Electric System Design Question

What about a biogas [or LP/NG] fired generator as part of the back up plan?

Hi Garth,

I thought of that one too, but were talking about the burbs and not just farming country.

Methane digesters are one area we work in , but only LNG or bottled , would be a potiential gas as a fuel to fire the generators.

Thanks

Joe

Here in the UK there is a scheme under development - for village sized rather than personal use - which uses wind and pv and tidal electrical sources to electrolyse water into hydrogen when there is plenty of supply. This can be stored long term and used to power a CHP engine/generator which is thus able to back up the renewables when they are too calm to produce enough power.

Although the investment will be higher, this combination gives a secure supply which is entirley without carbon input.

Hi Hugh,

I often follow these plan developments and learn a great deal about how to adept to my needs. The community plans are a better path for large scale use more than 1 home and that may be a requirement in this situation for a thought.

These Clients, are interested in just personal sized systems at this time. We have that experience with hog, cattle and poultry farming, so they called us. In the right conditions, storage at the site would be fine but these are subdivison homesteads of American standards IE: 1 Acre to 5 Acres would be the normal size lots that I know of and they come with restrictions for those upper -scale neighborhoods. CH&P from a generator , was my first thought too , with fuel from the neighborhood LNG or Bottle lines.

Thanks

Joe

my dear:

To solve this problem in an economicle method I advice as follows:

1:Using the battery converters, requires maney batteries( and depending for how long you want to use them in one period of operation) and simultinous charging of them. From the other side. This problem also decreases the life of the batterries. This means that you have to purchase some new batteries time to time. And I think it creats problems in areas like Africa which the grid is not properly running and may be their will lake of the grid in some areas. Thus this makes its use uneconomicle.

2: Since there are free natural resources for generation of electric power. Then why not to take advantages of this free energy in the reduction of our monthly payments of which are lose for us and even for our society( you know the problems of the grids as they are faced with that during its operation and the consumption of the materials used and the cost of the suply and instalment of those used parts which are purchased from the other foriegn countries with foreign currencies).

NOw to make it more economic I suggest that it is most economicle to use a mixed system of the sun energy, wind energy and the grid energy taking advantages of the motore Generatore system which works for wind energy and the sun energy( using its heat enegy for providing a prime mover) and using light bulbs (12v with high intensity which is used directly with solor systems) and present converter. Such systems will be more economic if they are used for one or tow limited residents which requires small electrical energy to reduce the cost of maintenance rather to use them for a big area which requires high energy which needs high maintenance cost.

thank you.

Hello Guest,

I don't know how to address your comments except say

Yes, that would be great & I advocate free building materials and thermal mass everyday in my work ! Perhaps if we all study and learn everyday , perhaps even just by watching some of the free energy device videos on youtube.com one of us just might actually come up with a real answer. Of my many relatavies , some work in the real science end of the world and I am in awe of some of the things I have learned from them. Dr Jerry Woodall at Perdue University has a excellent body of work in Hydrogen production with mixing chemicals Alum & Gallium + water makes vast reactions of H2 gas and in a clean burnable form. There is no shortage of these 2 chemicals and both have a recycle rate at the top of what one seeks commercially.

See : http://youtube.com/watch?v=tnv_ZXdd_II for that video

I just saw a Video of some fellow "?" doing what my father did way back in 1958 in college , I was told that if they could have just gotten the mineral to work with , called Alnaco he told me, they would have not had their engine to magnatize itself and cog up. Back then you could not by the stuff , as it was expensive & restricted, Im told. Ive never tried this experiment , but I think I will.

Try this video on for your taste, it looks like pretty neat stuff :

http://youtube.com/watch?v=mCANbMBujjQ&feature=related

Thanks

Joe

I note no mention of flow batteries or Hybrid flow batteries, nor Fuel cells which I was told are batteries by another name. In my study I was told that there are powerful batteries that have been in operation for 60 years. Obviously some batteries are better than others, and there is also the fact that some take up more room than others. The Submarine batteries and the forklift batteries are pretty mature as far as batteries go. My study recommends the most perfect inverters when meshing the different imputs and draws. (I don't know what the most perfect inverters are yet.) My study is incomplete. Still I suggest we look at the draws on the isolated from the grid system and determine what will power those demands. Plus you may ask, does the client intend to design for the power available from a sensible low cost system, or does the client require a system that conforms to demands from the past. It is nice that since the 70s there has been an effort on the part of manufacturers to make machines that demand less energy as a selling point.

