Leaderboard

I just finished up an off grid project on our classroom. My advice would be to always oversize what the calculators say you need. You will lose efficiency over time on both the planels and the batteries. I have three 200 watt panels on the roof with 560 Ah of wet cell batteries. It runs everything I need for 3 days of classes (lights, computer, big screen TV for power points, on demand water pump, etc. but bad weather and winter reduces its capability. I started with 400 watts of panels and that wasn't enough so I added another. I live in Alabama so that's an advantage over higher latitudes.

Here in south Florida, we have a retailer USsolar, they sell high quality 255 watt solar panels for about $230 bucks each. They also sell Trojan battery's and charge controllers. I do go to harbor Freight, but I would never consider their plastic mono solar panels. They are basic "Junk" I am aware of solar panels being used effectively as far north as Alaska. with necessary high inclination of panels at such latitude, snow accumulation on panels would be minimized. I love Solar power and here in Florida it's a "no brainer" I remember the last time I was in New Jersey the local utility had placed solar panels on top of each utility pole. not very attractive looking but it works. Our new house is just 3 weeks from Finnish and includes 6800 watt's of solar panels on our southern exposure.