coj off-grid process

[Lupus]

Something that helped me to reduce the energy consumption quite a bit mainly at night was replacing the lights outside. Think I mentioned it before. Its pitch black outside of my house but I have these lights that kick in from quite a distance all around the wall. Garages are 25W motion lights. 3 of them. Outside the 3 garages facing the street is 4x25W ones that really light up everything. I estimate it saved me about 1.5kWh a night. That's how my night baseload stays around 45W with little to no battery drain after bedtime.

All from Temu also for dirt cheap. 1.5 years and going strong with no failures. I think the silicone waterproofing I did is visible on the image. That is the sole reason for them lasting long. Without it I think in 1 rainy season they would have been dying one by one. You need much more power savings than that but i think the little stuff adds up.

View attachment 1900087

Just get solar spot lights and 10w led spot lights give way more light then you'd think for areas that need light

 

[denmendez65]

Something that helped me to reduce the energy consumption quite a bit mainly at night was replacing the lights outside. Think I mentioned it before. Its pitch black outside of my house but I have these lights that kick in from quite a distance all around the wall. Garages are 25W motion lights. 3 of them. Outside the 3 garages facing the street is 4x25W ones that really light up everything. I estimate it saved me about 1.5kWh a night. That's how my night baseload stays around 45W with little to no battery drain after bedtime.

All from Temu also for dirt cheap. 1.5 years and going strong with no failures. I think the silicone waterproofing I did is visible on the image. That is the sole reason for them lasting long. Without it I think in 1 rainy season they would have been dying one by one. You need much more power savings than that but i think the little stuff adds up.

View attachment 1900087

These are the others.


I have 5 of the left pic ones. One faces the fish pond and other 4 outside the garages towards the road. 3 of the center, one on each garage as the wife didn't like having to drive into a dark garage and look for the light switch. Right are motion activated bulbs that fit in any standard light fitting. I bought a whole box as spares but none have failed.

 

[denmendez65]

Just get solar spot lights and 10w led spot lights give way more light then you'd think for areas that need light

My neighbours have those. When I leave for the gym during the week at 5am, they are all almost dead and little to no light as the batteries are drained from being on the whole night. That's why I went with the sensor ones. When I leave at 5am, still the same brightness as when the sun just went down. My batteries on the lights will also last longer as they are barely working.

 

[Lupus]

My neighbours have those. When I leave for the gym during the week at 5am, they are all almost dead and little to no light as the batteries are drained from being on the whole night. That's why I went with the sensor ones. When I leave at 5am, still the same brightness as when the sun just went down. My batteries on the lights will also last longer as they are barely working.

Mine aren't too bad

 

[Neuk_]

Something that helped me to reduce the energy consumption quite a bit mainly at night was replacing the lights outside. Think I mentioned it before. Its pitch black outside of my house but I have these lights that kick in from quite a distance all around the wall. Garages are 25W motion lights. 3 of them. Outside the 3 garages facing the street is 4x25W ones that really light up everything. I estimate it saved me about 1.5kWh a night. That's how my night baseload stays around 45W with little to no battery drain after bedtime.

All from Temu also for dirt cheap. 1.5 years and going strong with no failures. I think the silicone waterproofing I did is visible on the image. That is the sole reason for them lasting long. Without it I think in 1 rainy season they would have been dying one by one. You need much more power savings than that but i think the little stuff adds up.

View attachment 1900087

Most of our outside lights are off at night, I keep a few facing the garden on, our driveway, our shared driveway and at our street gate. All are either last-of--the-line CFL bulbs or new LED's, I have pretty much replaced every light bulb in the house to either CFL or LED, maybe the ovens and extractor hood don't have. Unfortunately we have a lot of 'stuff' running constantly and contributing to base load, two fridge/freezers, a chest freezer, a long list of network equipment like NVR's, PoE switches, normal switches, AP's, line of sight repeaters, CCTv cameras, alarm system and then then usual phones, iPads, etc. all charging. As you say, it all adds up...

 

[Lupus]

Most of our outside lights are off at night, I keep a few facing the garden on, our driveway, our shared driveway and at our street gate. All are either last-of--the-line CFL bulbs or new LED's, I have pretty much replaced every light bulb in the house to either CFL or LED, maybe the ovens and extractor hood don't have. Unfortunately we have a lot of 'stuff' running constantly and contributing to base load, two fridge/freezers, a chest freezer, a long list of network equipment like NVR's, PoE switches, normal switches, AP's, line of sight repeaters, CCTv cameras, alarm system and then then usual phones, iPads, etc. all charging. As you say, it all adds up...

