How To Calculate How Many Solar Panels Needed

Other Factors Influence Battery Sizing:

• Ambient Temperature – Heat or cold has a big impact on battery performance and capacity.
• Seasonal Factors – People use more power at different times of the year. The sun produces more power in the summer than in the winter.
• Budget – Battery bank size is often a compromise between what you want to spend on batteries and how often you’ll need to run your backup generator.

How To Use A Calculator To Calculate How Many Solar Panels You Need

Our solar calculator can estimate the number of panels needed for your home. The tool works by taking your average monthly energy usage in kilowatt hours .

• Calculators that use kilowatt hours are more accurate because they consider your exact energy needs
• Those that ask for home area must assume the electricity consumption

Each electric company has a different power bill format, but they all display your electricity consumption for the billing period. The exact description will vary, but you should look for a term such as kWh used or kWh consumed.

Solar calculators also ask for your home location to determine how much sunshine is available. Based on those two values, they can estimate the system size in kilowatts. Some solar calculators assume a wattage for panels, while others ask you directly. Based on the total kilowatts and the rated watts per panel, the calculator can determine how many are needed.

It is important to understand the difference between kWh savings and dollar savings. kWh savings refer to the amount of energy that your panels produce. On the other hand, dollar savings are obtained when the solar electricity production is multiplied by the kWh price.

Understanding Your Solar Energy Goals

It sounds obvious, but if your objective is to reduce or stabilize your utility bill by a certain amount, you need to identify that specific goal. The number of commercial solar power panels you need will be dramatically different if youre looking to reduce costs by 50% as opposed to covering 100% of your energy needs. And if net metering is an option in your area, you may want to install even more panels to take advantage of the credit you could receive by sending unused solar energy back into the grid. Partnering with a solar energy consultant or solar equipment provider who understands your unique objectives is key to calculating your solar panel needs.

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How Many Solar Panels Does An Rver Use And How Many Solar Panels Do You Need On A Boat

Though these percentage ranges are relatively accurate, they are still not pinpoint precise. They are not precise enough for those who wish to calculate their requirements as accurately as possible at least without there being any waste in the process.

Understanding BatteriesThe Key to Specific RV and Outhouse Calculations

When using an RV or camper, it is the output of the battery that is really going to determine exactly how much solar power is required to meet your energy requirements.

This is the same if you are powering a workshop or shed too. You are ultimately going to have to generate enough power to be able to effectively recharge and sustain the battery that feeds power into your appliances from your solar panel array.

To make calculating as easy as possible for you, we have compiled a list of various different battery sizes and types in conjunction with the amount required to sustain them and also the number of panels that you will need in order to achieve these various wattage outputs too. Please note that every 100 usable battery hours require precisely 1,280 watts worth of power. Various battery types and their power requirements are as follows.

Alternatives To Solar Panels

As solar technology has developed more people than ever are now able to enjoy the benefits of free renewable solar energy. So, if you can’t fit enough conventional solar panels to your roof, then flexible solar panels and solar roof tiles are alternative options.Flexible solar panels are a lot thinner and lighter than conventional panels which helps to make them much more flexible. This means that anyone living in a home with a roof that might not be able to support the weight of several solar panels doesn’t have to rule out renewable solar energy as a way of cutting their energy bills.

Solar roof tiles, or solar shingles, tend to be more expensive than solar panels, don’t generate as much energy and aren’t suitable for all roof types, however, they’re an aesthetically pleasing option that are popular as part of a roof replacement.

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Cost Of Going Solar Vs Solar Savings

Let’s consider a nice house somewhere near Boston, Massachusetts. The average residential power use is 627 kWh per month, priced at 14.91¢/kWh. Rounding it up, we pay $94 for electricity monthly, and $1,128 yearly.

Now, the house has a gable roof, and one side of it is usually in the shade, so a solar panel power output there would be close to zero. It’s better to exclude this bit completely. If the total roof area was 1750 ft2, halving it means that we have approximately 875 ft2 of usable area.

Inputting the data into the solar panel calculator shows us that to offset 100% of electricity bills, we need a solar array producing 7.36 kW, assuming 70% efficiency. The average installation cost for an 8 kW system is $25,680. Dividing this by yearly electricity cost, we see that the solar panels for home use would return the investment after nearly 23 years.

However, this is a bad scenario, as solar panels are more efficient when used closer to the equator. Bear in mind that often there are incentives that help offset the installation price. Moreover, we didn’t account for inflation that causes electricity costs to increase. Although the final decision is yours, hopefully, our solar panel calculator can help you make an informed choice.

