Adding listeroid to solar system - project thread

[LowGear]

Hi,

The power company had no input, and neither did outback. If you have another suggestion to accomplish this, I'm all ears.

This too is my dream only not in the basement PLEASE!.  On the other side of the dog house - OK,  (Have you asked why there aren't many basements in your town?)  This same system, more or less, has been suggested to me by Hawaii Electric Company as the only way they can think of to get WVO power onto their grid system.  They feel it will piggy back onto the technology of the inverter company.  Outback is one but another newer inverter is being put out by.......(darn-it, my memory peaked when I was eight and it's been downhill ever since) Xantrex (Gosh Bless Ebay).  Oh! the power company said I'd be the first in the state but they couldn't see any problems.  My concern is their noticing a problem after I've dropped $20+ thousand on equipment and state blessed “experts”.

My tone may have been a bit edgy in the previous reply as a couple of postings on different threads have mentioned their grid tie generator systems but they won't get back to me with any details.  And both have Gaelic names to add hurt to the insult of a fellow named Casey McCarty.

I’d recommend:

• 1)   Contact your local power monopoly.  I just picked up the phone and called the number on my bill - $900 last month (44 cents a kilowatt)– no heat and no cooling.
  2)   Contact Outback.  They may be extra helpful if you’ve got their stuff collecting dust in your basement.  (I wonder why there aren’t many basements in your town?  Outside of New Orleans and a few like places – basements are the cheapest and most secure floor space you can buy.)
  3)   Just because the solar company bit the dust doesn’t mean the “brains” behind the venture died too.  Perhaps you could chase him/her down and get some help.  They may feel some personal responsibility.

I’ve always believed in waiting new technology out 90 days past new release but that was on measly $500 computers.  The additional $0 may require a like adjustment to the time line as well.

Casey

[Wizard]

Check on hidden tapping from neighbour.

900 bucks meant SERIOUS HEAT and light far way more than lazy guys who left their lights on and 21C temp all 24 hours a day.

Cheers, Wizard

[AdeV73]

That works out at an average ~2.8kW load, 24/7!

Over 2 megawatts in one month!

Are you running an aluminium [alt sp: aluminum] smelting plant??

(edit: oops, meant 2.8kW, not 28kW - damn those pesky decimal points)

[LowGear]

And you math majors always dreamed of living in Paradise.

The main house:

1739 kilowatt hours.
$769.00
726 / 1739 = 0.41748131109833237492811960897067
OK, I missed by 3 cents a kilowatt.
In the Tennesse Valley the same bill would be less than $90.
It is our single larges expense per day, month and year.

So almost free WVO up at the local supermarket and taco stand are sounding pretty darn sweet.  I'm still looking for someone that has one of these programs up, running and approved by all anointed bureaucrats.

Help Jason.  Help Casey.

Ok, OK, for you Paradise fanciers, it gets down into the high sixties at night and way over 75 in the afternoon but it’ll be fricking winter in 18 days for gosh sakes.  I'm still curious why they don't have many basements in Austin?

[rcavictim]

I'm still curious why they don't have many basements in Austin?

Perhaps geologically based regional issues with radon gas might explain the lack of basements in many areas of the US?  Basements are very common in Canada.  I have one and could not live without it.

[sodbust]

First of all, welcome to the family.. All of us twisted oil burner freaks..

First,, the 5kw head is a good match for the 6 horse.. No way can you out pull it and damage it with too much power output..

I would never want a diesel engine in my basement.  An outside power shack is the trick for safety and to control the mess, smell and noise.

I would ask you read up my efforts using veg oil for fuel and what I have found right and wrong with SVO..  www.oilcrusher.5u.com under the testing page.

I"m dealing with $0.17 KWH power here in NW Kansas due to the 25 + miles of power lines between farms.  Not cheap!   My 14/1 pulling a 7.5 Kwh ST head saves me over $200 a month in the summer while running my AC in my house. 

Read,, study,, and then make your own game plan.. Nothing done out of need is a waste of time but one has to watch the money.
sodbust

[LowGear]

I'm pretty sure a couple of you misread my posting.  That was 1739 kilowatt hours per month  or 58 kwh per day or $23+ per day.

Not many basements in Hawaii because they fill with the rainwater and besides smart houses are built well above the grade for environmental as well as insect reasons.  I'm still curious about Austin.

I sure wish someone with a low speed diesel grid tied would contact me.

Cheers,

Casey

[wrightkiller]

Must be the damn grow lights for the cash crop's       

Just kidding

[Stan]

Hey, I've sat on Casey's lanai and it is paradise.  Well worth $25/day electricity when you can pick all you want to eat just by leaning over the railing (well almost anyway).  Once you get those fish in the pond in front of your door raised up a little, you can fish for your food too.    (and after what I had to do today, there's no snow shoveling there either)
Stan

[lowspeedlife]

There was a fellow on the forum from New jersey if memeory serves the has a grid tie system using solar &  a Listeroid. He has a very nice set up with solar panels. On the south facing side he has plastic panels that trap heated air & circulates the warm air to the house. New Jersey payed for a large part of the system & he sells his "renewable energy credits" back to the system for hundreds of dollars. He also had a website.
Does anybody rememeber his name or his website ?
   