When I moved into the house 8 years ago every light was cfl and they were all dying. Some were so dim that a candle would have been better.
I went and replaced them all with leds, oddly enough the only ones that keep dying are the kitchen ones. Probably heat from the stove so replaced them with more expensive ones and those seem to have held years at least.

 

[Neuk_]

When I moved into the house 8 years ago every light was cfl and they were all dying. Some were so dim that a candle would have been better.
I went and replaced them all with leds, oddly enough the only ones that keep dying are the kitchen ones. Probably heat from the stove so replaced them with more expensive ones and those seem to have held years at least.

I am slowly phasing out the CFL's, there haven't really been any LED alternatives for outside biased CFL's until now, slowly changing.

 

[denmendez65]

I met with my old landlord (we are actually friends now) this past weekend, and he was complaining about his COJ bill of 7k every month, with 4000 plus being his electric bill, with him being postpaid. He says the neighbours are paying the same, as they are all on postpaid.

I decided to check my old bills to see exactly how much I am saving now, and WOW. My savings are the equivalent of monthly payments for a small car. Heck, a 330k brand new BYD dolphin is 5600 a month.

My average savings are R4136 rand a month based on 9 months of data. 50k a year basically, and with current increases (let's say 10% since it will be around 9 something), a saving of R4549 rand a month or R54600 a year.

One of the best financial decisions, including quality of life (outages don't affect me), I have ever made has been solar and going off-grid.

This is just electric usage, which comes to R2927 a month. Factoring fixed charges of R1360 a month in that period, it comes to R4136 a month.



Present:


For the People like where my old Landlord stays, who are paying 4k plus a month for electricity currently, it is a literal lack of solar education (misconceptions about price and system sizing) that is making them pay those huge bills.

Even complaining about lifestyle changes to being off-grid is not justifiable anymore. The 54k a year I save is enough for 4 Dyness 5kWh batteries a year. or 5 Navasolar/MUST batteries. 4 aren't enough? Then get 8 and knock yourself out running aircons, etc. It is far better than donating it to CP.

 

[wingnut771]

I met with my old landlord (we are actually friends now) this past weekend, and he was complaining about his COJ bill of 7k every month, with 4000 plus being his electric bill, with him being postpaid. He says the neighbours are paying the same, as they are all on postpaid.

I decided to check my old bills to see exactly how much I am saving now, and WOW. My savings are the equivalent of monthly payments for a small car. Heck, a 330k brand new BYD dolphin is 5600 a month.

My average savings are R4136 rand a month based on 9 months of data. 50k a year basically, and with current increases (let's say 10% since it will be around 9 something), a saving of R4549 rand a month or R54600 a year.

One of the best financial decisions, including quality of life (outages don't affect me), I have ever made has been solar and going off-grid.

This is just electric usage, which comes to R2927 a month. Factoring fixed charges of R1360 a month in that period, it comes to R4136 a month.

View attachment 1907473

Present:
View attachment 1907474

For the People like where my old Landlord stays, who are paying 4k plus a month for electricity currently, it is a literal lack of solar education (misconceptions about price and system sizing) that is making them pay those huge bills.

Even complaining about lifestyle changes to being off-grid is not justifiable anymore. The 54k a year I save is enough for 4 Dyness 5kWh batteries a year. or 5 Navasolar/MUST batteries. 4 aren't enough? Then get 8 and knock yourself out running aircons, etc. It is far better than donating it to CP.

How much were the therapy bills for the emotional damage of waiting for days standing in lines?

 

[biena]

How much were the therapy bills for the emotional damage of waiting for days standing in lines?

Nothing compared to the cost of calming and high blood pressure pills he had to take.

 

[denmendez65]

How much were the therapy bills for the emotional damage of waiting for days standing in lines?

 

[denmendez65]

How much were the therapy bills for the emotional damage of waiting for days standing in lines?

Well, I heard from someone who wanted to go off-grid that they went to the same COJ I went to, which jerked me around and they were told the same story of it's not allowed. Then he went again and was told that you can disconnect but must pay 1000 rand a month as an 'availability fee'.

