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Johandup

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News like this makes me very suspicious. It is not as If the average cadre (even her) can figure something out and then write 10000 words on the topic.

I am still waiting for the Zondo commission to start probing the very high (or so is the rumor) solar supply contracts with the independent suppliers. Is this the first stage of softening up the gullible voters of our country?

It has been published that Ramaphosa and his swaers are looking into this.

This article is about the progress of solar power supply in Kenia. But no mention is made of the cost.

https://www.news24.com/Columnists/Mamphela_Ramphele/mamphela-ramphele-needs-of-the-majority-must-be-top-priority-20190917

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Renewables are being spragged by the unions primarily. Those early rounds of renewable bids I understood to be a loss leader to get the ball rolling.

Probably everyone here finds the situation particularly ridiculous having installed our own systems, figured out the problems and issues. It is only politics preventing this happening more widely on a larger scale.

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2 hours ago, DeepBass9 said:

It is only politics preventing this happening more widely on a larger scale.

Not politics, greed is what I see, helped by politics.

Imagine we can all get subsidized to install solar AND large battery banks (like one day 2nd life batteries) with the express intention to feed the grid day and night?
Or, you go at it on your own and sell the power back to the Munic.

Now if that is not a 1st world properly distributed system, mil or more houses feeding the grid nationally, then I am at a loss. 🙂 

Edited by Guest
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With the way the price of lithium batteries is going the last couple of years and the rate the electricity tariffs are increasing, it it starting to make sense to just store your excess solar power in batteries for your own use at night. Why bother trying to feed back to the grid with their terrible feed in tariffs and high fixed monthly fees. Keep the grid only as a backup for when your batteries are a bit low and there isn't much sun. 

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It used to be that the cost of replacing batteries every few years was a large contributer to the total cost, but with batteries lasting 10 years now, I wonder was the break even cost would be per kWh.

Back of the cigarrette packet calculation : Assume you can install a system for R200 000 that provides all of your needs, and assume that this produces 20kWh per day and it's life expectancy is 10 years, before replacing batteries. That system will produce 7300 kWh per year, and 73 000kWh over the 10 years. R200 000 cost/ 73 000kWh = R2.74 per kWh. 

So Eskom is still cheaper in current prices, but not for long if they keep increasing the tariffs.

Edited by DeepBass9
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8 minutes ago, DeepBass9 said:

R2.74 per kWh

Jip, we are on R2.09 per kw - <600 units since we went grid tied.

23 minutes ago, Stanley said:

Keep the grid only as a backup for when your batteries are a bit low and there isn't much sun. 

Therein the problem. If the grid is not "fed", who is going to pay to keep it around?

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2 minutes ago, The Terrible Triplett said:

Therein the problem. If the grid is not "fed", who is going to pay to keep it around?

Yes, this is exactly the problem that Eskom and the municipalities are going to be facing quite soon. The people who use the most energy and therefore subsidize the people who use less energy are the very people who can afford to install solar panels and batteries to reduce their reliance on the grid. It will probably cause more above-inflation increases which in turn causes more people to invest in solar etc.

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7 minutes ago, Stanley said:

... municipalities are going to be facing quite soon.

Munics should, like CoCT, go to court to have the law changed so that they can buy power "locally". The Munic's are paying for the people who cannot afford, and it is a good thing that the poorest of the poor get free electricity. 

Munic's are the ones owing Eskom substantially mostly due to bad management of their internal affairs.

 

5 minutes ago, DeepBass9 said:

'utility death spiral'.

Eskom is a dinosaur. 

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1 hour ago, Stanley said:

Yes, this is exactly the problem that Eskom and the municipalities are going to be facing quite soon. The people who use the most energy and therefore subsidize the people who use less energy are the very people who can afford to install solar panels and batteries to reduce their reliance on the grid. It will probably cause more above-inflation increases which in turn causes more people to invest in solar etc.

Yet they mostly don't. Most people in my neck of the woods (which is not that exclusive) could afford a grid tied solution. But they don't do it. Most people in my street don't even have a UPS or a genny. 

