Help the new guy!!!

[Gsteele]

Hello everyone, I'm very very new to the solar usage but have always thought its a great idea. I'm wanting to start small, my wife and I are building a greenhouse aquaponics system. I would like to know what am I going to need to power light (216w/265V) system pump (44w,110V) heater (1500w,120V) and maybe a little bit more. Ok from what I've studied on (not much) i need solar panels obviously, a charge controller, battery banks, and an inverter. I'm not sure what exactly rating wise I would need. I've never used solar before and I know nill to none about wiring or electricity. I was thinking this from "Windy Nation" but geez thats expensive.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01BBDC9GC/...ing=UTF8&psc=1

[SunEagle]

Hello Gsteele and welcome to Solar Panel Talk.

I would suggest you look at the sticky posts in the off grid area of this forum. Once you have determine what your daily watt hour usage will be running those loads you should be able to size your battery system and then your solar pv array.

Besides that the one thing you will definitely need will be lots of money. Running a 1500 watt heater along with a pump and lighting will require a very big battery system.

[Sunking]

It will cost more than your house and you have to replace it every 3 to 5 years. You are talking a 6 digit system and 5 digits every few years replacing batteries. Oh and an acre of land to mount panels too and a building to hold all the batteries required. Never going to happen.

[DanKegel]

Why batteries? Are you not on the grid?

If you're on grid, and solar net metering is available, that is usually a far, far better deal than batteries.

Can you get your heating requirements down somehow? 1500W is a *lot* of power; you'd need
*four* times as many solar panels as that 'windy nation' kit you linked to to even drive them
in the daytime, let alone charge a battery to drive them at night.

Figure out how many kWh you would use every day on this little operation, and then go price a solar system.
The sticker shock will either drive you away from the project, or drive you to cut your power consumption to the bone... or both.

[Living Large]

I'm not sure what exactly rating wise I would need. I've never used solar before and I know nill to none about wiring or electricity. I was thinking this from "Windy Nation" but geez thats expensive.

OK, first off, you have learned something important - solar is expensive. Forget anything you heard about it being green and cheap.

The first and most critical step (stop shopping around) is to get an accurate estimated daily energy use in kWh (kilowatt hours). To do this, multiply the wattage by the hours each item will run. Here is an example (I have no idea what an aquaponics system is or how long the items run):

Heater: 1500 x 6 = 9000 Wh
Lights: 216 x 8 = 1728 Wh
Pump:44 x 12 = 528 Wh
Total: 11,256 Wh or 11.3 kWh

An off-grid system (no electricity, has a battery bank) that supports that daily consumption, which will likely require a generator to keep the batteries healthy, may cost $40,000 -50,000. You can see why calculating your consumption is critical. The second step is figuring out how to reduce whatever your planned consumption is, for obvious reasons.

Please do this exercise, and post the results. Then people here can help you better.

[J.P.M.]

I've always had 2 questions about aqua/hydroponics:

1.) How do you determine if/when you've watered too much ?
2.) How do you find a fertilizer that doesn't float ?

[Logan005]

fertilizer can be chemical, or organic, Organic can be refined to mix completely in water, any floating mater should be filtered out and composted. and added as fertilizer at a future time. IDK about over watering, although I have seen several dozen different types of systems.

[Sunking]

Sounds like a Ganga Farmer to me. His competition will eat his lunch with much lower prices.

[Gsteele]

Sunking hey jackwagon get your facts right before you starting insinuating illegal activities! I'm a Sheriff's Deputy in the Central part of Oklahoma, so no I, will not be farming "Ganga". J.P.M. an aquaponics system uses a tank with fish in in, then grow beds are connected to that. The fish waste is pumped through the grow beds, where the vegetables take the nutrients out and turn the nitrates into nitrites and the water is filtered and then deposited back into the fish tank. There is no media used, a ph neutral clay balls or something of the sort is used as the grow medium. So you take a plant put it in a net cup, then this goes down into your medium. As far as watering it depends on the plant, leafy plants (lettuce, kale, etc) can take water really well and the roots don't need medium, so you can float a styrofoam piece with holes in it for them to hang down into. The water level is controlled by a bell siphon when the water gets to the necessary level it starts siphoning the water down the drain tube, and deposits back into the fish tank... So that's why I was wondering about my power consumption because you can grow vegetables and fruit year round.

[sensij]

Based on my experience with an aquaponics system, I'd suggest taking some time to get the whole thing running and balanced before trying to add solar into the mix. It will be enough of a challenge keeping the fish and the plants happy, you don't need the complication of batteries yet.

[Sunking]

Sunking hey jackwagon get your facts right before you starting insinuating illegal activities! I'm a Sheriff's Deputy in the Central part of Oklahoma, so no I, will not be farming "Ganga

I am a Okie from Tulsa. Now that I know what you do for a living, there is no way you can afford to do what you want. You are talking a $100,000 system using $50,000 worth of batteries you replace every 3 to 5 years. Oklahoma has some of the lowest electric rates in the country. Use to work for PSO and contract for OG&E back in the 80's.

Anything you take off grid in Oklahoma is going to cost you roughly 600% more than buying it from your POCO the rest of your life. I know for fact you cannot afford that on a Sherriff's salary in OK unless you grow ganja. Secondly a 20 mph wind is not enough to do squat.

[Living Large]

Sunking So that's why I was wondering about my power consumption because you can grow vegetables and fruit year round.

You can't begin to design a solar solution until you have a good estimate of what your power consumption will be. Reason is, if you are wrong above or below, you will waste significant $$$ correcting the error, assuming a redesign is even practical. There are practical limitations on scalability, such as not being able to mix new batteries with old, space needed for panels, to name just two. Sunking's point is that it will be obscenely expensive compared with the power company, regardless of size. I don't see the answer to an important question - is power available?