What the generally acceptable home needs is food storage, (refrigerator), tool operation, and heating or cooling and lights.

What old things can most easily be abandoned? Incandesant light bulbs can very easily be abandoned. The refrigerator and air conditioner and the coffeemaker and the heater are the big draws. Electric heating has gone away in most places and is back to gas. Gas will be supplied from waste systems in lieu of drilling for it more and more.

The perfect generation system powers the perfect use system. Imputs are DC from Solar panels and batteries so that the inverters are feeding an AC system, which is inherited.

A questionaire to your client that answers what their needs are, will give you the answers you need in all cases to supply the answers.

Standarization will pivot on the mix of old or new, AC or DC appliances. -according to my study.

Hi Transcendian

You bring up somethings I also have considered suggesting. Mike "Stritski" ( up in Jersey ) I think was his name, did about this same process with Solar and a Hydrogen water splitter fuel system, but he had to have massive storage , which as you know is possible if tanks could be located . Having the space for that in the neighborhoods their thinking of , is not possible.

I know that I will suggest that they also sell & convert everyone to a Geothermal Heat & AC as it runs very cheaply and because we sell this too. I also sell SunFrost appliances too and I will be suggesting these in addition and a good conservation program with LED light installations and solar water heaters in addition to off set the KWH from whole home , the geothermal heatpumps and the addition of thermal heating of the floor systems when possible.

Thanks

Joe

The very very very first step is going to be to jettison that "200 Amp Service" idea. Unless you have acres of clear sun exposure, capturing and storing 200A for 12 hours is going to be impractical. 200A at 240V equates to 48kVA and if we simply assume resistive loads, that's 48,000 watts. A GOOD solar panel will put out about 12W / sq. ft., so you would need 4000 square feet of active solar cells, which along with framing to hold them etc.will likely come to 5000 sq. ft. of land. And that is PEAK output, i.e. 12 noon, no clouds, so shade. You really need a lot more to be consistent, probably 1.5 times to be safe. So if you had just a little 1200 sq. ft. house, you would need a solar farm 6 times as big as the house to power it with 200A continuously.

The best practice is to reduce loading, combine sources, use solar to augment heat and hot water as much as possible, use natural cooling as much as possible etc.etc. Off grid IS possible but not at the same gross wastefulness we are doing with grid powered systems.

Hi JRaef,

Well we never say never to a good client, I'm a brave lad but I want their business.

A new way of harvesting ( within the limits imposed ) all the available energy possible is more along the lines I am hoping for here. I suppose your numbers are correct and CH&P generators is what I thought would be the best available move.

Yep- the reduction of loads is in my mind too. Waste not-want not said Ben Franklin.

Most problems in energy are solved through combinations of solutions, that also make for complications and service calls. See, ya just have to find the good in every situation - paid service calls .

Thanks

Joe

hello joe woodall,

in about a 6 month old issue of "log cabin design" i saw an article about a ranch that was so far out that they and all of their neighbors were off grid. they had been there about 30 years. thru trial and error they and all of their neighbors had pretty much changed to the same type system for all of their needs. that was an xanic (i know it isn't spelled correctly, but i am lazy) 3,500 to 4,000 watt true sine wave inverter. 7,500 watts of solar panels and a battery bank. they said this supplied all of the power for the ranch.

all of this is kind of expensive, but still cheaper than the equivalent in diesel generator and fuel.

i myself have 500 watts of solar panels, a couple of 400 watt square wave inverters and free 12v deep draw batteries from the local parts house. i need to add at least another solar panel, perhaps 2. this is mostly because of all the online time for this laptop. by the way, i know that my battery choice is not the best, but they are free. they are returned or exchange batteries. little known fact: 75% of the time when a vehical won't start, it is because the terminals need to be cleaned. well, many people just put in a new battery instead of cleaning the terminals. i know this, the parts house knows this, so they actually check all returned batteries and either the employees take them home, or their customers. since we are not cranking an engine from a cold start, even older batteries work fine.

my needs are minimal. one panel runs the solar powered well pump. the other runs my lights and computer. when i need bigger power, i fire up the generator, and run the battery charger at the same time off of the generator.

my new "single family home methane digester running off of a flush toilet" should be producing gas in a few months.

i have been to your web site in the past. it is pretty good. you should include a link to your company web site.

joekersh@hotmail.com

Hi ArtbyJoe,I would like to read that article as I do enjoy a good adventure and I think their process of elimination and modification would be the natural process that I might would take .

