[RE-wrenches] peformance matters

Tue Nov 10 12:35:23 PST 2009

Marco,

I heartily agree with you about performance. There are 5 new PV solar  
startup "dealers" in my small town in the last year and they mostly  
promote the cheapest cost-per-watt modules. Why? Because in Arizona  
the utility rebate is based on the nameplate power of the module. So a  
cheap module gets the same rebate as an expensive module. Guess what  
most folks buy?

This frustrates me as we are about the hottest location in the USA and  
power losses are HUGE for modules with lousy temperature coefficients.  
The best performance solar panels, like Uni-Solar, SunPower, Kaneka  
and Sanyo, are a hard because of the higher price.

It's the same with home builders here. Air Conditioning bills for a  
2000 sq.ft. home run $400 and up each month. It would be SO SIMPLE to  
build efficient homes and AC systems. So for the next 100 years  
enormous amounts of energy are wasted! (OK, I'm ranting here. Sorry.)

Have a look at Home Power issue 128, page 78 for a some comparison of  
some popular modules. Look at the Max. Power Temp. Coeff. column to  
get an idea of the best performing modules.

Sincerely,

Larry Crutcher
www.starlightsolar.com
larry at starlightsolar.com
(928) 941-1660

Retail Store & Shipping
2998 Shari Ave.
Yuma, AZ 85365

Mailing address
11881 South Fortuna Road; #210
Yuma, AZ 85367

Renewable Energy Systems Sales, Service, Installations

On Nov 10, 2009, at 10:50 AM, Marco Mangelsdorf wrote:

> The common metric for many consumers when considering a PV system  
> purchase is the $/watt cost of the installed system.  This  
> misleading metric allows low-priced bottom feeders (those licensed  
> and unlicensed contractors working out of their garage or storage  
> spaces) to clobber those of us who pay all of the taxes and  
> insurances and infrastructure costs to run a brick-and-mortar  
> operation with employees, etc.
>
> But when it comes down it, what really matters to the consumer is  
> not the $/watt installed cost but the kWhs produced by the system  
> over time.  For what good is a cheap PV system if its output is poor?
>
> Our focus as PV integrators should instead be to emphasize the  
> superior performance of our offered products, as in kWhs produced.
>
> To that end, where can we go for objective performance data  
> comparing brands X, Y and Z in monitored side-by-side testing over  
> time?  Ideally if we had multiple sites worldwide, with multiple  
> climate conditions, we would be able to see whether a 2 kW array of  
> brand X put out more power than brand Y.
>
> Can anyone point me to readily available data comparing the  
> performance of the major mod manufacturers in side-by-side testing?
>
> Gracias amigas y amigos,
> Marco
> ProVision Solar
>
> _______________________________________________
> List sponsored by Home Power magazine
>
> List Address: RE-wrenches at lists.re-wrenches.org
>
> Options & settings:
> http://lists.re-wrenches.org/options.cgi/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org
>
> List-Archive: http://lists.re-wrenches.org/pipermail/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org
>
> List rules & etiquette:
> www.re-wrenches.org/etiquette.htm
>
> Check out participant bios:
> www.members.re-wrenches.org
>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.re-wrenches.org/pipermail/re-wrenches-re-wrenches.org/attachments/20091110/440f11b5/attachment-0004.html>