Advice needed for school project involving single solar panel- please help!

[NamedAfterNature]

Hello everyone,
My teammates and I are doing a public outreach project building a solar powered aquaponics operation that will be used to grow fresh herbs. Since it will be a school project that we have to fund on our own, I'm looking for the cheapest but most effective way to power the fish tank's bubbler on solar energy during daylight hours. Do I need a solar panel and a power inverter? If so, what are our best options for this? Would a standard 12V panel be overkill? I'm hoping there is something cheaper we can do, because 12V panels are around 100 dollars. We just need something that is going to run a 10 gallon fish tank bubbler. I am excited for your responses!

[bcroe]

Your most efficient setup would be a 12DC bubbler directly powered by a 12V panel. Use of
a selected matched set would avoid voltage regulation issues. Such a system would be
entirely dependent on amount of sun (clouds) and seasonal day length variations, not to
mention snow. Bruce Roe

[SunEagle]

Here is a 12VDC tank bubbler that I found on Amazon. Since it will run using less then 0.5amps I would think a small 20watt solar panel should be enough to power it. The only problem I see is that a solar panel may produce a higher voltage then it can handle since it was designed for a 12v battery.

There should be other tank bubblers that you can find that run directly from a solar pv panel.

[J.P.M.]

How long is the bubbler going to be needed ? That is, how long is the project expected to run ?

Bruce probably has one of the better/practical answers. Keep the pump/PV simple. You'll have fewer things to think about allowing stronger focus on the project.

Another question: What happens to the plants if the amount of sunlight is reduced by, say a few cloudy/sunless days and so no or reduced solar energy is available to power the pump ?

Good luck.

Stay curious.

[Yet another Yeti]

MODERATOR: He/She has been warned previously about running amok at the keyboard without any clue as to the accuracy of the output.

All postings by Yeti are suspect as to safety and accuracy.

Maybe some Outdoor mini-panel with integrated powerbank
and one or two USB-ports 5 V , 0.5 A to reload a mobile phone
could do the trick .

Needs a 5 V-bubbler , then ...