I remember when my uncle caught the energy monitoring bug back 30-ish, maybe even 40 yrs ago. 2 huge upright, self-defrosting freezers got parked in his barn to be used as storage units. He bought a 2nd chest type unit to replace them. I didn't ask too many questions because he had that engineer's mind and would happily volunteer a 3 hr impromptu course on the topic
I am considering installing an Ecoflow / Solar array system, along the lines of what you did. When this video came out I thought your approach (figure out the load requirement) was smart, so I bought the energy monitor wifi setup that you did. That was about a year ago. I got sidetracked. Now I'm getting back going, so I watched this video again. I've got to tell you, it is very informative and easy to understand. I thank you for making it.
I'm laughing because I literally did the same thing last week. You might want to check your mains at 4:08. Looks like you have them going into B and C instead of A and B, but then again if it works, its works. I also really like the Kasa smart switches and used them to turn on and off our driveway and garage lights. We have solar coming into through our barn, but that comes to the house as "sub-panel feed". Our barn has 100a service, but I setup up a 50a monitor on each leg. It works really well. It shows me how much is coming back from the barn and when I have heavy draw in the barn I still see it from the mains. Another thing I learned from our Emporia is that our stock tank heater is on all the time, but I thought it only came on when the water was at zero. I bought a Kasa smart plug and I use that the cycle power to the tank every two hours.
I put 2 circuit panels in my barn, one all grid and the other UPS backup via my solar inverter/battery. Both circuits get fed by solar if there's enough power (by inverter backfeeding of the main house panel when grid is up and senses and prevents backfeed when grid is down via the CT sensors) but in grid down the UPS panels (as well as critical loads in house) get power as long as battery is above x% with the hope that the sun will be out to charge most days if the outage lasts weeks. If not got generator hookup as well with PTO diesel tractor. I haven't felt the need for a monitoring system since my sol-ark inverter software measures the loads and graphs them so I've become trained to know what is on and what is not just by looking at my graphs over a year or so. Fairly easy process of elimination for the most part.
You can also buy whole home monitors that just show you total energy use and not each circuit. We have one like that and they are easy to install. Just 2 clamps on the 2 hot's coming into the breaker panel. It sill does live energy use monitoring and you can see it change as something turns off or on and get a good idea of how much power something is taking. Plus historical use and estimated power bills.
Evan, what you appear to be doing is a commendable effort to save some power and make use of saved solar energy via some batteries. I thought about doing the same thing where I lived about 175 miles west of you in Missouri. I had an expert explain to me that this will save some energy but these storage batteries are expensive and the amount of them required to really make any difference is self defeating. You’re much better off going grid tied. Get yourself an emergency generator that’s controlled by an automatic transfer bus for those rare occasions when the grid is down. You don’t even need to be at home to do this. I have a 20kw Generac which has been truly reliable for the 18 years I’ve had it and handled all my needs, not just the critical ones. My well is deep and uses some power. I used to have a low efficiency heat pump but I replaced that 12 years ago with a geo-thermal system. That reduced my electric draw by 65% - most of which was used by the heat pump which had a poor 5% efficiency rating. Going geo almost totally eliminated my propane use. I used to go through two 500 gallon tanks a year. Since replacing the old heat pump when it died with the geo thermal I’ve never had to have the tank refilled in 12 years. We lose power here 4-6 times a year for brief periods and once every 5-7 years for an extended period that is up to a day or 2. It runs off propane. I don’t use propane for my home or shop heat as it’s too costly. I use electricity from my solar or the grid. My solar system is 3 years old and will have completely paid for itself in another 4 years. My electricity bills for my hobby farm (22 acres) were averaging $150 a month prior to going solar ($175 in winter and $135 the rest of the year). Now there is only a $30 a month grid connection fee which you may not even have depending on your electric coop charges. I do usually have a month or 2 in the winter when my bill pops up when I’ve used up my surplus. You can tailor your setup to eliminate this if you wish. I recommend you view Jon’s excellent FarmCraft101 RUclips presentations on solar where he does the same thing you are starting but ends up draining his battery cells in hopes of using them some time in the future. That’s not to say you wasted the investment on your batteries completely. You can make good use of them on your spread out areas like your barn which has low irregular power demands or your currently unused well. Keep on installing the solar panels as you can afford them but do so with the plan of using the grid as your pool for storing your surplus and supplying your needs for the shop and house at night when the panels have no output. My plans for using batteries remains on hold until some new technology comes along that drives the price of them way down. Battery technology is really in its infancy so ride the curve on your solar plans. Develop your system as prices reduce. If that takes 15 or more years, so what? Use the grid in the meantime as your storage pool. It will save you money. Good luck. I really appreciate your excellent and technically well done videos. Keep them coming!!
I think he mentioned his grid sell back rate is very low per his power provider. Power companies are quickly ratcheting down new agreements to 5 cents/kwhr and lower for grid sell back so the days of pooling power in the grid at the same rate you buy it are largely over unless you are grand fathered in. Even California is seeing this effect. You can thank power industry lobby groups pushing government to keep them well in the green. If everyone went solar power companies would not be able to stay in business and still keep lines to every house and business. So we have to keep that in mind. If there is no money in making power as a grid then no one is going to do it.
