Terry, I will post a comprehensive link on solar EV recharging for information.

The fact is using the new Nissan Leaf EV as the model, noting it is one of the lowest retail priced EV available today, 270 Km theoretical maximum battery charge range (real world just over 200 Km).

But the Leaf for just over $50,000.00 plus recharging accessories and on road costs, say $55,000.00 on average.

Solar panels: 7 x 2 kilowatt system installed approximately $6,000.00 to $8,000.00 installed.

Already the cost exceeds $60,000.00 for a 4-seat occasional 5-seat small EV but an equivalent ICEV would cost about $20,000.00 so the question is how much would an owner "save" buying an EV based on lower "fuel" costs over, say 10-years of ownership? Answer very clearly is nothing, EV much more expensive when all factors are accounted. So impractical for all intents and purposes at this stage.

Add the loss from resale value of trade-in ICEV to the buyer's expenses. And if EV sales and related demand did take off the resale value would be scrap value at best. And if government intervenes to get rid of ICEV scrap value would be even lower as scrap merchants took advantage of ICEV being unregisterable, by order The Government.

It's like my "Hare & Tortoise" comment: you enthusiastically referred to rapid performance capacbilities (speed etc) of EV and I responded that we can only drive to the speed zone limits legally and that range was far more important, with EV way behind my diesel ICEV. In other words on long journey my "Tortoise" arrives first by a country hundreds of kilometres.

Again I repeat that in my carefully considered view Hybrids are best for Australia, EV maybe for suburban transport when the price is right.

But right now in 2019 even the lower end of the range Nissan Leaf EV does not stack up, even with very slow solar recharging, and after accounting for all the costs before claiming savings in operating expenses EV verses ICEV.

www.solarquotes.com.au/blog/charging-electric-cars/

Greystone, even the most solar enthusiastic qualified engineer who heads solarquotes advises that battery home storage such as Power Wall remain not cost effective, the payback period is many more years than the likely life before replacement of the battery storage system.

My son is a builder and a couple of years ago converted four older inner city home units into two townhouses and the owners wanted a solar system installed. The electrical firm doing all of the electrical work was asked to quote and the owner of the firm advised against the installation on the basis of real total cost, maintenance and replacement expense in a couple of future decades ignored for the calculations. But financing cost was included, in that case bank finance for the project.

I have considered rooftop solar at my home and so far cannot justify the expense after number crunching.

The result indicated that the installation would not be cost effective but the clients decided to proceed for their environmental protection reasons. Decisions based on environment always seem to ignore that 70-80 per cent of our electricity comes from coal and gas fired power stations supplemented in areas such as SA by back up diesel and gas generators for the wind farms and solar in that state. And that the interconnector from VIC to SA is often switched on to import electricity from VIC. Around and up to 10 per cent comes from hydro power stations and smaller hydro and the other up to 10 per cent from wind and solar - that is, when the wind blows and when in daytime solar conditions are suitable. And these days considerable energy distribution management by the authorities coordinating generators.

I am sure that Volkswagen will produce an excellent Buzz EV but wonder how it will compare to a Golf ICEV in cost. It would be a pity if fuel costs and maintenance savings did not at least recover the price difference. Right now Nissan Leaf EV operating cost savings would not go close to recovery of the retail premium over ICEV price paid.

Hybrid EV technology is now equivalent to ICEV model compared to equivalent model. Unfortunately for heavier towing above 2,000 kg Hybrid Volvo and similar are not yet affordable or as capable as my Isuzu MU-X.

Decisions based on environment always seem to ignore that 70-80 per cent of our electricity comes from coal and gas fired power stations supplemented in areas such as SA by back up diesel and gas generators for the wind farms and solar in that state. And that the interconnector from VIC to SA is often switched on to import electricity from VIC. Around and up to 10 per cent comes from hydro power stations and smaller hydro and the other up to 10 per cent from wind and solar - that is, when the wind blows and when in daytime solar conditions are suitable. And these days considerable energy distribution management by the authorities coordinating generators.

 

I assume you actually have something to back that claim up Knight. There are no gas generators in SA and the only time the diesel generator was powered up was to assist Victoria with its high load in a heatwave. SA sells power to the other states, it doesn't import it. when the storms took out the Qld and Victorian inter connector SA was exporting a lot of electricity to those states and if it wasn't for the quick reactions of the battery being able to stabilise the grid it would have shut down SA power as well. Instead the battery got a bit of free charging when it absorbed the spike and fed a bit out to cover the following trough and held the grid steady so SA customers didn't know anything had happened, but the states reliant on coal and gas plant generation sure knew they had a problem.

