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It should run you about $0.75/W to install them and hook them in for a grid tie system, maybe a hair more. Interestingly, that's the same for roof mount (with
by Syonyk 4y ago
It should run you about $0.75/W to install them and hook them in for a grid tie system, maybe a hair more. Interestingly, that's the same for roof mount (with rapid shutdown) or ground mount (without rapid shutdown). Costs vary slightly depending on what you're doing in terms of panel orientation and inverter DC:AC ratio (if it's not 1.2 or greater, add more panels).
This project (CO2 to CH4) would benefit from maximum raw production per panel, if you can ramp the plants up and down, so aim them south. I've been deploying, both for my solar and for some other residential projects I'm helping with, east-west facing panels, to get production up as early in the morning as possible and run it late. You get less kWh per panel than south facing, but you get a system that, on a good day, is producing from sunup to sundown, even when those set far north of east/west. Out here, peak days are almost 45 degrees north of E/W for sunrise/sunset.
Iron Ridge XR1000 and some locally welded frames work pretty darn well for this sort of thing, if you have the ground area for it.
- zaptrem 4y agoWhy can't you put the panels on an electric swivel? I assume it's significantly more expensive? Why?
- walrus01 4y agoA sun tracking ground mount that goes on a steel pole and can take the wind loading of just six 1.65 x 1.0 meter size 60 cell panels costs considerably more to buy, ship and install than the panels themselves. These days if you need more kWh per month your money is much better spent buying more fixed mount panels.
- Syonyk 4y agoYou can - trackers are absolutely a thing, and historically tended to be used a lot. Back when solar was $10/W. Adding even $5/W for tracker structure and equipment was far cheaper than additional solar panels. Now, with panels sub-$0.50/W, you can accomplish the same thing (more power) for far less money by just putting more panels on. You get less production per nameplate panel watt, but the total system costs are usually lower. And you can push your DC:AC ratios pretty high if you want - cap your inverter out on sunny days, but still get more power on cloudy days. It just depends on what you're trying to optimize for. I still see trackers on occasion - they're cool. But the only place they're useful is if you have some stiff limit on nameplate capacity. Out here, you're limited to a 25kW system for residential, and you can't exceed your local transformer capacity in panel area - not inverter output (why, I have no idea, I've gotten a range of BS reasons that mostly center around somehow changing the system, blowing up the transformer, and then the power company being on the hook for a new transformer). So if you want to run a large "residential" site (think a ranch or something like that with a bunch of outbuildings), you can hit the 25kW limit quickly, and then need to go to a tracker to increase kWh generated on your 25kW system. But outside edge cases like that, just put more panels on. The systems I'm helping people with are mostly A-frames, with east-west facing panels for long solar days, and a fairly high DC/AC ratio. I've got 7kW of panel on 6kW of inverter, though I rarely see the inverter past 4500W, which is by design - I don't like pegging out power electronics for long periods of time, and prefer to run things at 80% of design load or lower for longevity reasons.
- konschubert 4y agoNo, the project here would still benefit from some more evenly spaced production. If they can run their plant at peak just for 4 hours a day instead of, say, 8, it will take much longer to get back the capital investment.