Small solar requirements off grid

[runemaster]

I know absolutely nothing about solar, or electricity, but suppose I were going to camp out for months.
Suppose all I needed to run was the following, with some "overkill.":

1. (2) 100 watt light bulbs for 10 hours a day.

2. One hot plate twice a day.

3. Charge laptop.

4.Charge phone.

5. One small refrigerator.


Can you tell me what to ask for if I were shopping for a small system? I have seen some things that look portable.

Thank you.

[Wy_White_Wolf]

I know absolutely nothing about solar, or electricity, but suppose I were going to camp out for months.
Suppose all I needed to run was the following, with some "overkill.":

1. (2) 100 watt light bulbs for 10 hours a day.

2. One hot plate twice a day.

3. Charge laptop.

4.Charge phone.

5. One small refrigerator.


Can you tell me what to ask for if I were shopping for a small system? I have seen some things that look portable.

Thank you.

Hi - You need to list wattage and hours for each item like you did for the lights. The refrigerator you may want to get a kill-a-watt meter and measure it over a week or 2 to get an accurate number for WH used by it.

We would also need to know basic location for knowing how much solar insolation is available.

Without those we can only guess. My guess is you use somewhere between 4 to 8 KWH daily. That isn't that small of a system.

WWW

[Naptown]

It would take more than you would be willing to take camping.
Lights 200Wx10 hours=2000 watt hours
Hot plate say 1000 watts for 1 hour a day =1000 WH
Charge phone and laptop Say 200WH
Refrierator 300W x say 6 hours run time = 1800WH

Camping during the summer say you get 5 hours of sun (usable) per day
you have to account for some clouds so allow for 2 days of storage
You never want to discharge batteries more than 20% daily and 40% sometimes.

So lets add this all up comes to 5000 watt hours a day
So for batteries you need to multiply that by 5 for the 20% discharge This means a battery of 25000 watt hours.
Since you are running some fairly high current things this should be a 48V system.
25000/48= a 48V 520AH battery.
Now you have to charge the battery
You use 5000 WH a day. Charging losses are 50% with an Mppt controller
So 5000 x 1.5 /5= 1500W of solar panels
Add a 45A mppt charge controller, a 2000W inverter and a 1 ton box truck to carry it around.

[Naptown]

I know absolutely nothing about solar, or electricity, but suppose I were going to camp out for months.
Suppose all I needed to run was the following, with some "overkill.":

1. (2) 100 watt light bulbs for 10 hours a day.

2. One hot plate twice a day.

3. Charge laptop.

4.Charge phone.

5. One small refrigerator.


Can you tell me what to ask for if I were shopping for a small system? I have seen some things that look portable.

Thank you.

Now for reality
Lose the 100W bulbs and replace with LED or CFL bulbs
A 20W cfl = the light output of a 100 w incandescent.
lose the hot plate and cook with propane.
Refrigerator is anyone's guess. Take WWW's suggestion and put it on a kill a watt for a week.
Lastly look up the insolation for the month's and location where this will occur. This can make a huge difference in system size.

[Ian S]

Refrigerator is anyone's guess.

Sun Frost makes refrigerators designed for high efficiency; supposedly a factor of five less energy consumption. Comes at a price though. Although if it reduces your off-grid PV system size, it might be worth it.

[runemaster]

Thanks for the info

Thank you for the information. Someone told me that if I just wanted to power up, say a laptop, and a cell phone, I could go with a portable system. Any suggestions?

Thanks.