    Scott R.

[carlb23]

Scott,

That's probably my setup you are talking about, While the solar panels and the wind turbine are grid tied the Lister is not.  I only use the lister for backup power and route the power through a manual transfer switch when we have a power outage.  What Casey is trying to do is grid tie his lister which presents some issues if you don't use a UL and Utility approved inverter which means either generating high voltage DC using a 3 to 5hp DC motor or using standard gen head or induction motor and rectifying it to DC.  Most grid tie inverters that do not have battery backup run between 150 VDC and 500VDC inputs so a 180VDC motor would work fine but would not be of much use in a power outage.

PS.  We had a power failure for about 4 hours a week or so ago and the Natural gas / Diesel power listeroid performed flawlessly to run the backup power. We were only running about 1500 watts and burned less than a quart of diesel in 4 hours with the natural gas supplement. ratio is 75% Nat gas 25% diesel. 

Carl.

[LowGear]

Just a public note to thank Carl for all of his help and information.  His You Tube video will keep your energy independence fires burning for quite a while.

When we moved to Hawaii everyone recommended a backup generator.  Procrastination has really paid off well – I’ve completed all the classes and will have my masters degree once I get the paperwork completed and submitted.  We haven't had more than one or two interruptions that were over two hour in nine years so I'm not too concerned about backup considerations.  Of course when the rumor went across the islands that there was going to be a container shipping strike all the toilet paper was sold out in three days.  Priorities bra!  So if the diesel oil shipments stopped it wouldn’t be long before backup power was a real problem.  Perhaps I should look at scoring a ST head for the longer term.  This long shot consideration could move me towards rectifying AC and then submitting it to one of the newer grid tie inverters rather than getting set up with a DC generator.  But are those 200 watt PV panels coming down in price or what!

I'm still looking for the institutionally approved Lister grid tie hook-up.  Please don't be bashful.

Casey

[ronmar]

Casey
   Are there any grid-tie solar setups on your utilties grid?  They are popping up all over the place here.  Basically it uses the grid as a battery.  The DC from the panels via the inverter feeds your home needs during the day(and sunshine) and any excess is fed back down the grid.  No sunshine, and the house loads are fed from the grid.   

I don't think the inverter cares where it gets it's DC from.  Have you looked into 3 phase induction motors?  From what I understand traditional auto alternators are not very efficient. They were designed for small size, not efficiency.  But afterall, they are just a 3 phase alternator with a rectified output.  A 3 phase induction motor configured as a 3 phase generator, with the outputs rectified, combined and filtered to be acceptable to the inverter, might be a pretty efficient way to feed a solar grid-tie system when the sun isn't available...  The biggest drawback I see with induction motors as generators is voltage regulation.  But by rectifying to DC, the inverter now takes care of the regulation part.  As it must deal with varying voltages from the solar panels, so could it deal with the varying voltages from the induction motor/generator...  Sure sounds good in theory anyway:)   

[LowGear]

Tying the generator power into the approved inverter is the recommendation of the power monopoly, HELCO - The Company From Hell, here in Hawaii as well.  Actually they have been responsive to my inquiries but simply haven't told me what I wanted to hear.  "Just hook that slow speed diesel sucker to an inductive motor, rotate it at about 110% of its rated speed and throw the switch.  We all know when you loose our grid reference and excitation the electricity will cease to flow in our direction."  Your recommendation to use a 3 phase induction motor with a rectifier is the first cousin to the other suggestions of just using a DC generator.  This hooking into the approved-certified-blessed inverter with DC from one kind of generation plant or another is becoming the obvious path.  And three phase AC seems to be the cleanest way to rectify to DC.

With an approved, HELCO and state/county authorities, solar system it should be downhill.  The solar grid is the next "big deal" project before the diesel generator installation.  I'm closing in on the water catchment - irrigation project in the next few months and that shed "just" happens to have a roof section facing solar South that is 12 X 30 feet and slopes to within 3 degrees of the winter solstice .  I just wish Hawaii were as enlightened about AE grants and credits as Carl's New Jersey.  Of course looking at 74 degrees at 64% humidity does have some perks.

Casey

[carlb23]

Casey,

Remember what ever you do you should keep the option of running the listeroid as a backup generator in case the grid goes down. Someone with more electrical knowledge  than I would need to chime in about using a three phase induction motor run over speed to power the house if the grid was down.  I know they can self start using capacitors but I have never done this. 

Maybe running a run of the mill ST5 (like most of us) head rectified to DC and filtered hooked to the PV inverter when the grid is up and using an appropriate transfer switch to run  A/C to critical loads if the grid goes down   

remember when the grid goes down the grid tied inverters are worthless.


Carl