It sounds like you have quite an ambitious project at home yourself, with the combo system you have set up. And your off grid too & that's all the electric power you use daily ( save any generator time required ) . That's pretty impressive stuff to me; even that you have set up your home to be so frugal is really neat . I think your an inspiration to us all.

As concerns the digester system you spoke about , may I ask to learn from you, how you are able to keep your water temperatures up to where they must be, with your flushing toilets digester system ?

My own work has led me to believe that the flushing toilet systems impart too much input of fresh water through out the day, when compared to the poundage of solid waste introduced at delivery from a sewer pipe flushing system. We would feed an average system daily but in a very deliberate way imputing and exiting the same volume daily . I have noticed , and studies show, that continuous drops through out the day in temperatures, results in the causing of a stop in the anaerobic bacteria formations and their life cycle to be hampered greatly.

The 98.2 to 104 degrees temperatures must be held constantly, to keep the reaction going or the bacteria will die. I always likened this to being much like the complete draining of your electrical storage batteries and that it will shorten the battery's life or its ability to properly hold a charge.

How do you get past this ?

Generator fuel is expensive and is projected to go up to 6 to 8 dollars a gallon in our next 36 month future; have you ever looked at running yours on waste vegetable oil or waste motor oil as a replacement for 60 - 90% of the diesel ? A lot of interesting work has shown that this is a viable method that cost practically nothing after the initial cost outlay to build the fueling system is recovered. Reference the "Journey to Forever " web site for some interesting stuff along this line. We are ourselves are in this process now, of conversion to totally off grid power at my new home and this will be a less expensive cost to run the generator for us in the future.

If you will be using your methane, what will be your cleansing system to prepare the fuel to run a IC Engine ?

Thanks for the compliments of my little web blog , at this time this is fine for all our needs and I like the frugality of a free blog. Some criticize us as being very UN professional , because of our use of a free blog, in a commercial situation. We wanted to give the knowledge of how to build with earth, to those whom might need it, as that so much damage to Family life has happened due to the millions of us , being pushed out of our homes, by foreclosures . I can't tell you how many people have called or written to say they may have found a way from our page and others, to start again ,by just using what God gave us so long ago , Earth. The stories I've heard are really touching.

I once had a paid site for many years and created it myself . The delivery is about the same, at the site we use now and I really don't plan to add a proper company web site ,anytime in the future. That's more for institutional clients and I have found E-commerce to be practical too for the other blog pages that I control.

Thanks for your input .

Joe

I too have been following Artbyjoe's exploits on various threads.

I'll add some better Biodiesel links, as some of the Journey to forever stuff is questionable!

National Biodiesel Board site

http://www.biodiesel.org/

A good how to

http://www.biodieselcommunity.org/

The oldest BioDiesel forum [most info]

http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/eve/ubb.x

The thumbnail explanation

http://www.biodiesel-fuel.co.uk/how-to-make-biodiesel/

US Department of Energy

http://www.eere.energy.gov/afdc/altfuel/biodiesel.html

US EPA

http://www.epa.gov/region09/waste/biodiesel/

National Renewable Energy Laboratory

http://www.nrel.gov/learning/re_biofuels.html

Methanol prices

http://www.methanex.com/products/methanolprice.html

Just coming in from the side here.

If as you say you are after "off grid" condition and do not ever intend to connect, then why not go "DC"?

Campers and travelers have multiple DC devices available. The saved cost and complexity of the converter could be added to total power yield by buying more PV, turbine or storage into the system.

AC is great because it can be "transformed" to reduce transmission losses, but I presume your generation and use sites will be relatively close.

Just watch how you specify the switches.