I have people in my family from well off to very rich indeed. None of them have so much as a UPS. They are amazed to hear that I have solar, and hadn't even inquired to find out how much such a thing could cost. They seem to prefer sitting around in the dark complaining about the government.

Thinking of all the people that I know who have got rather more tom than I do, none of them have any kind of domestic electricity backup.

Why this is, I don't know. I suspect that in one particular case there is a complicated set of companies setup so that he actually pays rent to himself or something, but which also makes it hard for him to make changes because that may raise questions (should anybody actually notice) of whose home is it and who is paying for the modifications.

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8 minutes ago, Corné said:

That is wow ... 

One of the conditions are: "... on condition it accelerates the closure of polluting coal plants to make way for renewable energy."

What security would the investors have / recourse keeping in mind "State Capture" and the monies just being gone / no-one prosecuted (yet - yea I hope), I wonder how would that would work if after +-5-10 years the coal stations are still in their "death spiral", money is gone?

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2 hours ago, DeepBass9 said:

It used to be that the cost of replacing batteries every few years was a large contributer to the total cost, but with batteries lasting 10 years now, I wonder was the break even cost would be per kWh.

Back of the cigarrette packet calculation : Assume you can install a system for R200 000 that provides all of your needs, and assume that this produces 20kWh per day and it's life expectancy is 10 years, before replacing batteries. That system will produce 7300 kWh per year, and 73 000kWh over the 10 years. R200 000 cost/ 73 000kWh = R2.74 per kWh. 

So Eskom is still cheaper in current prices, but not for long if they keep increasing the tariffs.

I think if you can get cheap finance its already cheaper.

I recently sat and did the math on this, because if I can take out some of the equity in my house at just under prime, from a cashflow perspective it starts to get close.

Lets assume I go for the total Off grid solution

Currently I use around : 600-700 kWh per month, lets take the high end of that 700 / 30 = 24kWh per day.

Currently this costs me : 700kWh x R2.2 = R1520 + R360 for electricity availability, for a grand total of R1900 (yikes!)

I live in a very sunny area so I would think I could easily survive with:

20kWh worth of storage

12KW worth of panels 

10KW worth of inverter power

Sadly the math only works out if you all out East and cheap :P

So for batteries you have 2x 10kWh Revov's = R70K

Inverters : 3x Axpert 5KW King's R14K x3 = R42K

Panels: R5.6pw 12KW = R67.2K + say another R20K for mounting and accessories.

This totals: R199K lets add another R10K for bits and bobs.

R210K+-

If I finance this on my home loan it will add about R2.1K pm to the bond repayment, so its almost almost there, just R200 pm more than what I am paying now.

If we assume the entire system only lasts 10 years (which it won't the panels won't even be halfway through their life yet)

The Inverters and Batteries however I am not so sure, so lets say it all goes up in flames in 10 years.

24kWh x 365 = 8760 kWh PA

87600 kWh over 10 years, so that's R210K / 87600kWh = R2.39 kWh.

So its already a pretty close race... if my rate goes to R2.6 kWh its a no brainer.

 

 

 

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This is the thing. The components required to generate your own power are getting cheaper and the cost of electricity from Eskom and municipalities is climbing. Like you say, the cost is already very close to being equal, it just needs to tip a little more in favor of Solar and I imagine a lot more people will see the light.

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That cutover cost is pretty close now. When I went off grid I worked about that it was about R3.50 with more expensive panels and components back in those days, but now it is almost a no brainer. I'm not sure If I would want to finance a system though. Mine is long paid for so electricity and water is now 'free'. (ignoring opportunity costs and so on).

Why I went off grid though was the Eskom line rental was R1200 pm before I switched on a light, so I was effectively paying about R5/kWh, and the less I used the more expensive it got. 

Also the sums above are for what you can buy RETAIL. For a big installation the economy of scale should work out much much  cheaper.

Edited by DeepBass9
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2 hours ago, The Terrible Triplett said:

on condition it accelerates the closure of polluting coal plants to make way for renewable energy."