 

T1 Terry

Electric vehicles that cost far more and have many more operational complications than an equivalent ICEV, so called renewable energy wind and solar systems that are unreliable c't existompared to power stations (regardless of fuel to heat the water to create the steam to drive the turbines that drive the generators) and much more "socialism masquerading as environmentalism" solutions to problems that don't exist.

A climate emergency that is a political smokescreen and excuse for redistribution and wealth of developed nations with profiteering alongside by crony capitalists, what a crazy world it is today.

The following comment is not aimed at well meaning enthusiasts but I cannot financially justify an EV or a rooftop solar system for my purposes.

Already covered, but in short, the lower retail price EV models are considerably more expensive that an equivalent ICEV, and recharging is inconvenient, let alone for long distance travelling.

Rooftop solar is not really a saving until the electricity bill savings have paid for the solar system including financing, factoring in maintenance and eventually replacing it. Solar panels alone have a payback period of several years - no advantage for householder until outlay recovered in full. No point in saying my bills are lower, several thousand dollars have already been spent on solar. When paid for by savings then the householder might be saving money. But factoring in replacement, many have 25 years conditional limited guarantee but the average is 20 years useful service. So approximately 7 years for payback and 7 years of saving for replacement provision, therefore about 6 years of saving money. Of course as electricity pricing increases the calculation changes. Assuming that the solar-wind transition is not stopped and power stations (regardless of fuel used) return to being the favoured baseload generator source. Still 70-80 per cent of electricity. The rising price of electricity is caused by several factors including taxpayer-consumer paid subsidies for wind and solar private sector businesses (not to be confused with legal tax deductions on business expenses incurred in earning taxable profit available to wind, solar and power station owners), power stations handicapped by intermittent wind and solar activity causing inefficient operation at power stations and other negative factors. another being the crazy auction system for electricity supply to the grid and the highest price is paid to all generators.

How ridiculous that we are spending money on rooftop solar to avoid electricity price rises (or think we do) when not long ago there was a completely reliable grid providing low cost electricity via power stations, and that even now the unreliable energy farms are only around 10 per cent of grid supply.

And next EV replacing ICEV and we will possibly be forced into that unacceptably high expense and loss of value on our ICEV. It really is ridiculous.

I have applied my business background knowledge to work out the cost effectiveness of EV and Solar for my purposes and they are at this time not cost effective for me. The marketing hyperbole and puffery is amusing, like why do ICEV manufacturers provide fuel tanks to provide a range of 500 kilometres or more but EV sales pitch suggests that the average driver only needs a fraction of that range? Could it be because a lower priced EV ($50,000.00 range retail price) has not much better than plus or minus 200 kilometres range (as compared to theoretical battery capacity range). And to obtain 500 kilometres of a bit more we must pay well over $100,000.00 for one or another brand. Same for rooftop solar, the sales pitch does not pass the accountant's scrutiny.

Anyway, that's my opinion.

The SA Battery Bank for Terry;

The Hornsdale Power Reserve

The "mega-battery" complex is officially called the Hornsdale Power Reserve. It sits alongside the Hornsdale Wind Farm and has been constructed in partnership with the SA Government and Neoen, the French renewable energy company that owns the wind farm.

The battery has a total generation capacity of 100 megawatts, and 129 megawatt-hours of energy storage. This has been described as "capable of powering 50,000 homes", providing 1 hour and 18 minutes of storage or, more controversially, 2.5 minutes of storage.

At first blush, some of these numbers might sound reasonable. But they don't actually reflect a major role the battery will play, nor the physical capability of the battery itself.

What can the battery do?

The battery complex can be thought of as two systems. First there is a component with 70MW of output capacity that has been contracted to the SA Government.

What is Tesla's SA battery and how will it be used?


Tesla's Elon Musk promised the big battery would be in place by summer, but what exactly is it and how will it be used?
This is reported to provide grid stability and system security, and designed only to have about 10 minutes of storage.

The second part could be thought of as having 30MW of output capacity, but three to four hours of storage.

Even though this component has a smaller capacity (MW), it has much more storage (MWh) and can provide energy for much longer. This component will participate in the competitive part of the market, and should firm up the wind power produced by the wind farm.

In addition, the incredible flexibility of the battery means that it is well suited to participate in the Frequency Control Ancillary Service market. More on that below.

The figure below illustrates just how flexible the battery actually is. In the space of four seconds, the battery is capable of going from zero to 30MW (and vice versa). In fact it is likely much faster than that (at the millisecond scale), but the data available is only at four-second resolution.

