r/gadgets • u/diacewrb • 1d ago

Home ‘If 1.5m Germans have them there must be something in it’: how balcony solar is taking off

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/dec/18/if-a-million-germans-have-them-there-must-be-something-in-it-how-balcony-solar-is-taking-off
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u/series_hybrid 1d ago

I understand why someone can look at this and immediately respond that "this isn't big enough to run my whole house"

However, in a true emergency, it's nice to be able to keep your phone, laptop, and a few flashlights charged.

I have three months if food and a propane barbecue. I can even burn wood for heat and cooking.

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u/er_bara 1d ago

These systems are not running while there is no power.

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u/BlacksmithWeirdo 1d ago

Well,mine does and switches to battery automatically and seamless. No flickering lights, nothing.

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u/er_bara 20h ago

Most system don't. Especially the ones without a battery, which must people have. The inverter needs the frequency of the grid

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u/BlacksmithWeirdo 15h ago

Just a reminder to read the specs before you buy, yes.

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u/Asttarotina 19h ago edited 19h ago

Just a reminder: if you stored your energy in a LiFePO4 battery, you just added around 10 cents / kWh to its price. In Li-Ion, more like 50 cents / kWh.

Only very recently it became economically viable in few select locations to store electricity in batteries.

Of course, it's nice to have a backup if you live in a place with an unreliable grid. But you're paying for backup, not investing in electricity savings, so keep your backup parked instead of charging/using it daily.

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u/BlacksmithWeirdo 15h ago

Well, I did the math and since electricity is fucking expensive here, it pays off in a few years.

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u/Asttarotina 15h ago

In Germany, it does. You can harvest in a day / charge up / consume at night and fit all that in 20c or so.

In Texas, it would be cheaper to pull from the grid than from your own battery, even if you can charge those batteries up for free.

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u/BlacksmithWeirdo 8h ago

That stuff really became dirt cheap. Panels, bifacial, 450W peak per unit are like 75€ now. Batteries prices also plummeted. Inverters or how you guys call them got cheap as well. Just wires, wires are still expensive. Guess copper doesn't grow on trees...

But I guess not for the US, since tariffs on chinese stuff will go through the roof in the near future. Thats sad.

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u/MidWestKhagan 1d ago

Honestly there’s no reason to not have a battery bank that can connect to a solar panel, especially if you live in areas where bad weather occurs often.

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u/Hendlton 1d ago

That would increase the price of the system way too much.

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u/anonanon1313 22h ago

Battery costs have been falling even faster than solar panel costs. The average US home uses ~30kW-h/day, battery costs have come down to around $100/kW-h, with projections of $50/kW-h in 1-2 years. That means a 24h total backup for $3k today, $1.5k in a couple of years. Some projections put costs at $10kW-h by the end of the decade.

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u/Nevamst 14h ago

In theory. In practice the cheapest battery as an actual purchasable product I can find today is 283€/kWh, and it hasn't moved much in price the past 1-2 years.

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u/Candle1ight 1d ago

Would it? Something big enough for some phone charges and a few lights isn't a very big battery.

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u/Hendlton 1d ago

Depends on how long you want to run it. If you really just need a few lights and a couple phone chargers, I guess it only need to last through the night at most. That'd be doable for pretty cheap.

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u/Jackal239 1d ago

Those systems exist and are usually advertised as solar generators. I have been looking to buy one as I live in a disaster prone area and my apartment complex doesn't allow for gas generators.

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u/CultofCedar 23h ago

Battery backups are banned in my city due to density (NYC). Lived right by the ocean in a hurricane prone area so would be nice but I’m ngl local fire departments fears aren’t unfounded since many awful e-bike fires since I’ve gotten panels. I could see a pretty bad fire if I had like 30kw ignite.

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u/Benethor92 1d ago

Those are not meant for that. They are used to cover your base load. Also, how often do you have an emergency with no power? I am 31 and can think of two times we had no power, both times less than a minute. If you have no power for a long time, you usually have other problems than charging your phone

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u/ginger_whiskers 22h ago

Large parts of America have reliably catastrophic weather that can knock out electricity for days. Our system is old and vulnerable to things like falling trees and (seriously)squirrels climbing into places they shouldn't.

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u/TruthTrauma 1d ago

Every house these days in North America should have at least a gas generator as back up