Gaming the system: record EV range!

Lol. So you're saying you can save money on all of the energy you can no longer afford to use. That sounds like when my boss said "Good news, I'm giving everyone raises. Also, no more quarterly bonuses." Effectively we all took a pay decrease.

 

exactly, only i'm not saying it, it was some administration flunky.

 

I think it'd be more than 20 years. Granted, you'll probably need to throw an inverter replacement in there, maybe some other work, but a PV system should last at least a half century or so.

 

wow, i had no idea, that's really a one time investment then, and a little maintenance along the way.

what do you do about the roof shingles?

 

I have ZERO maintenance! Solar City warranties their system for 20 years. Everything is covered. I have a tile roof, zero maintenance.

Yes, I was being conservative with my 20 years lifespan, because that is the length of the 100% warranty. 20 years from now.......I wont be driving anymore!

 

Replace them when you need to.

It's a little more work to wrap the panels, disconnect them from the switch, and disconnect them from the racking, then do the opposite once the roofing has been replaced , but not that much more work.

The only exception would be if you went with a different roofing material and had to get/install new mounts/racking.

 

Let say for the sake of this discussion. If I do a lot of city driving(90% of the time); would then be wise to purchase a pip or just to keep the one that I have. Should I purchase a volt than?

 

I got solar installed back in May.
My solar company warrants the panels for 25 years (from the manufacturer) and 5 more years themselves.
The inverter has a 10 year warranty, plus they will replace it once for free.
Also, they will, one time, remove the panels for roof repair/replace for free.
They also do roofing work so they hope you'll use them, but it is not required.

Mike

 

out here, asphalt shingles are good for 25 years give or take. so even on a new roof, you'd have to replace them once on a 50 year system. i wonder if they last longer being under the panels, or shorter because of heat build up.

 

Its an interesting question...

However, my guess is, 25 years in the current state-of-the-art and costs of solar panels are going to be vastly cheaper, higher efficiency, and superior in every other respect. So if you installed your panels on a roof that was say less than 5 years old chances are that you'll just junk the system at 20 years when you redo that roof and put up whatever is the current tech at that time. It just literally probably won't be worth the labor to put it back up vs putting up a new one.

 

good point, and you will probably make money on the deal. 20 years is a long time, tech wise.

we only have to look back to 1995, to se the solar advancement in tech and cost, and i think it will change more rapidly in the future.

 

I factored our amortization period @ 6 years (2014) - which was about a year ago for us. The payback came quick because I factored in the $4/gallon we were NOT paying, because 4 years of the surplus PV went to transportation miles - 12k miles year @ zero cost, instead of the 50mpg we'd be paying for on the prius ICE.
.

 

It actually does translate into real efficiency. You can test this yourself by making the same drive several times. Do a couple of trials using EV only on downhill or flat sections, and another couple of trials using EV for uphill and acceleration and HV for downhill and flat sections. There is a vast difference in MPG between the two techniques.

On my 95-mile commute I can average 85 mpg on one charge with judicious use of EV for downhill and flat sections with slow traffic, but if I just throw it in EV and leave it there until I run out I only get about 65 MPG.

 

don't you have to compare mpg and mpkwh?

 

Last time I filled up was May 27, 2015 Amount of gas: 6.862 gallons. Now here's the bad news, I pay my landlord $15.00/mo for electricity. so $15.00 x 6 = $90.00 add the $12.00 I paid for gas today, that comes to $102.00. I paid $1.74/ gal so 102/1.74 = 58.62 gallons add in the 1434 miles and divide it by 58.62 gallons it comes out to a grand total of 24.46 MPG but, hey! whose counting? Go green!!!!!

 

If the panels have already paid for their self - how does one assign value to the subsequent benefits (rhetorical) ? Our minimum "value" for electricity is what our local utility charges for it - which is about 10¢/kwh. To go 100 miles it takes (at least) 25kWh, or $2.50 of electricity to go 100 miles (2.5¢/mile). I suppose in the 'gaming' spirit of the OP's title, we could attribute the 2.9¢/kwh wholesale value that we're paid for providing surplus to the grid (cutting the 100 mile travel cost to ⅓, ie; 1¢/mile) - but generosity is how we roll.

 

at 24 cents / kWh, i should be able to go solar and make a living at it.

 

I don't gain anything by doing this with my PiP. I live near a big hill, and I occasionally acquire a few EV miles if I pulse-and-glide while going down the hill, but I know it's at the expense of fuel economy. There's simply no free lunch.

 

The only free lunch is plugging in at work.


iPhone ?