Greystone wrote:

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Knight, the link to the solar quote Terry provided is$3.3k for a 6kW system. That's less than half what we paid for and based on our consumption we would have recouped that cost in about 2 years. Every year it's getting cheaper and that's why solar PV uptake in Australia is high. I now see very large PV systems in regional Australia (for example Broken Hill) as well as PV panels on residences and business premises. I don't believe those investments are made if the numbers don't stack up.

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 Greystone, $3,300.00 plus finance cost (loan or loss of earnings) so by your estimate $1,650.00 a year saved by 6 kW theoretical maximum output of solar panels? That's $412.50 a quarter saving.

But solar does not supply 100% of design output on average, and best most likely to be obtained between 10.00 am and 2.00 pm (4-hours a day) with sun up to sun down hours lower output, zero at night of course. I understand that the average household uses 8 kW? It is a complicated calculation because of feed in tariff rate when household is not consuming solar energy, or very little. And we never use washing machine and all appliances at the same time, apart from refrigerator and in some homes hot water system. 

Please do not introduce business owned solar as a comparison with non-business or rooftop home solar because businesses write off assets against taxable income, householders cannot. And few larger businesses these days do not have a back up generator or more than one generator. And that cost must be added.

I agree that businesses usually do the calculations, but not all of them do, too many people are motivated by perceived saving as in lowering electricity bills and forget the costs involved. And there are what are often called "virtue signallers", people who believe sincerely that they are helping the environment and forget that Australia's emissions are less than 1.5% of global emissions and that countries including China and India are increasing emissions every year. China increases emissions every year by more than Australia produces every year. Obviously India and China are not concerned about a "climate emergency", as many other countries are not.

I do not want to target anybody over EV or Solar, we all have the right to make choices. But as I have pointed out, those technologies do not work out for me, but maybe they will in the future.

This is interesting;

https://www.solarquotes.com.au/how-does-solar-power-work/how-much-power-do-i-need/

And also;

https://www.solarquotes.com.au/calc5/

 

-- Edited by Knight on Thursday 10th of October 2019 11:26:32 AM

-- Edited by Knight on Thursday 10th of October 2019 11:29:37 AM

Knight, apart from you not understanding the "Big Batteries" part it plays to stabilise a grid system, what are you trying to say? In the posted article about the Murraylink and limestone coast link the wording says "can" it does not say anything to suggest it "does" that. Your suggestion that the wind wouldn't blow across the whole state including the on shore winds is just silly talk. The wind turbines are part of an interconnected grid, the wind will still be blowing in some part of the state and the wind off the coast doesn't just stop. It can change direction and does between the day and the night, but fortunately wind turbines self adjust to get the max output if there is somewhere for that output to go. You may have seen wind turbines idle, that doesn't mean there isn't enough wind to drive them, there just isn't an available market to sell the power they could be generating, so they are put into idle mode. The more batteries that are added the more SA will become the grid stabilising section of the local states network, but once the other states get on board the grid stability will be better spread across the network.
The battery just keeps the network up and running, it isn't designed to power the grid on it's own for long periods. While the grid remains stable all the rooftop solar, commercial solar and wind generation can keep feeding the grid. The black out is caused by grid instability and the generators, no matter what sort they are, must drop off line to keep the line safe for the repair crews to fix what ever is wrong.
In a system without a battery the power drops out, the system tries to automatically switch it back on but if the supply isn't there or a serious voltage or frequency fault occurs, the system drops out again. It is designed to retry a number of times, then it remains off. I'm sure most have recollections of the lights going out, back on briefly a few times and then staying out. That is what the battery stops, the fault occurring from the voltage variation or the frequency variation. Talking about how long the battery can actually power the grid I just silly smoke screen nonsense put up by vested interests, there are no logistical facts involved, just nay sayer talk and nothing more.
As far as how grid back up or off grid solar actually works, you clearly have no idea so best to stay away from that topic because your credibility will be shredded if you try to continue with it, I'll just let it slide for the moment allowing for your obvious ignorance on the subject.

As far as the newer EV's, you aren't just buying a vehicle, or even a vehicle that can be refuelled at no extra cost ( is that better than free for you) it also supplies a battery pack that can be used for the house to go off grid. Now solar feed in tariffs are ignored, but so are the poles and wires charges ignored as are the charges for the actual electricity supplied. The average household bill of $500 plus for energy per quarter could be completely negated, that gives a system payback of $2,000 plus per yr. No fuel costs, no energy costs and much lower vehicle maintenance costs, makes a big solar array and a two car EV family quite a good investment. Let's face it, the pittance the bank gives you for you money could be far better spent investing in future enegy supply, you future energy not shares or futures on the stoke market, so no fees there either .... or GST ..... add the govt rebates for going off grid where applicable and it really starts to make $$ sense

T1 Terry

T1 Terry

Knight wrote:

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June 2019

Why are there so many 6.6kW solar deals around at the moment?