@@trophyfishn9757 My sell back rate is 40% lower than my buying rate from my Ozarks electric coop. My system is 9.25 KW with 24 panels. My surplus generation is enough to keep me going most years for 11 months. I could add an extra pair of panels to cover this if I wished to. I think Evan bought some economy panels that output 315 watts each so their cost should be more affordable. Mine are 390 watts each so if I decide to add an extra pair it won’t be for a few years. I understand that the grid companies need profit to remain in business. They just don’t need to make all their profit from me! 😁
@@Timberland-Farms Yes, as we do the opposite in the south, but the couch in the living room doesn’t care if it is 40 or 80 degrees. Save money/electricity and turn the fan off when not home.
This was an extremely interesting video. I'm surprised that in our energy conscious world that more if not all new home power installations wouldn't have monitoring capability provided at installation.
You can create some content on the old freezer. There are videos on how to increase the efficiency of old freezers. 1. Clean the condenser coil. 2. Insulate between the compressor compartment and the freezer with spray foam. 3. fill the spare volume in freezer with ice. 4. Put the freezer on a timer switch. (how much does it draw when the freezer compressor is not running?). 5. Replace the door seals around the outside of the door. If it is leaking, it could cause the freezer to cycle more. It would be interesting to see how much you can improve the efficiency of the freezer. There is a new generation of motor controllers coming out based on gallium nitride power chips. These will vastly improve the efficiency of home appliances like freezers, refrigerators, fans, computers, etc. basically anything that has an electronically controlled motor will benefit compared to silicon. Anker power supplies has GaN based products that are just coming out. Pretty impressive. I would wait a few years (if you can wait) before replacing an old inefficient appliance until the GaN based ones are out. Solar power - I would install as much solar as your power company and you system allows. I got a 10.9 KW system in 2018. Then I got an electric car in 2022. The solar only puts out enough to cover about 60% of my power now. Before, it was 95%. Its a lot more hassle to add additional solar panels to your system than to do it all up front. If you end up with an excess of solar credit come March, you can always plug in a space heater. With your pond aerator pulling 500-1000 watts all the time, it is probably the single biggest user of power. Get an electric vehicle and you will need more solar.(that is the future).
Makes sense that out in the countryside where energy is weather dependent you'd have a good backup system. Having a farm, all the freezer meat would thaw out in a prolonged power outage.
Evan, keep in mind and for a safety measure you need to go 15 to 20 percent over what you think you will need to power your place. It's always better to be safe than sorry.
Reminds my back in the early 90s our local EMC would offer a meter they could switch power from a few peak moments each day and give us a 10 dollar break per meter per month. We had two heat pumps and even added another a few years later and 30 bucks was free money back then and we never even noticed when it would happen. You might find y’all like solar even more than you think been watching lummah acres he has me convinced if I ever move to the country I would definitely try it.susan
I put an emporia in a month ago, managed all the slack from the CT's with Velcro. I have 26 individual circuits I was able to cover all the circuits by clamping 2 hot wires on the same phase on some of the 50A CT's. I would pair a normal use circuit with an extremely low use circuit like plugs in a spare room. Works great.
a great use of an old chest freezer is for livestock or poultry feed at the barn. keeps the mice out. you wouldn't store grain loose.. you would have to drop in a container. That also keeps it a little cleaner in the off chance you need to put it back online as a freezer.
Just be careful here, if grain or whatever is stored in freezer and the top or door closes completely, it can capture moisture and cause mold n mildew to spoil grain, cubes, etc... . Ask me how I know?
@@jimsfarm Good to know. I can see how that would happen. I guess any time I have seen one in use, they had it near an inside feeder. they would carry 100 lb sacks to it and use it to store their opened bags as they used them.
Our house has been fully automated (with the exception of our exercise room)for approximately 7 years. We have our lights on timers, door sensors, and geo fencing so that the lights don't stay on all the time. We have also connected our house to Google home and have the whole system (including the AV system) on voice control. We can even yell at our phone, anywhere that we have data available, to control our home. Don't forget to ask your propane supplier about adding a module to your propane tank so that you can monitor the level of propane in your tank using a cellular phone network.
Awesome information !!! Thanks for bringing us along !!!!! Been thinking of solar n now i know how to diagnos where power is actually going !!!!!! Thanks again for the information my friends !!!!!!-
A note about freezers: I understand that your goal is to reduce power consumption in order to implement solar. And you also already have your other, newer freezer, so this is mostly just food for thought. When considering these things consider total ownership cost into your equation. That old chest freezer has been around for a few decades and is still running. Modern freezers often fail before they are 10 years old, but they are a little more efficient. So compare the total cost of saving $30/yr in electricity but buying a new freezer every 10 years with the cost of keeping that old freezer. $30/yr more for 10 yrs is still less than the cost of a new freezer. The cost savings can be put into having a couple more panels on your solar array to make up the difference.
I agree, an even better idea is to buy the DC compressor style...The Amish in northern Indiana manufacture a DC 12/24vdc chest freezer (3 models) and one upright fridge / freezer...I think they use .7Kw-1.0 /day, and that's no losses by converting to AC like a normal appliance, you'd have to account for something like 20% more solar production to match those smart outlet readings on AC appliances. They can run on one 300w panel, a tiny MPPT controller (10a) and a single AGM battery for backup. Plus they have really thick insulation and keep food frozen for 4 days in the event of total failure.
Nice one Evan, I like what you did there! Lots of great information for a person to collect. Always love watching your videos, thank you. Have a great weekend!🙂
Great video, Evan! We have had our grid tied 10kW system in place for over 7 years. I think you will be surprised how much more energy you will generate in the summer. We live in MN, and definitely use more electricity than you do, mostly because we heat our house and water with electricity. We buy energy from our electric utility at a much lower rate (called off peak) for our heaters which heat at night then release heat during the day. About 90% of our annual energy production is in the summer months. Last year (2022) we generated enough extra energy that our utility pad us back $1200 for the year. Which includes our Tesla! Solar is the way to go!! I am so glad you are doing this series which will interest others in doing the same! Cheers!!
