than some folks use in one year)
Propane - about 3,000 gallons roughly.
Gasoline - 200 gallons roughly including generator time.

Obviously there are a lot of details that I did not mention. If you want details just look back at the history of mankind on the planet Earth, it is full of details on how to live without electricity. A hint - look at pre 1900's history!

power consumption | 9 comments (9 topical, 0 editorial)

Menu

� create account
� How to use the board
� FAQs
� search the board
� Google search the board
� Old Otherpower Board

Login

Make a new account

Username:

Password:

Total Views

��135 Scoop users have viewed this posting.

Related Links

� Also by bob g

You must be a registered user to post here. It's easy and free, and the link is on the upper right side of your page.
All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective companies. Postings are owned by the poster, but may be deleted or moved at the ADMIN's sole discretion. The Rest � 2003 Forcefield.
You can Email the board ADMIN here. PLEASE include the username you signed up with!