Figure Out How Many Solar Panels You Need

So, you know the size of the solar system you need to cover your energy usage. Now what? To figure out how many solar panels youll need, take the solar system size and multiply it by 1,000 to convert the size from kilowatts to watts.

Next, take the size of the system in watts and divide it by the wattage of the solar panels you want to install.

Voila! Thats the number of solar panels you will need to power your home.

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Solar Panel Specific Yield

After you determine how many kWh of electricity your home uses annually, you’ll want to figure out how many kWh are produced by each of your solar panels during a year. This will depend on the specific type of solar panel, roof conditions and local peak sunlight hours.

In the solar power industry, a common metric used to estimate system capacity is “specific yield” or “specific production.” This can be defined as the annual kWh of energy produced for each kilowatt of solar capacity installed. Specific yield has much to do with the amount of sunlight available in your location.

You can get a better idea of the specific yield that can be achieved in your location by checking reliable sources like the World Bank solar maps or the solar radiation database from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

To estimate how many kW are needed to run a house, you can divide your annual kWh consumption by the specific yield per kilowatt of solar capacity. For example, if your home needs 15,000 kWh of energy per year, and solar panels have a specific yield of 1,500 kWh/kWp in your location, you will need a system size of around 10 kilowatts.

Paradise Energy Solutions has also come up with a general formula to roughly ballpark the solar panel system size you need. You can simply divide your annual kWh by 1,200 and you will get the kilowatts of solar capacity needed. So, if the energy consumption reported on your last 12 power bills adds up to 24,000 kWh, you’ll need a 20 kW system .

How Many Solar Panels Do I Need For A 6kw Inverter

In general, the solar system size should be the same as the inverter size, so 6kW of solar output. This is because inverters are most efficient when they are fully loaded.

A 6kW solar system will need:

• 6000/300 = 20 solar panels, each rated at 300 watts each
• 6000/200 = 30 solar panels, each rated at 200 watts each
• 6000/100 = 60 solar panels, each rated at 100 watts each

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Future Of The Solar Power System

As solar energy systems become cheaper and more efficient, more people will see some economic value with incorporating them into residential projects.

With the integration of the solar power monitoring systems with the Internet, it will be easy to monitor solar power output in real time.

More solar power systems will upgrade over time to integrate with smart technology and selling household solar PV power that is in excess to need. Solar power accounts for around 35 percent of all new electrical power generated in the U.S.

To enhance their PV sales some installation companies are offering innovative financing solutions to people to help set up their solar panels system. These solutions use the financial return of the power savings to pay for the PV solar system capital cost.

A full solar system with batteries is not only a cleaner source of renewable energy but a correctly sized solar system is a good investment too.

References:

• Struggling with the high cost of electricity, and
• want the right solar power option for you?
• Confirm that your solar quote price covers what you need.

This Checklist covers the things to consider when investing in a Solar PV system.

How Many Solar Panels Do I Need To Power My Home

by Khaled Elsheref | Jul 28, 2021 | Uncategorized |

Did you know that in early 2019, the total number of solar energy system installations in the United States exceeded 2 million?

When people contemplate going solar for the first time, one of the first things they ask is, How many solar panels do I require to power my home?

While this may seem to be an easy question to ask, it is really one of the final responses you will get when determining what kind of solar power system to place on your property. The first thing youll need to figure out is how much energy your house is presently using.

Are you thinking of installing solar panels but dont know how many you would need? Here is how to calculate the number of solar panels needed for your home.

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Factors That Influence How Many Solar Panels You Need: Size And Output

To determine how many solar panels are needed to power a house, several factors must be considered. For example, if there are two identical homes powered by solar energy in California and New York, with exactly the same energy usage, the California home will need fewer solar panels because the state gets more sunshine.

The following are some of the most important factors to consider when figuring out many solar panels you need:

Inverter Sizing For A Grid

Inverters for grid-tie solar systems are simply sized to take maximum advantage of the solar output. In practice this means the inverter can be undersized to around 85% of the solar PV array size without much penalty in energy production. Even for a perfectly south-facing solar array. Solar panels rarely produce rated output, you will see that happen just a few times a year, usually in early spring when it is still very cold outside, with a clear-blue sky, and the sun already high in the sky at noon. The rest of the time solar panels will produce less, much of the time a great deal less, than their rated output.

For solar arrays that are less-than-ideal, it may be possible to undersize the inverter even more, without a penalty in annual energy production. That is something that needs to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

It is important to keep in mind that inverters do not need to be the same size as the solar array. This is an area where potentially some money can be saved so there is a better payback period for the solar system, and resources are better utilized.