If your power company bought your sell back power at 2.5 cents or 5 cents a kwhr how would your numbers be then? Most new contracts are significantly less than what you buy from the power company. Even California is seeing this now as are most states. The days of really good solar deals for sell back at the same price you buy it are pretty much over unless you are grand fathered in. This keeps power companies in the black. If everyone got paid the same as they bought, it would drive solar demand up so much grid power would not be sustainable. I believe Evan said in a previous video his sell back rates are extremely low so he wants to consume what he makes as sell back wouldn't be worth it.
Interesting and informative. 🤔 In my experience, dusk-to-dawn lights are effected by shadows so up under a roof like your porch the sensors would think it’s dark all the time thus staying on longer than they should. You made a good choice with the programmable switch. 👍 God bless 🙏🏼🇺🇸
you can pickup a light sensor and wire it into your outside light circuits, I mounted it outside under the even were I could easily reach the power coming from the switch. Then just leave your switch on all the time, I have mine covered with a plastic shield. Cheaper than a smart switch, not fancy or wi-fi however.
Thanks this is helpful. I'm using the Emporia unit already with similar success, but the light switches were a good tip, and especially for the capability to be used as a countdown timer.
Following!! Planning on building our home next year on our acreage and becoming self reliant. Solar is being highly constrained right from the start. Can’t wait to see the installation of your panels!
So if you add batteries you need to factor in extra solar panels to charge these batteries at the same time you are powering your loads in your critical load panel. I would also look at the power generation during cloudy days and upsize your panels accordingly. Many folks, have an array for summer loads, another array for battery loads, a winter array load to make up for less sunshine, and if needed an EV array. Good video, thanks for sharing your data.
Okay... looks like we kind of got a tour of your home... house... cabin... whatever. I'll have to check your channel, but right now I'm wondering if THAT build is on the channel. You have a BEAUTIFUL home... and I hope, if you haven't already, you give us a brief tour of all you got going on in there.
I put a little meter on a power bar that has TV, TV box, Modem, Nintendo, and google cast. All were suposidely off . It draws 2kw, an hour 24/7. These phantom draws could easily be elemanited by the manifuctuer.
What a fascinating video. Thanks for going step by step. That energy monitor is brilliant, as is your approach in assessing your homes usage. Can’t wait to see your next step in getting your solar into the pole barn roof. Be careful. Be safe!👍👍👍
👍👍👍👍👍👌really enjoyed the video, great data collection, and surprising results on the analysis of load consumption , very good series!!! And very well presented.
try turning your fans down to low. All you want to do is move the hot air around the room in winter and the cool air i summer. Another hint: fans blow up in winter, down in summer
Very interesting Evan, you shared a lot of great information and it is appreciated. Great job on finding where the energy is going. Stay safe and keep up the great videos and the fun around there. Fred.
heat rises chest freezers get more efficient when they are full so if it isnt full take up extra space with water bottles they will also act as thermal battery's if power goes out
Hey, yeah ceiling fans suck power also check cable boxez like dvr one's. I use wall oscillating fans that use a lot less electricity and found that they work better. The wall smart switches here in florida aren't feasible due to the lightning storms we have in the brownouts the brownouts do more damage than the lightning the on off on off on off fast will blow right through most surge protectors. The panamax ones are probably the best surge protectors I seen those get direct hit by lightning and protect the device.
Hello from San Diego, great video…. I’m going to pick up the same monitor to calculate my ADU. I have had solar for 17 years & I’m just upgrading my system but also wanting to add batteries. I’m now subscribed keep up with the videos and thank you. Vic
Very good video. You did a lot of research for your analysis and presentation! As a side note, I also figured out the outdoor lights were always on. Of course I took the Thrifty route and purchased individual light bulbs that have the On/Off function based on a solar cell. Keep up the good work..
We have a completely separate power panel for our solar system. This system is always on the battery, so in a power outage everything stays on. The battery will last approx three days in winter with only a little sunlight to charge the battery PS: the generator is wired into this panel
Really great video!! Thank you for showing your examples and going in-depth with what you're plans are and how the equipment is functioning. I appreciate it as I want to do something similar!
I have the Sense system as it only uses one st of inductors on the main line into the box. Over time, the box senses each appliance and you can watch your usage. I use the Kasa stuff as well, they even have plugs as well so I have one system with the Sense.
Great video. I am about to order my Emporia 16 circuit monitor. I was hoping to install it in my main panel but the circuits to sub panels are 60amps. I haven’t been able to determine what tolerance these clamp sensors have. I had looked at the Sense monitor but that only measured incoming grid power or whatever you had on your mains. It then used “machine learning” or AI to tell you what was running. I would rather use a circuit based monitor and narrow down to the individual breakers (also I would use some smart outlets to track/control usage if there is a string of outlets on a circuit. I do have usage information from our rural utility company and see the average we are using per day/month/year. That is interesting to see total usage,but doesn’t help to narrow down who is taking the majority of power (or rather the power that we can eliminate because we didn’t realize the phantom loads). Thanks again for your video! All the best! This year I want to install critical loads panel with generator or solar backup at least. Love learning all the details of how these systems work.