That COJ branch needs to be investigated, as they are the same ones that told me I didn't belong to that region and must get assisted by region B in Randburg, only for region B to say region C is messing around a lot with its clients for basic things, and that I should call the manager of the place if the employees pull that stunt.

Region C has a lot of corruption I suspect and the customer service is appaling.

2 COJs, different statements and ways of treating clients.

 

[wingnut771]

Well, I heard from someone who wanted to go off-grid that they went to the same COJ I went to, which jerked me around and they were told the same story of it's not allowed. Then he went again and was told that you can disconnect but must pay 1000 rand a month as an 'availability fee'.

That COJ branch needs to be investigated, as they are the same ones that told me I didn't belong to that region and must get assisted by region B in Randburg, only for region B to say region C is messing around a lot with its clients for basic things, and that I should call the manager of the place if the employees pull that stunt.

Region C has a lot of corruption I suspect and the customer service is appaling.

2 COJs, different statements and ways of treating clients.

 

[Slowestclock]

Well, I heard from someone who wanted to go off-grid that they went to the same COJ I went to, which jerked me around and they were told the same story of it's not allowed. Then he went again and was told that you can disconnect but must pay 1000 rand a month as an 'availability fee'.

That COJ branch needs to be investigated, as they are the same ones that told me I didn't belong to that region and must get assisted by region B in Randburg, only for region B to say region C is messing around a lot with its clients for basic things, and that I should call the manager of the place if the employees pull that stunt.

Region C has a lot of corruption I suspect and the customer service is appaling.

2 COJs, different statements and ways of treating clients.

Interesting! I've been to busy to run this gauntlet myself but I think this "availability fee" will be their only solution going forward in trying to squeeze more cash out of whats lets of JHB paying residents.

 

[Lupus]

Well, I heard from someone who wanted to go off-grid that they went to the same COJ I went to, which jerked me around and they were told the same story of it's not allowed. Then he went again and was told that you can disconnect but must pay 1000 rand a month as an 'availability fee'.

That COJ branch needs to be investigated, as they are the same ones that told me I didn't belong to that region and must get assisted by region B in Randburg, only for region B to say region C is messing around a lot with its clients for basic things, and that I should call the manager of the place if the employees pull that stunt.

Region C has a lot of corruption I suspect and the customer service is appaling.

2 COJs, different statements and ways of treating clients.

Region C is terrible, it is also the one with one of the most faults.

 

[denmendez65]

Interesting! I've been to busy to run this gauntlet myself but I think this "availability fee" will be their only solution going forward in trying to squeeze more cash out of whats lets of JHB paying residents.

Unless they want lawsuits, they can't do that. It's just another desperate attempt like the solar registration thing.

Just stop paying and head to court. I guarantee the user will win the case.

 

[denmendez65]

Region C is terrible, it is also the one with one of the most faults.

Very!

I was told it is not possible, and they all acted dumb. If I gave up on the spot, like what the other guy in my neighbourhood did, I would still be paying. I persevered and went to CP to get the note. That's when region C came up with the story of I don't belong to region C, but belong to region B, even though the statement said C.

Their plan was to tire me out or make me lose interest, which I almost did. The neighbour gave up, so it's a trick they have been successfully using for a while.

I am a bit of a vulture when it comes to money, so I wasn't going to let the 1.4k go that easily, along with the stupid estimates I was getting.

 

[denmendez65]

Wanted to share some data on what looks to be decent info for sizing a system to go off-grid without a generator (in Gauteng), based on my experience so far.

My household's load in the last 5 months totalled 1108kWh. Only giving the last 5 months, as this is the worst period for JHB generation. That's about 221 kWh a month.

Note, I haven't added a geyser to this. I am assuming the geyser for a typical household, if serious about going off-grid, is running off a heatpump (that will add about 100kWh a month to my above 221kWh figure for a family of 5) or a standalone solar system with a Gas backup.

Adding geysers to inverters is just not a good idea for going off-grid, as you will need a generator, and there is no way around that without spending huge amounts on the solar install to cater for it.




My battery capacity was 12kWh during this period until I increased it to 17 kWh recently. The lowest the 12kwH GEL bank ever dropped was to about 50%, and that happened maybe 2x this whole year.