There are a couple of regulations that have resulted in many solar companies offering a 6.6kW system. Firstly, a home with single phase power is limited to a solar system that is 5kW or less, however, the regulation is actually measured by the inverters output, not the panels. That means installers can over-size the panel array in comparison to the inverter. This is something that we do as well, in fact, it is a great way to maximise the output of the system.

The other part of the equation is that the Clean Energy Council has regulated at that an inverter can be over-sized by up to 133%, which means on a 5kW inverter you can have a panel array that is up to you guessed it 6.6kW.

You Have Been Warned Dont Buy A Cheap 6kW Solar System

If you were to get 3 quotes for a good quality 6kW solar system from reputable solar installers in Australia, you would find that our prices are all within a few hundred dollars of each other. Yes, there can be slight differences, but for the most part, the quotes will be around the same price.

To put it another way, you wont find a $7,000 6kW system on sale for $4000. Even if youre happy for the installer to cut a few corners (which you shouldnt be), you simply cant get top quality brands for that type of money.

Good quality solar panels have dropped in price to the point that it no longer makes sense to consider the bottom end of the solar market when buying a 6kW solar system. You can have the best solar panels from the worlds leading manufacturers, online monitoring, a professional installation, full technical support, and still get a return on your money in 3-5 years.

---

 And there we finally have it. This explains the links back to a solar quoting website and the anti battery stance, they don't understand the technology so can only number crunch what is offered on the market and come up with the "not financially viable" advice.

Yes, I do subscribe to your news letter, always good to follow what is being spread across the interweb. The information articles are at least easier to find when in one place but of course there needs to be further searching for the articles not linked to on your site for what ever reasons.

 

T1 Terry

I do actually walk the walk, not just talk the talk. Been doing this stuff for a long time so I do get to speak from first hand knowledge rather than putting forward spin and commercial redirection to certain sites.
A slip of the finger when you typed you would find that our prices are all within a few hundred dollars of each other was it?

 

T1 Terry

I give up, you win. The topic started out about how an Aussie company is starting to produce electric vehicles and has ended up in a dispute about renewable energy never being able to replace coal fired power station and now gas fuel turbines used in peaking demand times when the big $$ are paid for power sold throughout the eastern grid.
Some of the legacy gas turbines that were built to supply industries that required back up power in the SA grid's early days are connected to the SA grid and can use that grid as a conduit to sell power interstate where the $$ are high enough to make it profitable. Yes, this generated power would be used by the consumers located closest to the generation source as that is the nature of electron flow, the path of least resistance, so technically they do supply power to the SA grid, but they don't actually sell the power to the SA grid, they sell it to the other states that have a less than adequate generating capacity. I see no point in going into just how that takes place because it is way too far off topic.

T1 Terry

:lol: not bad, back it up with a quote from your own website :lol:

Just a bit back onto the original diversion this thread took regarding EV charging stations in rural areas, just noticed this on the AEVA forum

T1 Terry wrote:

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:lol: not bad, back it up with a quote from your own website :lol:

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 Terry, it's not my website.

But if it was, so what? You must feel intimidated, and maybe considering all of the flip flops you should be, just one being you demanding that I show evidence of SA gas generators, you claimed there re none, and I did.

Interesting all those recharging points, the mud map is revealing, that so many so close to one another are considered necessary for EV country travel. That is if a driver has the time to spare for so many recharges. And how about that SA battery capacity that earlier you suggested was exportable energy?

-- Edited by Knight on Thursday 10th of October 2019 08:46:12 PM

-- Edited by Knight on Thursday 10th of October 2019 08:47:06 PM

Greystone wrote:

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One sunny day last week our 6kW system exported 24 kW into the grid after own use. On most days it's around 12 to 15. And it's not summer yet. So for most households a 6kW system is more than adequate. In case you wonder why we're not off grid yet, it's because the power company would charge us $2500.

---

Interesting, why the charge of $2500 to drop off the grid? In SA I asked the engineer who gave the talk about how the SA grid was adapting for the EV recharging, about what the process and penalties were for taking a house off the grid. His reply was that it just required a phone call and the power would be disconnected, but it would cost to have the cables removed and cost a lot more to have them reconnected. He couldn't believe anyone would choose to drop off the grid and go self sustained, "why would they give up their feed in tariff and loose all that income?" was his statement which gained a good laugh from all at the meeting. They are so removed from the real world they don't realise the combination of the fees just to have the power connected and the charges for electricity used from the grid far outweighed any monies received from their feed in tariffs. Some even pointed out they fed in more than they used over a 12 mths period yet they had a bill every billing period.

 

T1 Terry