Some things I'll pass along from my own in-process adventure with solar: Inverter is your cost and feature bottleneck. Do you have a well? Then you'll need one capable of 2x120 'legs' (also for a welder/etc). Get an inverter good for 'off grid' and you can be off grid, backup, plus the other features. If you get a 'grid tie' type the inverter will shut down when the grid is down (so no backup energy! And most power companies are not paying equal anyway). Get the 'string' type panel inverter not the MPP (mini inverters at each panel) as that will be much more expensive. Rather than worry too much about maximum tracking angle and shading -- just buy 10% more panels. However, split the array in two and set one to the declamation for your area more East and the second more West (think of a low angle 'V' layout)-- that way you get more energy morning and evening without clipping in the middle of the day. Go with a ground mount if doing it yourself, roof mounts are unnecessarily complicated. Consider having the ground mount just high enough to be a 'car port' type of installation you can park low equipment under like lawn mower, disk, etc.
Hope you can share a cost breakdown once it's finished. Our well pump was one of our biggest draws so my system is sized bigger than what I think you are planning but I'd still enjoy comparing the diy number to what a paid install would be. Luckily PVC conduit is finally starting to drop in price
You can also buy dusk to dawn lightbulbs that have a built in photocell. Some even have WiFi connectivity so you can control them directly, although that is confusing when you can also switch them on/off.
Some exterior light fixtures will work with new LED bulbs with built-in dusk/dawn sensors. I just bought a ten pack and they work like expected (under a porch may be problematic). Your energy monitoring will likely show chest freezers are more energy efficient than vertical freezers, given similar motors/insulation/etc, maybe even old chest is still better vs new upright. AC, water well, and sump pumps can be biggest electricity draws (assuming you have gas cook stove, furnace, dryer). I've seen our electric use drop 10-12% since I tiled a side-hill spring away from the house drive (that's electric energy use dropped, the price of electricity per unit still went up!) so the sump pumps were not running bailing out the water that ran through the sand under the concrete.
Super easy to determine household electric energy needs - Your monthly electric bill tells you the amount of energy you used for the period for which you are being charged. That number will be the total kilowatt hours used for the period. Using your arithmetic skills you (hopefully) acquired in 6th grade, just divide the kilowatt hours used by the number of hours in the period (30 days = 720 hrs, 31 days = 744 hrs, and 28 days = 560 hrs). The result of this foray into higher mathematics will indicate the AVERAGE HOURLY demand for electric power for the period under examination. For example: My most recent bill was for 349 kwh (Kilowatt Hours) for a period of 30 days ( 720 hours ), so my average electric POWER use was 0.485 kw or 485 watts. Since there is a lot of variability in electric power requirements to meet power surges like water pump, furnace, or refrigerator starting, I would at least double the 485 watt requirement to 1 kw, in my case. ( I own a 5 kw (rated peak output) emergency generator which I have used for over 45 years during power outages, and have never "popped" its 30 amp circuit breaker ( 240 v X 30 a = 7.2 kw ).
Excellent video, thank you for taking the time to post all this great information Evan. As you were explaining everything, I started to realize you have an ideal set up to go 100% solar. With the compact size of the lithium iron phosphate batteries right now they would not take up much space beside your existing electrical panel. There is awesome all in one MPPT inverter chargers available right now. You’re about 44,000 KWH per day is very doable. If you were to consider going 100% solar, it would save you some money on breaking out a critical load panel, all you would need is a transfer switch. Really looking forward to the solar build, whichever system you use, good luck with everything.
I remember when my uncle caught the energy monitoring bug back 30-ish, maybe even 40 yrs ago. 2 huge upright, self-defrosting freezers got parked in his barn to be used as storage units. He bought a 2nd chest type unit to replace them. I didn't ask too many questions because he had that engineer's mind and would happily volunteer a 3 hr impromptu course on the topic
I am considering installing an Ecoflow / Solar array system, along the lines of what you did. When this video came out I thought your approach (figure out the load requirement) was smart, so I bought the energy monitor wifi setup that you did. That was about a year ago. I got sidetracked. Now I'm getting back going, so I watched this video again. I've got to tell you, it is very informative and easy to understand.
I thank you for making it.
they make a great grain holder no critters can get in them,love your blog. from east,texas
Great video Evan!👍🏻
I'm laughing because I literally did the same thing last week. You might want to check your mains at 4:08. Looks like you have them going into B and C instead of A and B, but then again if it works, its works. I also really like the Kasa smart switches and used them to turn on and off our driveway and garage lights. We have solar coming into through our barn, but that comes to the house as "sub-panel feed". Our barn has 100a service, but I setup up a 50a monitor on each leg. It works really well. It shows me how much is coming back from the barn and when I have heavy draw in the barn I still see it from the mains. Another thing I learned from our Emporia is that our stock tank heater is on all the time, but I thought it only came on when the water was at zero. I bought a Kasa smart plug and I use that the cycle power to the tank every two hours.
I put 2 circuit panels in my barn, one all grid and the other UPS backup via my solar inverter/battery. Both circuits get fed by solar if there's enough power (by inverter backfeeding of the main house panel when grid is up and senses and prevents backfeed when grid is down via the CT sensors) but in grid down the UPS panels (as well as critical loads in house) get power as long as battery is above x% with the hope that the sun will be out to charge most days if the outage lasts weeks. If not got generator hookup as well with PTO diesel tractor. I haven't felt the need for a monitoring system since my sol-ark inverter software measures the loads and graphs them so I've become trained to know what is on and what is not just by looking at my graphs over a year or so. Fairly easy process of elimination for the most part.
Very interesting video Evan. I am looking forward to seeing how all this works out. Keep up the good work.
Sizing your home for solar is one of so many great uses for the Emporia Vue Energy Monitor! Great video, Evan!
