It is also a simple fact that the cost of installation of solar panels to run your house takes about 20 years to recoup in energy produced. What is the life expectation of a solar panel? About 20 years.
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I have 12KW PV on the roof and have an 85% warranty for 25 years.
I originally expected a payback of 7 years but it looks like it will be more like 10, as electricity prices go up my payback will go down. I have 5 years under my belt and love having power on the roof.
I made a bad decision when I decided to use a flooded lead acid battery. They work ok but require a lot of attention and I haven’t given them the attention they really demand and have lost a lot of my 3000AH capacity so I am going to replace them with AGM’s. I would have liked to go with Lithium but they are really expensive and require some attention and I don’t want to give the attention they should have. Lithium is 3 or 4 times as expensive as AGM’s but they can be discharged all the way without hurting them very much. AGM’s can take an occasional complete discharge but it will reduce their total life. Since I just use them for backup and can recharge from solar or generator I won’t have to discharge more than about 20% so they will likely last me the rest of my life.
One more thing, my new batteries will not eat up as much of my solar production as my current FLA’s so I will increase my daily production by about 15%, that’s will give me about 9kw a day extra production on a good day.
After 5 years I liked it enough to do the same thing on our 2nd home in Florida where I only had to put 9KW on the roof but because there is so much sun down there the daily total is not much less than in Kentucky. It’s enough to take care of the pool pump, the A/C and the rest of the house.
Energy savings wasn’t my only goal, I wanted to reduce monthly outlays. If I croak my wife won’t have a substantial bill for electricity. I’m still connected to the grid but I wanted to make sure that if there was a $#!+ hits the fan situation I would not lose all the storage in my freezers and I really like summer time air conditioning. Payback is not the only goal or only advantage of solar.
Solar is getting less and less expensive. It will one day be cheaper than the grid and most people will get it.
You know more than I do. But, I still think environmentally safe disposal of old panels is a big issue.