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GREETINGS FROM OUR SOLAR POWERED OFFICE: After a very smoky
summer, we are glad to get the cooler weather—and cleaner air—of
autumn. Solar water pumping has really taken off for us this year,
and we are happy to have provided water for families, irrigation,
fisheries and livestock. Renewable energy systems are our focus, for
remote homes, utility-tied residences, water pumping, RV, back-up or
marine use. We offer complete systems to fit your project’s needs.
If you want to do something to make your home or business ‘greener’
give us a call. We also offer a line of efficient electric and gas
appliances to help keep a lid on your electric bill.
For those of you who aren’t “on line”, or are beginning your
project, we have an extremely informative Product Catalog on disc
for $10 ($18 out of country)—essential for your renewable energy library!
Products, system sizing, pricing, components, importance of energy
efficient appliances, battery care, and wind turbines are just some
of the topics covered. If you are on-line, you can see example
systems (costs, components and power output) at
www.oasismontana.com/systems.html
To assist your information input, we’ve tried to develop as much
on-line information as we can. For solar water pumping, see
www.PVsolarpumps.com; for utility-tied photovoltaic systems, visit
www.grid-tie.com; for efficient AC appliances, DC ’fridges, coolers
and freezers see www.eco-fridge.com; for natural and LP gas
appliances, see www.LPappliances.com. Our main index page is
www.oasismontana.com. We have a great deal of information on our web
sites—please feel free to visit and stay a while!
Fronius IG and SMA Sunny Boy batteryless grid-tie
solar inverters
Unlike most things in life, a batteryless grid-tie
solar power system will pay for itself (and then some) in energy
cost savings over its 20+ year expected life span. Current federal
and state incentives can shorten this payback period even further
(see www.dsireusa.org for details). Setting up one of these systems
is very simple since the solar modules can be mounted on the roof of
your home or, preferably, on a mount structure in your front/back
yard with the grid-tie inverter mounted indoors or outdoors near
your utility service entrance. Your solar array needs unobscured
sunlight. Once the solar array is properly wired and connected to
the inverter and the inverter is connected to your main AC breaker
box, the system can be turned on and the solar array will begin
feeding power to your home (assuming that the sun is still out!).
This power will either be used directly by any 120/240 VAC loads
that you have on at the time or, if the solar array is producing
more power than your AC loads are using, the excess power is then
sent back to the utility grid which turns your kilowatt-hour (kWh)
meter backwards, reducing your monthly electric bill even further.
The one drawback of this type of system is that for safety reasons
it shuts down during a utility outage so you will be without power
just like everyone else, since these types of grid-tie inverter
systems do not offer battery back-up.
There are many different
manufacturers of solar grid-tie inverters, but we lean towards the
Fronius IG and SMA Sunny Boy lines due to their high efficiencies,
built-in DC/AC disconnects, informative LCD displays/monitors and 10
year warranties. The Fronius units range in power output from 2,000
to 5,100 watts while the new Sunny Boy US series power range is from
3,000 to 7,000 watts (and, newer units will be available soon). The
Sunny Boy inverters are slightly more efficient than the Fronius
units, but the Fronius units weigh much less and have a more
informative LCD display. All of the Sunny Boy new U.S. units can be
used with 240 VAC single phase units or 3-phase AC power (208 or
277V) while only a couple of the Fronius IG units can be used in
208V 3-phase applications. Both manufacturers offer remote
monitoring systems for their inverters so you can see how the system
is performing from the comfort of your living room. The Sunny Beam
allows you to keep tabs on up to 4 Sunny Boy inverters while the
Fronius Personal Display will monitor up to 15 of their IG
inverters. This usually isn’t a concern unless you plan to install a
very large residential or commercial system with many inverters
operating in parallel. To make a long story short, both SMA and
Fronius make efficient and dependable solar grid-tie inverters that
we are confident to quote to our customers. Please look over the two
system quotes below and let us know if either of them would work for
your residential or commercial application. And of course, we can
design to whatever power system requirements you desire.
2.2 kW residential 240 VAC Fronius IG system:
 12
Evergreen Spruce ES-190-RL 18V 190W solar modules
1 twelve module top-of-pole mount structure (8” ID SCH80
steel pipe required)
1 50’ double ended Multi Contact (MC) cable assembly
1 Fronius IG 2000 240 VAC solar grid-tie inverter
1 Fronius personal display
1 Fronius wireless card (required for personal display usage)
Equipment total = $ Call us for current price
On average this system will produce ~8 kWh per day with 5 hours of
full sun.
13.7 kW commercial 208 VAC SMA Sunny Boy system:
72 Evergreen Spruce ES-190-RL 18V 190W solar modules
1 UniRac SunFrame flush mounting roof system
6 50’ double ended Multi Contact (MC) cable assemblies
2 SMA SB6000US 208 VAC 3-phase solar grid-tie inverters
1 Sunny Beam Monitor
2 Sunny Beam Antennas
Equipment total = $ Call us for your current price
On average this system will produce ~48 kWh per day with 5 hours of
full sun.
The small print: while we try and hold the line on prices, they are
subject to change without notice. System costs do not include
freight or installation.
“If we all knew
what we were doing, it wouldn’t be called research.” --Albert
Einstein
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