I've been seriously considering doing this myself, I love being able to monitor things. I've been using Killawatt meters to monitor individual items.
You can also buy whole home monitors that just show you total energy use and not each circuit. We have one like that and they are easy to install. Just 2 clamps on the 2 hot's coming into the breaker panel. It sill does live energy use monitoring and you can see it change as something turns off or on and get a good idea of how much power something is taking. Plus historical use and estimated power bills.
I love watching you jump right in and figure out solutions...and then see you carry them out.
Great video Evan. You explained everything so well, kept it interesting and I'm glad you showed the app with all the circuits displayed.
Great video!!!
Evan, what you appear to be doing is a commendable effort to save some power and make use of saved solar energy via some batteries. I thought about doing the same thing where I lived about 175 miles west of you in Missouri. I had an expert explain to me that this will save some energy but these storage batteries are expensive and the amount of them required to really make any difference is self defeating. You’re much better off going grid tied. Get yourself an emergency generator that’s controlled by an automatic transfer bus for those rare occasions when the grid is down. You don’t even need to be at home to do this. I have a 20kw Generac which has been truly reliable for the 18 years I’ve had it and handled all my needs, not just the critical ones. My well is deep and uses some power. I used to have a low efficiency heat pump but I replaced that 12 years ago with a geo-thermal system. That reduced my electric draw by 65% - most of which was used by the heat pump which had a poor 5% efficiency rating. Going geo almost totally eliminated my propane use. I used to go through two 500 gallon tanks a year. Since replacing the old heat pump when it died with the geo thermal I’ve never had to have the tank refilled in 12 years. We lose power here 4-6 times a year for brief periods and once every 5-7 years for an extended period that is up to a day or 2. It runs off propane. I don’t use propane for my home or shop heat as it’s too costly. I use electricity from my solar or the grid. My solar system is 3 years old and will have completely paid for itself in another 4 years. My electricity bills for my hobby farm (22 acres) were averaging $150 a month prior to going solar ($175 in winter and $135 the rest of the year). Now there is only a $30 a month grid connection fee which you may not even have depending on your electric coop charges. I do usually have a month or 2 in the winter when my bill pops up when I’ve used up my surplus. You can tailor your setup to eliminate this if you wish.
I recommend you view Jon’s excellent FarmCraft101 RUclips presentations on solar where he does the same thing you are starting but ends up draining his battery cells in hopes of using them some time in the future.
That’s not to say you wasted the investment on your batteries completely. You can make good use of them on your spread out areas like your barn which has low irregular power demands or your currently unused well. Keep on installing the solar panels as you can afford them but do so with the plan of using the grid as your pool for storing your surplus and supplying your needs for the shop and house at night when the panels have no output. My plans for using batteries remains on hold until some new technology comes along that drives the price of them way down. Battery technology is really in its infancy so ride the curve on your solar plans. Develop your system as prices reduce. If that takes 15 or more years, so what? Use the grid in the meantime as your storage pool. It will save you money. Good luck. I really appreciate your excellent and technically well done videos. Keep them coming!!
I think he mentioned his grid sell back rate is very low per his power provider. Power companies are quickly ratcheting down new agreements to 5 cents/kwhr and lower for grid sell back so the days of pooling power in the grid at the same rate you buy it are largely over unless you are grand fathered in. Even California is seeing this effect. You can thank power industry lobby groups pushing government to keep them well in the green. If everyone went solar power companies would not be able to stay in business and still keep lines to every house and business. So we have to keep that in mind. If there is no money in making power as a grid then no one is going to do it.
@@trophyfishn9757 My sell back rate is 40% lower than my buying rate from my Ozarks electric coop. My system is 9.25 KW with 24 panels. My surplus generation is enough to keep me going most years for 11 months. I could add an extra pair of panels to cover this if I wished to. I think Evan bought some economy panels that output 315 watts each so their cost should be more affordable. Mine are 390 watts each so if I decide to add an extra pair it won’t be for a few years. I understand that the grid companies need profit to remain in business. They just don’t need to make all their profit from me! 😁
Far Out..!!
looking forward to this series...two thumbs up.
I like the subject and the presentation you're doing.
Good wiring job, My old 54 year deep freeze crashed this year, . They don t make them like that any more,
I live in Florida and we use the rule “paddle fans cool or warm people not rooms” so when home fans are on and when away fans off.
In north east we use ceiling fans to push heat back down as heat rises and makes a more even temperature in the room
@@Timberland-Farms Yes, as we do the opposite in the south, but the couch in the living room doesn’t care if it is 40 or 80 degrees. Save money/electricity and turn the fan off when not home.
This was an extremely interesting video. I'm surprised that in our energy conscious world that more if not all new home power installations wouldn't have monitoring capability provided at installation.
Yes, with newer smart homes. This would be ideal.
Excellent video for an education on how to monitor your electricity usage. You explained things very well.
You can create some content on the old freezer. There are videos on how to increase the efficiency of old freezers.
1. Clean the condenser coil. 2. Insulate between the compressor compartment and the freezer with spray foam.
3. fill the spare volume in freezer with ice. 4. Put the freezer on a timer switch. (how much does it draw when the freezer compressor is not running?). 5. Replace the door seals around the outside of the door. If it is leaking, it could cause the freezer to cycle more.
It would be interesting to see how much you can improve the efficiency of the freezer.
