3 years off grid! female designed & constucted homestead seeks 80 watt panel(s)

hi karen,

  good for you. i bet your grandfathers would be proud.
please contact kerry at customer service. she has a pv module with your name on it. supply her with the shipping details and choose between the sharp ne-80eje 80 watt or the kyocera kc85t 85watt or the mitsubishi mf110ec4 110watt module. the account has been taken care of.

hope this helps, dave

karen please consider adding some gallery photos of your homestead.

karen,

  as an afterthought. i believe you should take a few minutes when you call the store to speak to mr. cormican altE's technical adviser to make sure you don't face any compatability issues adding on to your system. he  will need to know what your running now, at least the module name and number. if you can give him the voc and vmp numbers off the label so much the better he most likely would know these anyway. as well as your nominal (battery) voltage and your charge control setup. he may want you to go with an entirely different module than those we mentioned, follow his recommendations. a word of caution here when dealing with james, make sure you say photovoltaic module not "solar panel" things could get ugly real quick. all kidding aside he is brilliant and won't steer you wrong.

  karen, about the path you have chosen..i applaud you! it is what some of us have only day dreamed about. i'm not sure i would have the guts.

  as for myself i live in a small studio flat and have no way using re but have gotten my daily power usage down to less than 5kwh through conservation methods. such as leaving my electric hot water off until ten minutes before i need it. and adjusting the fridge to best economy with a kill-a-watt meter. (lowest is not always best) and teaching myself to shut things off!

  it's been sort of a game to me to try and offset my usage by producing power at other locations with different projects at my friends and families properties. your original posting brought back fond memories of hiking through joshua tree and prompted me to act on your behalf. so it is my pleasure to help out. mentally i will add .5kwh per day production to my tally.

  also that evaporative cooler should work great in your low humidity. i'm sure you've seen the charts that show your expected temperature drop across the pleats. as for refridgeration you might consider going with an lp setup.

 "vicariously living in the high desert"

all the best, dave