[Thilak29]

Originally Posted by umashankar

Could you please share details of the company that helped you set up the solar unit.

GoGreenINN is based in Mangalore, here is the link.
If you are considering in Bangalore : https://www.hinren.com/

Originally Posted by jkrishnakj

I don’t think I’ll ever get to pay the Bescom bills. I generate more power than I consume. It’s such a good feeling.
The next aspiration is a good EV car with a good range.

Excellent thought on EV and suits best for a city commute.
Do you mind posting a screenshot of your recent bill (mask or hide any personal detail in bill). I am curious to see how BESCOM does it.

Originally Posted by saisree

Thanks Thilak for such a detailed write up. Now it’s a bible of sorts for interested people like me.
Chennai has only two seasons. Summer and Hot Summer and so, Solar makes a viable option.

Thanks for your kind words, just did my bit that's all. For Chennai it would be ideal I would say!

Originally Posted by M00M

Currently we are generating about 50-60 units per day. 10 KW takes up 30 panels and each panel is 330 watt panel.

I am trying to expand my 9.75 or 9.9 kw by adding another 9.75 or 9.9 kw in the next few months as i intend to buy an EV to replace the daily driver in the house in the next 1 year with an EV if possible. Cmon Honda bring the Honda E to India or a Fiat 500 EV. Lol. I hope Tesla Model Y is affordable Lol.

That's extraordinary production! Wonder how it does that well!? Very glad to hear you are expanding further.I am on the same boat as far as EV thing goes.

[Thilak29]

Originally Posted by IP_Man

In order to reach breakeven faster, I have few suggestions.

1. Full LED lighting setup. It looks premium and saves up to 80% energy compared to filament lamps and 50% compared to CFL lamps. I have implemented that in my new apartment, 100% LED lighting setup.

Done - almost 4 years ago

2. Five start energy efficient electrical equipments. BLDC motor in place of induction motor saves energy. BLDC celling fans are now in the market.

Most are 5* except a few which will see a replacement in due course of time. BLDC motor based fans are something under consideration. Mainstream brands arent offering anything as I see and bit hesitant on newcomers.

3. Solar water heater inlace of geysers.

Done - been on this for the last 10 years

4. Falls celling with insulation keeps room cool and saves electricity.

Done - Mud tiled roof above terrace helps a lot in this regard

5. In order to keep efficiency of the solar panels high, it is possible to install water sprinklers with timer that will keep panels dust free automatically.

Sprinklers are good for ones on the ground but for roof top may not be viable I guess, However I intend to use my pressure washer/hose.

Thanks for your kind words! I have inserted my comments inline.

[Emvi]

Kudos to Thilak29 for this wonderful initiative. Great job

Just a clarification, excuse me if I have missed the point. Do you have any arrangement for the power backup during night time in the case of power failures?

We have a solar power system installed in our home, which in comparison is of lower capacity and a lot simpler. We have installed 4 solar panels of 250W capacity each equating to 1KW of power. These panels are connected to a Solar Hybrid Inverter. The power storage is taken care by 2 numbers of 220AH capacity tubular batteries connected in series. The rated capacity of the inverter is 1.6KW and it can take load upto 1.4KW. The inverter logic is to ensure the batteries are fully charged first and once that is done, MESCOM power supply gets cut off automatically and solar power is made available for the domestic usage through the inverter system. On bright sunny days, the solar panels produce the maximum power i.e., about 1kw of power from morning 8.30 till about 4 in the evening. In this period, as long as the usage load is within 1KW, MESCOM power supply is completely cut off and only solar power is used. If in case the usage load goes beyond 1KW, only then the electrical power supply kicks in to compensate the extra load.