There is a new generation of motor controllers coming out based on gallium nitride power chips. These will vastly improve the efficiency of home appliances like freezers, refrigerators, fans, computers, etc. basically anything that has an electronically controlled motor will benefit compared to silicon. Anker power supplies has GaN based products that are just coming out. Pretty impressive. I would wait a few years (if you can wait) before replacing an old inefficient appliance until the GaN based ones are out.
Solar power - I would install as much solar as your power company and you system allows. I got a 10.9 KW system in 2018. Then I got an electric car in 2022. The solar only puts out enough to cover about 60% of my power now. Before, it was 95%.
Its a lot more hassle to add additional solar panels to your system than to do it all up front. If you end up with an excess of solar credit come March, you can always plug in a space heater. With your pond aerator pulling 500-1000 watts all the time, it is probably the single biggest user of power. Get an electric vehicle and you will need more solar.(that is the future).
Makes sense that out in the countryside where energy is weather dependent you'd have a good backup system. Having a farm, all the freezer meat would thaw out in a prolonged power outage.
Very interesting when you break down the individual appliances to see what's watt.
Super interesting Evan. I look forward to seeing more on this project
Evan, keep in mind and for a safety measure you need to go 15 to 20 percent over what you think you will need to power your place. It's always better to be safe than sorry.
Thanks for video, going down the same road you are. Buying the energy monitor asap. Thanks
LOVE his video. We I’ll definitely be getting a metre system to become more efficient. Thank you so much for this video my friend.
Hi Evan, as I have said before, you are a genius, got myself a little headache now.🥰
I really enjoyed this video!!! Now I am going to have to look into what you did!!!
Reminds my back in the early 90s our local EMC would offer a meter they could switch power from a few peak moments each day and give us a 10 dollar break per meter per month. We had two heat pumps and even added another a few years later and 30 bucks was free money back then and we never even noticed when it would happen. You might find y’all like solar even more than you think been watching lummah acres he has me convinced if I ever move to the country I would definitely try it.susan
👍excellent video....great content THANKS!!!!
Interesting Evan have a great day.
Very cool video for us tech nerds! Cant wait to hear how the solar does
Looks like your going to need 40kw solar system as you will be lucky to produce half the power during winter.
Great video 👍
You are doing a out standing job to the coast down 👍👍👍👍👍
Very interesting and informative!! Will enjoy "going along" for the solar process. Thanks
I put an emporia in a month ago, managed all the slack from the CT's with Velcro. I have 26 individual circuits I was able to cover all the circuits by clamping 2 hot wires on the same phase on some of the 50A CT's. I would pair a normal use circuit with an extremely low use circuit like plugs in a spare room. Works great.
People using solar always say to set it up with more power than you use. Old freezers are good for storing feed in the barn, unplugged of course.
a great use of an old chest freezer is for livestock or poultry feed at the barn. keeps the mice out. you wouldn't store grain loose.. you would have to drop in a container. That also keeps it a little cleaner in the off chance you need to put it back online as a freezer.
Just be careful here, if grain or whatever is stored in freezer and the top or door closes completely, it can capture moisture and cause mold n mildew to spoil grain, cubes, etc... . Ask me how I know?
@@jimsfarm Good to know. I can see how that would happen. I guess any time I have seen one in use, they had it near an inside feeder. they would carry 100 lb sacks to it and use it to store their opened bags as they used them.
One of your best videos ...
Nice video, efficiency is cool rabbit hole to get into
Our house has been fully automated (with the exception of our exercise room)for approximately 7 years. We have our lights on timers, door sensors, and geo fencing so that the lights don't stay on all the time. We have also connected our house to Google home and have the whole system (including the AV system) on voice control. We can even yell at our phone, anywhere that we have data available, to control our home. Don't forget to ask your propane supplier about adding a module to your propane tank so that you can monitor the level of propane in your tank using a cellular phone network.
Thanks. I appreciate the light switch option.
Awesome information !!! Thanks for bringing us along !!!!! Been thinking of solar n now i know how to diagnos where power is actually going !!!!!! Thanks again for the information my friends !!!!!!-
A note about freezers:
I understand that your goal is to reduce power consumption in order to implement solar. And you also already have your other, newer freezer, so this is mostly just food for thought. When considering these things consider total ownership cost into your equation. That old chest freezer has been around for a few decades and is still running. Modern freezers often fail before they are 10 years old, but they are a little more efficient. So compare the total cost of saving $30/yr in electricity but buying a new freezer every 10 years with the cost of keeping that old freezer. $30/yr more for 10 yrs is still less than the cost of a new freezer.
The cost savings can be put into having a couple more panels on your solar array to make up the difference.
I agree, an even better idea is to buy the DC compressor style...The Amish in northern Indiana manufacture a DC 12/24vdc chest freezer (3 models) and one upright fridge / freezer...I think they use .7Kw-1.0 /day, and that's no losses by converting to AC like a normal appliance, you'd have to account for something like 20% more solar production to match those smart outlet readings on AC appliances. They can run on one 300w panel, a tiny MPPT controller (10a) and a single AGM battery for backup. Plus they have really thick insulation and keep food frozen for 4 days in the event of total failure.
Nice one Evan, I like what you did there! Lots of great information for a person to collect. Always love watching your videos, thank you. Have a great weekend!🙂
Great video, Evan! We have had our grid tied 10kW system in place for over 7 years. I think you will be surprised how much more energy you will generate in the summer. We live in MN, and definitely use more electricity than you do, mostly because we heat our house and water with electricity. We buy energy from our electric utility at a much lower rate (called off peak) for our heaters which heat at night then release heat during the day. About 90% of our annual energy production is in the summer months. Last year (2022) we generated enough extra energy that our utility pad us back $1200 for the year. Which includes our Tesla! Solar is the way to go!! I am so glad you are doing this series which will interest others in doing the same! Cheers!!
