solar news site.

news site for solar news, looks good.

http://www.youtube.com/user/photovoltaicsystem?v=VYnd78MfneM

run the imiev off solar to counter the power from coal concern of some people. in NZ abut 70 percent of power is from water, wind or geothermal.

70% is a really good number compared to the rest of the world. Then you know you are trully driving green. Here in Ontario, Canada I live close to Niagara Falls and the hydro electric plants. I like to think my car runs on water.

Ontario is moving soon to coal free power, I've read in the new as as soon as 2014! We have a lot of wind power in the region as well. I know our numbers aren't anywhere near 70% but its definitely getting better.

Ontario Power Authority is encouraging homeowners and building owners to generate their own electricity through a Feed In Tarriff program. The availability is limited in these early stages and I'm hoping my application will be accepted and I'll have solar panels on my house soon. I'll just have to wait and see.

HI MLucas,
The solar on the house plan looks great !, Here in NZ, the Sun rises in the East and Sets in the West, so back the front to Canada !.

On the Plans and Compass provided, I would suggest, if funding permits later, to fit some panels on the East side of the roof as we found here that the best sun producing hours were from the midday and afternoon hours, not so much the morning hours, so panels set for getting the afternoon sun might be a good idea.

By afternoon, fog and frost are gone and the our West, your East panels are / would be, working better. If the budget is there I would recommend it. Perhaps wire and install the East panel holders until enough is saved for the panels later ?.

iMiEVNZ7 said:

...Here in NZ, the Sun rises in the East and Sets in the West, so back the front to Canada !...

Click to expand...

Um, methinks it doesn't quite work that way. It's North facing panels in the Southern Hemisphere and South facing panels in the Northern Hemisphere, but East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet... (Kipling ballad, and popular 50's songs). :roll:

In California because of time-of-use metering whereby rates are highest in the afternoon, it makes sense for us to also face our panels with a westward bias.

As an aside, when I sailed dead North from NZ to Fiji, the problem I had with my aft-mounted solar-panels is that they were in the shade of the sails for a significant portion of the day - noticeably affected my power management.

Grin,
I had to rethink that a bit, I can't yet work it out, yep now I can, i imagined two people looking at the sun as it moves, one person in the northern hemisphere and one in the southern hemisphere, both looking to the equator.

Both see the same sun, one sees it move from his left to his right, and the other sees it move from his right to his left, but in both cases it is east to west. Got it !.

Technically though, there must be a place where east meets west surely ?. there should be a line where if you go a bit each way, you are at the point where it is east and west together sort of, like a boundary line ?.

Sailing is cool, I want to make a electric powered ketch rigged catamaran, and instead of sails, two free standing masts with many small wind turbines, powering twin imiev like motors.

Like sailing, without the flapping or rushing to furl or reef, but still figureing out how to reduce windage on the turbines, thinking self feathering blades, or a mast track system where they come down and stow below.

Oh and the hulls on a suspension system, to stop the rolling, sigh. love sailing but I get seasick on slow waves.

Maybe a submarine, solar powered ?

I should have noted I only own the left/west side of the building. We call them semi-detached houses in Ontario, I know they are called other things in other places. My property taxes are cheaper and my heating costs are cheaper since I share a wall with another dwelling. We don't have air conditioning, opted not to have it all though our neighbors think we are crazy. We've found ways to get through the summers without it. The six inch walls make the house very efficient.