Power failures are a common thing in our part of the world. We sometimes have power failures for hours and days! Yes, you read it right. Overs the years what I have observed is that other than the TV and refrigerator, ceiling fans consume a lot electricity in our home. The ceiling fans generally consume about 70-75 watts of power. In my home, atleast 2 fans are always ON in the day time and 3 during the night. Previously when we did not have the solar power system + bigger capacity storage batteries, during power failures of longer durations, the inverter batteries used to die down in the middle of the night, waking up everyone in the process. After some research, I came across BLDC fans. These fans have very low power consumption, as low as 1/3rd of the conventional fans. We have installed 3 such fans at our home, the maximum power consumption of each fan being just 28 watts! Effectively 3 BLDC is more or less equivalent to one conventional fan with regards to the power consumption. It has been more than 3 years since the installation of solar power system, never once have I seen the low battery warning indication glow, which was a regularity previously. Of course, we make it a point to use power judiciously at night during power failures. Also incase of emergencies and heavier load usage situations, we have a 4KW diesel power generator as the back up, which we rarely use.

[Sankar]

Originally Posted by Thilak29

BLDC motor based fans are something under consideration. Mainstream brands arent offering anything as I see and bit hesitant on newcomers.

Orient and Usha BLDC fans were available from 2019. I changed all ceiling fans (total 8) in my home to Usha BLDC two years ago. I chose Usha as it was advertised being equipped with NIDEC motor. Only the no frills old school looking (my preference) Energia 32 was available then in 2019 but now aerodynamic styles have been launched.

[Emvi]

Originally Posted by Emvi

Effectively 3 BLDC is more or less equivalent to one conventional fan with regards to the power consumption.

"Effectively 3 BLDC fans are more or less equivalent to one conventional fan with regards to the power consumption" is what I meant.

The BLDC fans that I have installed are from a home grown brand by name Atomberg Technologies. The quality is top notch and so is their service.

Note: Moderators may club this post with my previous post. Thank you.

[Thilak29]

Originally Posted by Emvi

Just a clarification, excuse me if I have missed the point. Do you have any arrangement for the power backup during night time in the case of power failures?
Power

I have two batteries (150Ah each) which stores enough to manage non inductive load for about 14 hours.

Originally Posted by Sankar

Orient and Usha BLDC fans were available from 2019

Wah ! Thanks for inputs, I’ll explore and replace at least three to start with.

[SKC-auto]

OT: Never considered these BLDC fans, if they save so much of energy, I feel the govts should ban sales of new induction fans, consumers can anyway get their additional spending back in an year.

My quick calculation, considering replacing 20 crore fans ( atleast 1 fan for 6 Indians running all day) will save 20crore*40W = 8GW of power saved, that's 8 1GW coal plants closed.

[jkrishnakj]

Great inputs IP-Man. It’s been 4 years and we have not felt the need for geysers. We had the solar water heater on the roof top. It’s only after it conked off, did we have to get one.

And yes, LeD is what we went with at my home.

I like the idea of the false ceiling - may do that in my bedroom. Thank you.

[bejoy]

Congrats Thilak for the setup and thanks for sharing here! Hope you will recover the costs much faster!

My uncle who retired from KSEB have the 3KW on-grid setup at his home in Kerala and and here are some titbits from him:

• Monthly bill reduced from 3000 to 250
• The meter is "floating" and will compute the net consumption.
• The on-grid setup will be allowed by first come first serve policy only. This is because KSEB maintains a percentage of power generation by homes for each end transformer. i.e. if the last transformer is 100KW, only 13.5kW return generation is allowed. He got it right in time as a nearby school had already put up a 10KW setup.
• Shades from trees play a big spoilsport in the solar power generation. Even distant tall trees casting shade will affect the generation.

[IP_Man]

Originally Posted by SKC-auto

OT: Never considered these BLDC fans, if they save so much of energy, I feel the govts should ban sales of new induction fans, consumers can anyway get their additional spending back in an year.

My quick calculation, considering replacing 20 crore fans ( atleast 1 fan for 6 Indians running all day) will save 20crore*40W = 8GW of power saved, that's 8 1GW coal plants closed.

Please refer the bellow table for the energy saving of BLDC fan.

Not only this, Crompton Energion comes with goodies like 'timer' function. Generally we don't require fan in the early morning so we can set timer that will automatically switch off fan in the morning, thus saving even more energy.