If your power company bought your sell back power at 2.5 cents or 5 cents a kwhr how would your numbers be then? Most new contracts are significantly less than what you buy from the power company. Even California is seeing this now as are most states. The days of really good solar deals for sell back at the same price you buy it are pretty much over unless you are grand fathered in. This keeps power companies in the black. If everyone got paid the same as they bought, it would drive solar demand up so much grid power would not be sustainable. I believe Evan said in a previous video his sell back rates are extremely low so he wants to consume what he makes as sell back wouldn't be worth it.
Interesting and informative. 🤔
In my experience, dusk-to-dawn lights are effected by shadows so up under a roof like your porch the sensors would think it’s dark all the time thus staying on longer than they should. You made a good choice with the programmable switch. 👍
God bless 🙏🏼🇺🇸
That was an excellent presentation.
Great video Evan. Looking forward to the install, especially the critical load panel and how it connects to your battery system.
you can pickup a light sensor and wire it into your outside light circuits, I mounted it outside under the even were I could easily reach the power coming from the switch. Then just leave your switch on all the time, I have mine covered with a plastic shield. Cheaper than a smart switch, not fancy or wi-fi however.
Thanks this is helpful. I'm using the Emporia unit already with similar success, but the light switches were a good tip, and especially for the capability to be used as a countdown timer.
Following!! Planning on building our home next year on our acreage and becoming self reliant. Solar is being highly constrained right from the start. Can’t wait to see the installation of your panels!
So if you add batteries you need to factor in extra solar panels to charge these batteries at the same time you are powering your loads in your critical load panel. I would also look at the power generation during cloudy days and upsize your panels accordingly. Many folks, have an array for summer loads, another array for battery loads, a winter array load to make up for less sunshine, and if needed an EV array. Good video, thanks for sharing your data.
Interesting efficiency tool
This was super interesting! Thank you for sharing with us
Very informative video Evan. Thank you.
Okay... looks like we kind of got a tour of your home... house... cabin... whatever. I'll have to check your channel, but right now I'm wondering if THAT build is on the channel. You have a BEAUTIFUL home... and I hope, if you haven't already, you give us a brief tour of all you got going on in there.
Yes the cabin build is on the channel. But the video quality isn't as good as what I make now.
I put a little meter on a power bar that has TV, TV box, Modem, Nintendo, and google cast. All were suposidely off . It draws 2kw, an hour 24/7. These phantom draws could easily be elemanited by the manifuctuer.
I was very impressed with what you’re doing. I think it’s a great idea. I think I’m going to do the same thing. Thank you very much.
Good job. Practical and informative.
Great video Evan! Very interesting!
Thoroughly enjoyed that…trying to do my own diy Solar…subscribed…Will lookout for updates…watching in the U.K….Brian.
What a fascinating video. Thanks for going step by step. That energy monitor is brilliant, as is your approach in assessing your homes usage. Can’t wait to see your next step in getting your solar into the pole barn roof.
Be careful. Be safe!👍👍👍
That is not me. This is a scam.
Great informative video. Got me thinking about how much electricity that my household wastes.
👍👍👍👍👍👌really enjoyed the video, great data collection, and surprising results on the analysis of load consumption , very good series!!! And very well presented.
Another interesting video Evan. You gave me some things to think about that will save on energy usage. Blessings🙂
Can not wait till you show how you add a critical load panel and how you decide to switch between grid and battery power.
I will doing it soon. I have the panel and transfer switch.
New to your channel like this video good information
Good info from this video. very good explanation of this process. looking forward to your data from this install.
try turning your fans down to low. All you want to do is move the hot air around the room in winter and the cool air i summer. Another hint: fans blow up in winter, down in summer
Very interesting Evan, you shared a lot of great information and it is appreciated. Great job on finding where the energy is going. Stay safe and keep up the great videos and the fun around there. Fred.
heat rises chest freezers get more efficient when they are full so if it isnt full take up extra space with water bottles they will also act as thermal battery's if power goes out
Hey, yeah ceiling fans suck power also check cable boxez like dvr one's. I use wall oscillating fans that use a lot less electricity and found that they work better. The wall smart switches here in florida aren't feasible due to the lightning storms we have in the brownouts the brownouts do more damage than the lightning the on off on off on off fast will blow right through most surge protectors. The panamax ones are probably the best surge protectors I seen those get direct hit by lightning and protect the device.
Great video. A lot of useful information. Thank you.
Hello from San Diego, great video…. I’m going to pick up the same monitor to calculate my ADU. I have had solar for 17 years & I’m just upgrading my system but also wanting to add batteries. I’m now subscribed keep up with the videos and thank you. Vic
Try your ceiling fans at middle speed and your saving will increase very much . found it to be a easy work around for the saving TN 🤠🤠🤠
There are photosensitive bulbs. Just replace the bulbs and keep the fixtures 👍 Love your videos. Keep it up!
Old box freezers make great feed storage. 🙂🙂
I’m very impressed, good job !
Thank you for sharing!
Very good video. You did a lot of research for your analysis and presentation! As a side note, I also figured out the outdoor lights were always on. Of course I took the Thrifty route and purchased individual light bulbs that have the On/Off function based on a solar cell. Keep up the good work..
Like comment and SUBSCRIBE!