For our sample solar system of 9.25 kW of peak-power in solar modules this means:

9.25 x 0.85 = 7.9 kW inverter size is sufficient

Fronius makes a nice 8.2 kW string inverter, that is the next size up, and it would be a great choice for this system!

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Research Your Utility Companys Policy On Solar

Does your utility company have a net energy metering program? Most utility companies have net energy metering policies, where utilities have to credit owners of a home solar energy system for the excess energy they produce. Without a Net Energy Metering program, you wont get paid for any extra solar power you generate. In California, the net energy metering means that any kWh of energy your homes solar panels generate over your households utility demands gets credited back to you in equal measure. Please note, the amount you get credited isnt very significant. Most utility companies will pay in the range of .04-.12 cents per kilowatt-hour. However, if you undersize your system, you may be paying a range of .22-.48 cents per kilowatt-hour.

Pro Question: How much will your utility company allow you to oversize your system? Utility companies will limit how large you can build your solar energy system. Some utilities will allow you to oversize your system to 150%, while others will only allow 100%. 

Not All Roofs Are Suitable For Solar Panels

Apart from estimating how many solar panels you need, you should also consider the weight of the panels themselves.

On average, a single panel weighs around 40 pounds, adding around 2.8 pounds per square foot for a typical pitched roof and 5 pounds for flat roofs. Therefore, you need to make sure that your roof can support this added weight. You also need to consider the material, age, and structure of your roof.

According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy, approximately 50% of homes cant support rooftop solar panels. Community solar programs are a common way for many homeowners, businesses and renters to go solar without actually installing anything on their roof. Participants can subscribe to a nearby solar farm and pay a lower price for the electricity sourced from it. Through Community Solar with Nexamp, the process is similar to determine the size of a subscribers share of a solar farm is similar to determining the number of rooftop solar panels. We simply analyze a subscribers last 12-13 months of energy usage and recommend a suitable allocation of our farm for them to subscribe to at a discounted rate. The end goal is to offset as much of a subscribers annual electricity costs as possible.

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Daily Peak Sunlight Hours

Solar panels rely on the sun to capture electricity, so your panel needs are directly related to the amount of sunlight you get. The Renewable Resource Data Center provides this information for your state and further breaks it down by major city. Dividing the daily requirement by the number of daily peak sunlight hours calculates the amount of energy your panels need to pick up every peak sunlight hour.

Continuing with the example, if you lived in Daytona Beach, Florida, with 5.2 daily peak sunlight hours, divide 20.5 by 5.2 to calculate 3.94 kW required per hour. Multiply the kW by 1,000 to convert the measurement to watts. In the example, multiplying 3.94 times 1,000 converts the figure to 3,940.

Number Of Residents And Amount Of Energy You Use

Households with more members normally use a higher amount of electricity, and this also means they need more solar panels to increase energy production.

Electricity usage is a very important factor, as it determines how much power must be generated by your solar panel system. If your home uses 12,000 kilowatt-hours per year and you want to go 100% solar, your system must be capable of generating that amount of power.

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Rv Solar Panels Video Transcript:

Again, from the power audit and solar calculator you used back in part 2, you should have a decent idea as to what your total solar panel wattage is going to be. First, Im going to talk about small setups. If this doesnt apply to you then you might want to check out the time stamps in the description and skip ahead to the next chapter.

Your Current Energy Consumption

Many solar customers desire a system that generates equal to or close to the amount of energy theyre consuming each month. To get a feel for your current energy consumption, look at your watt usage over the last 12 months. Depending on your situation, you may need more or less solar panels to potentially reduce your bill.

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The Final Calculation Of The Size Of The Solar Power System Needed

Once the daily power requirement estimation has been done, we need to check those calculations for each season. For instance, say the figure applicable to daily power requirement we arrived at is 240w.

We divide the daily watts required by the number of sunshine hours for the season to get the panel size .

• 240 watt-hours/ 6 h = 40 Watt panel.

Similarly the calculation for winter daylight hours gives:

• 240watt-hours / 4h= 60 Watt panel.

Depending on the brand of solar panel that you choose to buy, you will know the size of the solar panel you need. So if your chosen company makes 30 watt panels, then you need two panels connected in series. Note that based on the above calculations, the most satisfactory requirement for all year would be to use the higher number of watts and thus solar panels.

The above factors and metrics will help you in calculating the energy requirements for the solar power system that needs to be set up. There may be a difference in the estimated numbers from the actual watts output delivered. When the system is up and functioning you can adjust it.