These investors have conditions to do away with coal plants. Why is this.

What do we do with all the coal Eskom is not going to use anymore. This might bring the price of coal down and close a couple of coal mines?

 

 

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39 minutes ago, Gerrie said:

These investors have conditions to do away with coal plants. Why is this.

What do we do with all the coal Eskom is not going to use anymore. This might bring the price of coal down and close a couple of coal mines?

I'm guessing they see non-coal plants as a safer investment because legislation is not going to shut them down in 5 to 10 years time. Power plants are expensive, so a long pay back, and to pay you back they have to be busy producing for a good period of time.

Plus they may be hoping for a share rebates for carbon savings. An even better investment.

And maybe because  Eskom, who like what they know and know what they like and what they like is coal, are less likely to be owners.

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1 hour ago, DeepBass9 said:

That cutover cost is pretty close now. When I went off grid I worked about that it was about R3.50 with more expensive panels and components back in those days, but now it is almost a no brainer. I'm not sure If I would want to finance a system though. Mine is long paid for so electricity and water is now 'free'. (ignoring opportunity costs and so on).

Why I went off grid though was the Eskom line rental was R1200 pm before I switched on a light, so I was effectively paying about R5/kWh, and the less I used the more expensive it got. 

Also the sums above are for what you can buy RETAIL. For a big installation the economy of scale should work out much much  cheaper.

Well yes. I worked out a 9 year payback when I bought mine. But that was based on known Eskom increases. When COJ hit with a 19% increase, my payback time came down.

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4 hours ago, Gerrie said:

I agree with you but it looks like the Chinese have a gigantic appetite for coal power.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/judeclemente/2019/01/23/coal-is-not-dead-china-proves-it/amp/

Most people probably don’t know how gigantic China is.

With the previous Olympics they had 330 power stations with 30 standing idle due to no coal supply.

In the 80s we attended an international mining show as we intended to purchase one longwall (a coal mining setup).

China pitched up and they wanted to purchase 180 long walls. The whole of SA probably had 10 longwalls running at a time (too lazy to think back now).

We had a mining delegation visit them in the 2000s and their scale of mining plus their coal reserves astonished us. It left us so far behind it wasn’t even funny.

We used to count our mining reserves in maybe 100 million tons per mine. They were talking about billions per mine.

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20 hours ago, PJJ said:

nverters : 3x Axpert 5KW King's R14K x3 = R42K

Panels: R5.6pw 12KW = R67.2K + say another R20K for mounting and accessories.

This totals: R199K lets add another R10K for bits and bobs.

R210K+-

Redoing the math on this, If I play around I might actually be able to go Victron after all.

2x 5kVA Multi's R50K

3x 150/70 Blue solar MPPT R22.5K

1x Venus R3.5K

Totals : R72.5K vs 42K = R30.5K premuim.

However, if I can then assume a system lifetime of 15 years.

8760 kWh PA x 15 (not really possible I know since the batteries don't also now last longer, but humor me :P)

R240K /131 400kWh = R1.82 kWh

Edit:

Lets say I dropped the Revov's and went Pylon, and since they claim to do 4500 cycles to 70% remaining capacity, I should just just just maybe make 15 years worth of lifetime.

7 Pylon's would cost 7 x R19 500 = R136 500 - R70K = R66.5K premuim

So now its R306 500 / 131 400 kWh = R2.33 kWh, its getting close boys.

Edited by PJJ
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There are softer benefits involved as well - harder to put a number to, and different people will weight them differently. 

For a start there's your deep freeze. You are not going to lose the contents of that. Sure... your insurance would cover it, but they have ways of getting that money back.

Secondly there is the comfort and convenience of always having the lights on. When I got my system I wasn't quite sure if I was doing the right thing. It's not small change. 4 power cuts later (one starting about 4 in the morning and lasting 6 hours) and I feel surer that I did right. Also our mayor got so incensed with what Eskom's 13% increase was going to to the already hard pressed residents of his city that he hit us with 19%. Now the payback period is a bit shorter and our fridges, electric fence and nearly everything else keep on working.

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