👍🤣😂🤣
Even they sell dusk till dawn led light bulbs now very reasonable prices. I have 5 pulling about a total of 70 watts
We have a completely separate power panel for our solar system. This system is always on the battery, so in a power outage everything stays on. The battery will last approx three days in winter with only a little sunlight to charge the battery PS: the generator is wired into this panel
Really great video!! Thank you for showing your examples and going in-depth with what you're plans are and how the equipment is functioning. I appreciate it as I want to do something similar!
Very interesting video. Some of my friends use old freezers in their barns to put horse feed in but it will work for any animal feed
They make a light bulb for dusk till dawn.I have 3 they work really good.
I have the Sense system as it only uses one st of inductors on the main line into the box. Over time, the box senses each appliance and you can watch your usage. I use the Kasa stuff as well, they even have plugs as well so I have one system with the Sense.
👍👍👍💙💛❤BINE GANDIT EVAN. EFICIENTA ESTE LUCRUL DE BAZA.💙💛❤👍👍👍
See about getting LFP batteries. They're heavy and bulky but you have plenty of room. they can be charged to a higher level and last 3 times longer.
I love how you don't half-ass anything!
Great video. I am about to order my Emporia 16 circuit monitor. I was hoping to install it in my main panel but the circuits to sub panels are 60amps. I haven’t been able to determine what tolerance these clamp sensors have. I had looked at the Sense monitor but that only measured incoming grid power or whatever you had on your mains. It then used “machine learning” or AI to tell you what was running. I would rather use a circuit based monitor and narrow down to the individual breakers (also I would use some smart outlets to track/control usage if there is a string of outlets on a circuit.
I do have usage information from our rural utility company and see the average we are using per day/month/year. That is interesting to see total usage,but doesn’t help to narrow down who is taking the majority of power (or rather the power that we can eliminate because we didn’t realize the phantom loads).
Thanks again for your video! All the best! This year I want to install critical loads panel with generator or solar backup at least. Love learning all the details of how these systems work.
Amazing
Some things I'll pass along from my own in-process adventure with solar: Inverter is your cost and feature bottleneck. Do you have a well? Then you'll need one capable of 2x120 'legs' (also for a welder/etc). Get an inverter good for 'off grid' and you can be off grid, backup, plus the other features. If you get a 'grid tie' type the inverter will shut down when the grid is down (so no backup energy! And most power companies are not paying equal anyway). Get the 'string' type panel inverter not the MPP (mini inverters at each panel) as that will be much more expensive. Rather than worry too much about maximum tracking angle and shading -- just buy 10% more panels. However, split the array in two and set one to the declamation for your area more East and the second more West (think of a low angle 'V' layout)-- that way you get more energy morning and evening without clipping in the middle of the day. Go with a ground mount if doing it yourself, roof mounts are unnecessarily complicated. Consider having the ground mount just high enough to be a 'car port' type of installation you can park low equipment under like lawn mower, disk, etc.
Hope you can share a cost breakdown once it's finished. Our well pump was one of our biggest draws so my system is sized bigger than what I think you are planning but I'd still enjoy comparing the diy number to what a paid install would be. Luckily PVC conduit is finally starting to drop in price
Yes I plan to share the cost.
You can also buy dusk to dawn lightbulbs that have a built in photocell. Some even have WiFi connectivity so you can control them directly, although that is confusing when you can also switch them on/off.
Some exterior light fixtures will work with new LED bulbs with built-in dusk/dawn sensors. I just bought a ten pack and they work like expected (under a porch may be problematic). Your energy monitoring will likely show chest freezers are more energy efficient than vertical freezers, given similar motors/insulation/etc, maybe even old chest is still better vs new upright. AC, water well, and sump pumps can be biggest electricity draws (assuming you have gas cook stove, furnace, dryer). I've seen our electric use drop 10-12% since I tiled a side-hill spring away from the house drive (that's electric energy use dropped, the price of electricity per unit still went up!) so the sump pumps were not running bailing out the water that ran through the sand under the concrete.
Super easy to determine household electric energy needs - Your monthly electric bill tells you the amount of energy you used for the period for which you are being charged. That number will be the total kilowatt hours used for the period. Using your arithmetic skills you (hopefully) acquired in 6th grade, just divide the kilowatt hours used by the number of hours in the period (30 days = 720 hrs, 31 days = 744 hrs, and 28 days = 560 hrs). The result of this foray into higher mathematics will indicate the AVERAGE HOURLY demand for electric power for the period under examination.
For example: My most recent bill was for 349 kwh (Kilowatt Hours) for a period of 30 days ( 720 hours ), so my average electric POWER use was 0.485 kw or 485 watts. Since there is a lot of variability in electric power requirements to meet power surges like water pump, furnace, or refrigerator starting, I would at least double the 485 watt requirement to 1 kw, in my case. ( I own a 5 kw (rated peak output) emergency generator which I have used for over 45 years during power outages, and have never "popped" its 30 amp circuit breaker ( 240 v X 30 a = 7.2 kw ).
looks good
nice job👍
We moved out out dated freezer to the barn where it is used to store chicken feed, rodent proof and keeps our feed dry and out of the way
This is not me. This is a scam.
Excellent video, thank you for taking the time to post all this great information Evan.
As you were explaining everything, I started to realize you have an ideal set up to go 100% solar. With the compact size of the lithium iron phosphate batteries right now they would not take up much space beside your existing electrical panel. There is awesome all in one MPPT inverter chargers available right now. You’re about 44,000 KWH
per day is very doable.
If you were to consider going 100% solar, it would save you some money on breaking out a critical load panel, all you would need is a transfer switch.
Really looking forward to the solar build, whichever system you use, good luck with everything.