[M00M]

Originally Posted by Thilak29

That's extraordinary production! Wonder how it does that well!? Very glad to hear you are expanding further.I am on the same boat as far as EV thing goes.

I am surprised you think it is good. I was under the impression it is too less because considering the amount of capacity it should generate basically depends on the sun and clear days. Now during Nov Dec it was making 40 units roughly and in October it was very less during the last rains. Anyways lets see i want to generate enough that i can use the entire house on it along with charging of 3 EV in the future. Fully carbon neutral if that is the definition of it. I wanted to get the hybrid set up but somehow the installers say that that is not allowed.

[Thilak29]

Originally Posted by bejoy

• The on-grid setup will be allowed by first come first serve policy only. This is because KSEB maintains a percentage of power generation by homes for each end transformer. i.e. if the last transformer is 100KW, only 13.5kW return generation is allowed. He got it right in time as a nearby school had already put up a 10KW setup.

Thanks for sharing this, it’s new learning to me.

Originally Posted by M00M

I am surprised you think it is good. I was under the impression it is too less because considering the amount of capacity it should generate basically depends on the sun and clear days. Now during Nov Dec it was making 40 units roughly and in October it was very less during the last rains.

What I learnt is that ratio between panel capacity to production is 1:4, that is 1kWh panel is expected to produce about 4kWh during the day, with that in mind I said 60 kWh production out of 10kW panel is excellent.

[docsr]

Thanks for the very informative writeup.
I had applied to BESCOM for it's solar panel promotion (Sourya Gruha Yojana). The wheels turned sloooowwly! After the initial verification, the local AE came to do a site inspection and took measurements. Again after a long gap, today, I received an email with a formal quotation under this scheme. I have attached the quote. This seems to be from a company called Wenergie.



I have the following questions:
1. Are the various components listed standard
2. Is the costing reasonable
3. How do I decide between the 3Kw and 5Kw
4. Is there a facility to add batteries to this rig at a later date
5. Any infö about the company Wenergie
6. Anything else I should consider

I own a Kona Electric that is currently being charged via a dedicated electricity meter, different than the domestic house one. Can I charge the car via the solar panels?

Unfortunately, I have been singularly unsuccessful in gaining even a basic understanding of how this entire thing works - and not for want of trying. So any inputs from you all would be most welcome.

[shaheenazk]

Originally Posted by docsr

5. Any infö about the company Wenergie

You may visit their website for more information:

https://www.wenergie.io

[Sankar]

Originally Posted by docsr

Thanks for the very informative writeup.
I had applied to BESCOM for it's solar panel promotion (Sourya Gruha Yojana). The wheels turned sloooowwly! After the initial verification, the local AE came to do a site inspection and took measurements. Again after a long gap, today, I received an email with a formal quotation under this scheme. I have attached the quote. This seems to be from a company called Wenergie.

Attachment 2133441

I have the following questions:
1. Are the various components listed standard
2. Is the costing reasonable
3. How do I decide between the 3Kw and 5Kw
4. Is there a facility to add batteries to this rig at a later date
5. Any infö about the company Wenergie
6. Anything else I should consider

I own a Kona Electric that is currently being charged via a dedicated electricity meter, different than the domestic house one. Can I charge the car via the solar panels?

Both quotes are on the expensive side. These do not seem like subsidised rates either. The rate you got is the current market rate of same kW non subsidized grid tie solar plant installations in Kerala done using mono perc panels. Poly crystalline panels in your quote is an inferior panel tech compared to mono crystalline.

If you are not getting subsidy there is no reason to use poly panels, these only reason to use poly panels is that mono panels do not qualify for govt subsidy. But these don't look like subsidized rate either.

For comparison the KSEB Soura subsidized (if one qualifies) rates for 3kw and 5kw grid tie plants are iirc 1.3xxlacs and 1.7xxlacs.

Regarding the separate meter for EV charging and using solar units i think there is a workaround. It's possible with KSEB and i will post in detail tomorrow. If BESCOM provides a similar workaround you can in theory use solar units to charge EV.