So we can get our first bit of data here, I used 6kWh at my worst point. My load is 7.3KwH average a day, so you basically only need enough battery to last 24 hours.

My PV array (inverter connected only, not counting my geyser panels) is 5.14kW. Data from PV Watts, with generation estimates based on weather and my very poor mounting angle, leads to a generation of 2853kWh in those 5 months.

My load was 1100kWh over the same period, so it is a ratio of 1:2.6. For every kWh of consumption, you need 2.6 times the generation.



Having enough battery to last 24hours of consumption and 2.6 times the generation to load, I have been able to get away with not using a generator.

There are some inaccuracies, as when the clouds bit really badly, my pool was off, but all other day-to-day activities in the house were done. I would shed about 2kWh from just not running the pool, which ran about 4 hours a day this year. But this is something a typical solar user does already.

If I had my geyser on the inverter and going off the same figures, with my geyser having used an average of 7kWh a day when grid connected on a timer. Then I would need 15kWh of battery and about 10.2kW of solar. And that is being conservative on the battery side of things, as generation during heavy clouds between a 5kW system and a 10kW system would be within a few hundred watts, so you can't make up the 7kWh deficit by just doubling the panels. The only real fix would be more batteries to ride it out.

So basically, get enough battery to last 24 hours with zero generation.

Get enough panels to generate at least 2.6 times your load requirements (could be less, as keep in mind my panels are south west facing).

 

[wingnut771]

Wanted to share some data on what looks to be decent info for sizing a system to go off-grid without a generator (in Gauteng), based on my experience so far.

My household's load in the last 5 months totalled 1108kWh. Only giving the last 5 months, as this is the worst period for JHB generation. That's about 221 kWh a month.

Note, I haven't added a geyser to this. I am assuming the geyser for a typical household, if serious about going off-grid, is running off a heatpump (that will add about 100kWh a month to my above 221kWh figure for a family of 5) or a standalone solar system with a Gas backup.

Adding geysers to inverters is just not a good idea for going off-grid, as you will need a generator, and there is no way around that without spending huge amounts on the solar install to cater for it.


View attachment 1912591View attachment 1912592

My battery capacity was 12kWh during this period until I increased it to 17 kWh recently. The lowest the 12kwH GEL bank ever dropped was to about 50%, and that happened maybe 2x this whole year.

So we can get our first bit of data here, I used 6kWh at my worst point. My load is 7.3KwH average a day, so you basically only need enough battery to last 24 hours.

My PV array (inverter connected only, not counting my geyser panels) is 5.14kW. Data from PV Watts, with generation estimates based on weather and my very poor mounting angle, leads to a generation of 2853kWh in those 5 months.

My load was 1100kWh over the same period, so it is a ratio of 1:2.6. For every kWh of consumption, you need 2.6 times the generation.

View attachment 1912603View attachment 1912604

Having enough battery to last 24hours of consumption and 2.6 times the generation to load, I have been able to get away with not using a generator.

There are some inaccuracies, as when the clouds bit really badly, my pool was off, but all other day-to-day activities in the house were done. I would shed about 2kWh from just not running the pool, which ran about 4 hours a day this year. But this is something a typical solar user does already.

If I had my geyser on the inverter and going off the same figures, with my geyser having used an average of 7kWh a day when grid connected on a timer. Then I would need 15kWh of battery and about 10.2kW of solar. And that is being conservative on the battery side of things, as generation during heavy clouds between a 5kW system and a 10kW system would be within a few hundred watts, so you can't make up the 7kWh deficit by just doubling the panels. The only real fix would be more batteries to ride it out.

So basically, get enough battery to last 24 hours with zero generation.

Get enough panels to generate at least 2.6 times your load requirements (could be less, as keep in mind my panels are south west facing).

How come you didnt run out of hot water over multiple cloudy days?

 

[denmendez65]

How come you didnt run out of hot water over multiple cloudy days?

Ask Geysertech .

That controller is probably very efficient. There are also 4 panels on it. Maybe that's why. But I genuinely haven't struggled with hot water at all.

Didn't matter when the wife was here, when I had 5 people over in December, and now Winter with my brother staying with me. It just works.

That's why when I have kids and am back in SA, I will get a second geyser and hook another controller to it with its own panels. I have the space for it.