As someone who’s house is entirely powered by solar, I love the long days! I also do a lot of outside work so the extra hours of daylight really help me there too
During winter it was so overcast and cloudy that I had to run a generator almost the entirety of the season
If it weren’t for having to run the heat pump, I’d have 10X what I need right now. But 3 or 4 hours of usable sunlight in the winter makes it hard to keep up.
For real, I have wood stoves (and propane heaters a supplemental) for winter heat so luckily a little less load on my system! This past winter was so cold here I had to get a subzero sleeping bag and put a living heater (my dog) inside of it because even the wood stoves couldn’t keep up
I have mini splits but because of the sun situation I couldn’t run them on heat without burning through my power/spending hundreds of dollars on gas for the generator!
I have woodstoves as well, but I’ll run the furnace fan to distribute the heat, so there’s a bit of use, and it’ll kick propane in if the fire burns down, or the heat pump if it’s above -15 outside and I have capacity. I tend to be around 10KW of usage but 23KW of panels struggles some days. After about 5 days of poor sun I’ll be out of reserve, and I fire up the genny for 5 hours to top them back up.
I’ve considered building a woodgas source for the genny, that would take me pretty much completely off the teat. I’d love to get a groundsource heat pump but those are mucho dinero.
I’ve also considered melting urea for a cooling source, since we farm and need N for the sprayer. It’s amazing how much heat the endothermic reaction takes, and using a sprayer for topdressing is much more precise than spreading dry fert.
That’s awesome, I’d love to get a system like that going for my generator. Good luck with that, if you end up doing it!
What’s the insulation situation in your house? I didn’t build mine and the previous owner who did used Styrofoam and cinder blocks so it’s a losing battle keeping it climate controlled 95% of the time (alongside no central ducts at all minus the chimney)
It being summer here, I’ve stripped the inside walls and insulation. It was built in the 60s and had terrible insulation. I did have to wear a respirator because that era of gyproc used asbestos and mine tested positive. But now I’m furring out the walls on the inside with 2X material to get an R20-24, and I’ll probably add a reflective layer for added heat retention/reflection. I also have to re-do the siding, so I might add a 2" closed-cell layer under that for another R8. I’d like to have it competely passive, with a greenhouse on one side to gather winter heat and circulate. Winter here is pretty much 8 months so I have an uphill battle there.
As someone who’s house is entirely powered by solar, I love the long days! I also do a lot of outside work so the extra hours of daylight really help me there too
During winter it was so overcast and cloudy that I had to run a generator almost the entirety of the season
Full solar power is the dream! That’s awesome.
It can be pretty great, but you really do need to treat it differently than you would on the grid!
For example: at night, making sure you don’t leave lights on, not running heavy loads like the microwave for very long, etc.
The good news is that as the old expensive equipment gets phased out, it gets easier and cheaper to DIY your off grid (or emergency backup) system!
If it weren’t for having to run the heat pump, I’d have 10X what I need right now. But 3 or 4 hours of usable sunlight in the winter makes it hard to keep up.
For real, I have wood stoves (and propane heaters a supplemental) for winter heat so luckily a little less load on my system! This past winter was so cold here I had to get a subzero sleeping bag and put a living heater (my dog) inside of it because even the wood stoves couldn’t keep up
I have mini splits but because of the sun situation I couldn’t run them on heat without burning through my power/spending hundreds of dollars on gas for the generator!
I have woodstoves as well, but I’ll run the furnace fan to distribute the heat, so there’s a bit of use, and it’ll kick propane in if the fire burns down, or the heat pump if it’s above -15 outside and I have capacity. I tend to be around 10KW of usage but 23KW of panels struggles some days. After about 5 days of poor sun I’ll be out of reserve, and I fire up the genny for 5 hours to top them back up.
I’ve considered building a woodgas source for the genny, that would take me pretty much completely off the teat. I’d love to get a groundsource heat pump but those are mucho dinero.
I’ve also considered melting urea for a cooling source, since we farm and need N for the sprayer. It’s amazing how much heat the endothermic reaction takes, and using a sprayer for topdressing is much more precise than spreading dry fert.
That’s awesome, I’d love to get a system like that going for my generator. Good luck with that, if you end up doing it!
What’s the insulation situation in your house? I didn’t build mine and the previous owner who did used Styrofoam and cinder blocks so it’s a losing battle keeping it climate controlled 95% of the time (alongside no central ducts at all minus the chimney)
It being summer here, I’ve stripped the inside walls and insulation. It was built in the 60s and had terrible insulation. I did have to wear a respirator because that era of gyproc used asbestos and mine tested positive. But now I’m furring out the walls on the inside with 2X material to get an R20-24, and I’ll probably add a reflective layer for added heat retention/reflection. I also have to re-do the siding, so I might add a 2" closed-cell layer under that for another R8. I’d like to have it competely passive, with a greenhouse on one side to gather winter heat and circulate. Winter here is pretty much 8 months so I have an uphill battle there.