Originally posted by davidgrouchy
Originally posted by haarvik
solar power
Thoughts?
Haarvik,
I was with you, decades ago, but then I learned something.
Refrigerator-Freezer
16 cu. ft. | 380 Watts
20 cu. ft. | 420 Watts
Refrigerator-Freezer (frostless)
16 cu. ft. | 600 Watts
20 cu. ft. | 800 Watts
It's not that solar power isn't awesome,
and the original design of panels last as long as glass,
but that our appliances are grossly inefficient,
and haven't gotten any better since the 50's.
One would think in 60+ years that the appliances
would at least be a tiny bit more efficient, but they aren't.
The day companies start selling 38 Watt refrigerators
is the day solar will eclipse oil.
David Grouchy
edit on 18-11-2011 by davidgrouchy because: (no reason given)
Its like that for a reason... the people who sell the electricity own the companies that make the product so if the yuse more electric that means the
companies both make more money
also there are plenty of homes and business that are 100% off grid and have all the normal things a regular grid home have and works all the same if
not better.
you do this buy having efficient products because they actual do have them... like a tankless hot water heater so you only use electric to heat the
water when you need hot water, some people use a preheating system where the sun heats the water like they do in most heated pools in FL... this helps
usually to use in the summer in places where it snows and in the winter you kick on the tankless heater.
There are also efficient brands of just about everything, switch all lights to LED, start actually conserving power and paying attention to leaving
lights and things on...
For new houses I have seen allot of different green design shows that are pretty cool where the houses are built in specific ways to take advantage of
natural breezes and the sun coming up and things like that... Like the bedrooms were on one side that gets less sun to keep them cooler and on the
side with sun were allot of windows and this big chimney thing of rocks that held the sun heat so it helped regulate the house temps...
There is allot that we can do especially in new building to make a huge difference.
I think that the non profit would be good if you could do the grid tie in and have the home owner pay 50% of their average bill and they would just
always pay that and it would be a constant number and never change. :You would keep the money generated from the grid tie in.
Then like you said above put that money into a fund and use that to put the system on other houses. Eventually I guess if the profit dipped from so
many houses being grid tied in so there is excess electric and the electric companies paid less or wont buy the extra electric...
By that time you should have enough people in your system that the monthly money you get form them you could keep installing systems... Also you have
to think about the money you can make also for repairs and things you make it so that you are the only person that can repair the system or upgrade it
that way you make a small profit from that and you make a fair profit so that its better for them to have you do it.
Once you got going good with it you should be able to start buying things in bulk and getting a pretty good discount on them... The biggest point here
is to actually do it to help people and not to profit other then making enough profit to sustain the business model and continue to install the system
to more homes....
Another side to this is actually charging business's to do it and using that profit towards the free installs for homes.
I think this would be actually a very good idea and I have thought of it before and have the skills to do this, the only problem is the capital
investment to get it started...
i think the best place to start this would be in rural areas.