Living in an Off-Grid Home

Solar Electric Power for Homes not connected to an Electricity supply.
 

Bright Green Energy has designed a number of complete stand-alone energy systems to cater for the needs of the individual or family. Configurations may include a mixture of electrical generating sources. Options include:

• Solar PV modules
• wind turbines
• small hydroelectric generators
• diesel or petrol generators
• hybrid systems comprising of two or more of those mentioned above.

We receive lots of requests to design off-grid power system, but it is worth stating that you must do your sums correctly.

THE FIRST STEP

Make sure that you know what power you need. It sounds obvious, but there is a huge difference between watt hours and kilo-watt hours. Thus, if you want to run your house off-grid and you need "2000 kW Hrs" of electrical energy then you may not have read your electricity bill correctly!!
Just to be clear. 2000 kW Hrs stands for 2000 kW Hrs or 2000 x 1000 watts per hour or 2,000,000 watts. If this was a quarterly figure then dividing by the number of days in the month you will arrive at another huge number. For example, let's assume that your electricity bill reading from Jan-March is 2,000,000 watt hours. Dividing this by the number of days (91) in the quarter then we end up with 21,978.02 watts per day? What the hell does that mean exactly? It means nothing unless it is attached to the duration (TIME) of use.

2,000,000 Watt Hours is the amount of electricity you used in a three month period. The term watt-hours is used to assign a cost value to each watt used. You pay for consumption. That is, for each watt of electricity consumed, you pay a price assigned by the electricity company. You have to bear in mind, that if a bulb is rated at 65 watts, for example, it will use 65 watts of electricity for every single moment it is switched on. Hence the reason why electricity is charged according to time and why you receive your bills stating WATT HOURS or KILO WATT HOURS.

THE SECOND STEP

If your electricity bill is really 2,000kWh per quarter then you need to switch off all your appliances and examine every single appliance to find its rating in WATTS. At the same time think about the amount of time (HOURS) you use the appliance. This is better known as a LOAD CALCULATION.

The process of working out your electricity consumption is the basis of your calculations to size a solar or wind powered system. What we're after is the total watt hours per day or per week. As you can see 2,000,000 Watt hours is a lot of energy and to meet that demand you will need a lot of solar panels, approx 100 or more. Can you imagine that and think of the cost! Scary!

THE THIRD STEP

Get in touch with us and we'll help you design a system that meets your exact needs.

If you need an "off the shelf" system then consider the following. Call us for pricing.

TYPICAL SOLAR POWER SYSTEMS FOR OFF GRID HOMES

PLEASE NOTE: IT IS ESSENTIAL THAT YOUR HOME
IS PROPERLY INSULATED AND THAT ALL APPLIANCES AND LIGHTS
USED ARE ENERGY EFFICIENT.

The power generated by the Solar Medium Energy Package can run all of the following appliances and gadgets (though not all at once!)

• low power lighting
• stereo, tuner, CD and DVD player
• small fridge
• TV and VCR
• computer, printer, and scanner
• kettle
• various power tools
• microwave oven
• toaster
• vacuum cleaner
   

Remote power systems are ideal for providing energy to rural properties, holiday homes, alternative power systems and small community power supplies. If you live in an area where there is no electricity and connecting to the electricity grid is not an option, most likely it is far too expensive! The UK is unusual in that it experiences good wind conditions so wind power is certainly viable. Coupled with sunshine, a solar and wind solution provides a reliable, safe, environmentally friendly and user-friendly source of electricity for a very long time. A solar and./or wind power solution will need little maintenance simply because there are no moving parts. Component failure is very rare and come with superb guarantees, solar panels offer a 25 year warranty as standard. Best of all, you are generating your own electricity for free!

We offer a customised design service and are able to design a system that meets your exact needs. Everything we do is ecological responsible and sustainable. We offer complete, efficient, cost effective, and environmental systems.