Eskom solution

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greggpb

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So a friend of mine decides screw Eskom and installed solar panels on his roof and batteries in his garage... With this soultion he can switch of his circut breakers and just about everything still runs...

this was his plan... now the interesting thing happens ... he has one of the old mechanical electricty meters.. when he turn on his circut breakers... the meter starts running backwards because he is suppying the eskom grid with power... he now has he own little power station...

shouldn't we all be doing this ? it would solve the power problem chop-chop.. the only thing it might do is put a big dent in eskoms profits ? because they would just be supplying infrastrucure and not to much power ?
 
Last edited:
greggpb said:
So a friend of mine decides screw telkom and installed solar panels on his roof and batteries in his garage... With this soultion he can switch of his circut breakers and just about everything still runs...

this was his plan... now the interesting thing happens ... he has on of theo old mechanical electricty meters.. when he turn on his circut breakers... the meter starts runiing backwards because hi is suppying the eskom grid with power... he now has he own little power station...

shouldn't we all be doing this ? it would so the power problem chop-chop.. the only thing it might do is put a big dent in eskoms profits ? because they would just be supplier infrastrucure and not to much power ?
Click to expand...

Telkom? Lol. Force of habit, ftl!
 
Moederloos said:
Telkom? Lol. Force of habit, ftl!
Click to expand...

Hehe, I also noticed that!

Hmmm, will Eskom pay him for the juice he is supplying? If not, booger them then as they will supply the excess power, your buddy has so kindly supplied, to someone else at a PROFIT! :mad:

But kudos to your bud for doing his thing to save power and, more importantly, becoming self reliant. :cool:
 
Jase said:
Hehe, I also noticed that!

Hmmm, will Eskom pay him for the juice he is supplying? If not, booger them then as they will supply the excess power, your buddy has so kindly supplied, to someone else at a PROFIT! :mad:

But kudos to your bud for doing his thing to save power and, more importantly, becoming self reliant. :cool:
Click to expand...



Well they come read his meter every so often to charge him... and the meter reading will be less becasue it has been running back wards... so he is effectily selling electricty to eskom at what they charge him for it... so it probally cost them more money than if they had produced the electricty them selves
 
Dude, I question whether that juice is actually going into the grid. From what I understand you have to do a little more than just push the juice onto the lines to feed back into the grid, and this is something Eskom is not able to do at the moment.

I suspect if the breakers are switched off, the meter is just running backwards by default and the power is not actually going into the grid. Perhaps it is just running into a ground feed (ie: being wasted because he installed more panels than he needed to)?
 
In the state that my dad lives the power company is required (by law) to buy any surplus power you might have available. :)
 
I just had a chat with an electrical engineer. Off the top of his head he had this to say (said he will do a little research himself):


From a technical side, you can supply the grid but you would need to synchronise with said grid (special piece of equipment). I am no expert but it has to do with the nature of electricity (Waaay over my head to try and absorb in a 5 minute conversation over the phone).

Legally: AFAIK, there is legislation that currently prohibits the supply by private individuals. I think in light of the current situation it will probably change. Certain other countries do work this way and people receive a rebate for this.

So yes it can be done, but our infrastructure and legislation will need tweaking.
 
wouldnt surprise me if eskom accuses him of turning back the meter and gives him a nice fat fine.
 
Jase said:
From a technical side, you can supply the grid but you would need to synchronise with said grid (special piece of equipment). I am no expert but it has to do with the nature of electricity (Waaay over my head to try and absorb in a 5 minute conversation over the phone).
Click to expand...

That is what I am referring to. I understand that all power stations in the country are synced, so to bring one online after going offline requires a bit of timely or whatever to get the grid feed correct.

So you would have to ensure that the panels / inverter are feeding back at the right rate into the grid.
 
IIRC, in California, you earn credits for supplying excess electricity that you feed back into the grid which then can be redeemed.
 
greggpb said:
So a friend of mine decides screw Eskom and installed solar panels on his roof and batteries in his garage... With this soultion he can switch of his circut breakers and just about everything still runs...

this was his plan... now the interesting thing happens ... he has one of the old mechanical electricty meters.. when he turn on his circut breakers... the meter starts running backwards because he is suppying the eskom grid with power... he now has he own little power station...

shouldn't we all be doing this ? it would solve the power problem chop-chop.. the only thing it might do is put a big dent in eskoms profits ? because they would just be supplying infrastrucure and not to much power ?
Click to expand...

Ask your friend which company he used to install the setup. I'd be interested.
 
greggpb said:
So a friend of mine decides screw Eskom and installed solar panels on his roof and batteries in his garage... With this soultion he can switch of his circut breakers and just about everything still runs...

this was his plan... now the interesting thing happens ... he has one of the old mechanical electricty meters.. when he turn on his circut breakers... the meter starts running backwards because he is suppying the eskom grid with power... he now has he own little power station...

shouldn't we all be doing this ? it would solve the power problem chop-chop.. the only thing it might do is put a big dent in eskoms profits ? because they would just be supplying infrastrucure and not to much power ?
Click to expand...

Not very clever, he generates and supplies Escom at around R 9.00 per kilowatt hour,whilst Escom supplies at R 0.045c.
What happens when the power comes back on?
Will the smoke come out?
We all know that electronic components work on keeping the smoke in.
When the smoke comes out,electronic components work no more.
Hau! eish! She is broken!
 
greggpb said:
So a friend of mine decides screw Eskom and installed solar panels on his roof and batteries in his garage... With this soultion he can switch of his circut breakers and just about everything still runs...

this was his plan... now the interesting thing happens ... he has one of the old mechanical electricty meters.. when he turn on his circut breakers... the meter starts running backwards because he is suppying the eskom grid with power... he now has he own little power station...

shouldn't we all be doing this ? it would solve the power problem chop-chop.. the only thing it might do is put a big dent in eskoms profits ? because they would just be supplying infrastrucure and not to much power ?
Click to expand...

Good...At the end of the day, send Escom their bill :D
 
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