When a local power grid is not available to connect to, or would be too expensive to connect to, alternative sources are needed. While many options are available, we will focus on a particular installation as a case study. It has been chosen because it combines multiple sources that work well together, and are completely renewable.
The property in question is a private residence of modest size which is located on a piece of land that is not near the public utility system. The house is 3000 square feet and their is a barn which has a small apartment. The house is equipped with central air conditioning, along with a healthy demand for electricity. There is a modern high efficiency oil fired furnace which provides the hot water for heating. The radiant heat system pumps hot water to small heat spreaders below the floorboards. A much better system then the antiquated radiators.
The electricity generation system involves multiple components. Both the house and barn are fitted with an array of solar panels on the southern exposures. Adjacent the barn there is a small wind turbine mounted atop a mast. Both of these sources feed a bank of batteries via a central power control center . As a backup, there is a generator in a small out building together with a supply of biodiesel in a fifty two gallon tank. These components all work together autonomously to provide a constant supply of electricity far the home. Every watt of power generated comes from a completely renewable source.
The solar panels are mounted to the existing roof, which in this case are synthetic roofing tiles. The orientation of the roof was ideal for solar panel placement, as it faces almost due south. Well, half of it does anyway. The solar cells are housed in panels which are fixed about four inches above the tiles. Installation was fairly straight forward and did not require a specialist. Any construction professional is quite cabable of performing the job, or even the ambitious do-it-yourself homeowner.
Wind turbines are notorious for being very noisy and producing such an amount of vibration that they could not be attached to any inhabited structure. There is, however, a whole new generation of turbines designed for residential installation that produce very little noise and vibration. These new turbines can be mounted directly toa home or business without concern for comfort. This particular turbine is installed on a mast immediately adjacent to the barn where it sits about a foot above the peak of the roof. The mast acts as a conduit for the power cables.
Electricity from both the solar panels and wind turbine flow through a central power controller and into a bank of batteries. This microcontroller based unit is essentially the combination of a small computer and switches that connect the components discussed here to the main circuit breaker box for the house. type here
A diesel generator, housed in it's own shed is necessary to serve as a supplemental source of electricity in the rare event that demand exceeds production and the battery bank does not hold a sufficient charge. type here
The cost of this system is a few tens of thousands of dollars. As with many alternative energy installation, one must consider both the future cost savings and the many grants and subsidies that are available from government, industry, and non-profit associations, that can ultimatly represent a significant percent of the cost.
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