Val de Vie planning solar power plant

Neptuner

Neptuner

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Jan said:
Top residential estate planning to build its own solar power plant

Val de Vie is planning to build its own solar power plant with 3,600 photovoltaic (PV) modules to generate 1 MV of electricity.

Val de Vie is one of South Africa’s top luxury lifestyle estates and is located in the Cape Winelands between Paarl and Franschhoek.
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Seen a few of these security complexes being developed across the country. This will definitely gain momentum.
 
system32

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Put solar panels on roof instead of separate plant.
Create a micro grid with storage.

Make each home a smart-home with PV + Grid-Tie (or hybrid) Inverter
Why is there no mention of storage?
Have a central megapack battery (or even lithium battery per home)
Much better use of land.

1655100103586.png
With panels on roof, they closer to sun and so work better :cool:
 
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G

Gaz{M}

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I wonder how they will "share" the power with all the houses? Unless its a free for all and you can start a bitcoin mine and use as much power as you like.
 
Speedster

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Gaz{M} said:
I wonder how they will "share" the power with all the houses? Unless its a free for all and you can start a bitcoin mine and use as much power as you like.
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They'll sell it at premium pricing.
 
R13...

R13...

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El Presidente said:
I think we're in for a fun ride. The upper middle and well off of will either emigrate or go solar. These kind of communities will generate their own power and Eskom will be left with the people that can't pay to carry them...
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The government will just tax those remaining few to prop up Eskom. That's if the ANC remain in power. It's a big IF.
 
Cactus

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R13... said:
The government will just tax those remaining few to prop up Eskom. That's if the ANC remain in power. It's a big IF.
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Agreed, however you can only tax someone that much, at some point you run out of other people's money. I hope the government has a plan for this...
 
Benedict A55h0le

Benedict A55h0le

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system32 said:
Put solar panels on roof instead of separate plant.
Create a micro grid with storage.

Make each home a smart-home with PV + Grid-Tie (or hybrid) Inverter
Why is there no mention of storage?
Have a central megapack battery (or even lithium battery per home)
Much better use of land.

View attachment 1329318
With panels on roof, they closer to sun and so work better :cool:
Click to expand...
Your suggestion is much better, but that won`t look nice. Besides, if the estate manages this, then they can exploit the home owners more efficiently. This will also not save money, it will only do away with load shedding.
 
R13...

R13...

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system32 said:
Put solar panels on roof instead of separate plant.
Create a micro grid with storage.

Make each home a smart-home with PV + Grid-Tie (or hybrid) Inverter
Why is there no mention of storage?
Have a central megapack battery (or even lithium battery per home)
Much better use of land.

View attachment 1329318
With panels on roof, they closer to sun and so work better :cool:
Click to expand...
They probably don't want to sully the beauty of their homes with unsightly solar panels on the roofs. But you're right, much more efficient if they just installed per home. Maybe just the solar with each owner deciding if they want battery storage as that's the expensive part. I suspect they won't be going for a mega pack. There are micro grid solutions with storage I think.
 
HumanShield

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This is how things will go. As infrastructure starts to crumble, we'll have more and more large estates and residential associations providing for themselves. It probably wont stop at just power, given some time they'll have their own water treatment/filtering plants because the municipal water won't be good enough.
 
The_MAC

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system32 said:
Put solar panels on roof instead of separate plant.
Create a micro grid with storage.

Make each home a smart-home with PV + Grid-Tie (or hybrid) Inverter
Why is there no mention of storage?
Have a central megapack battery (or even lithium battery per home)
Much better use of land.

View attachment 1329318
With panels on roof, they closer to sun and so work better :cool:
Click to expand...

3 reasons I can think off that makes sense to centralise:

1) Maintenance
2) No need to retrofit each home
3) centralised billing
 
Benedict A55h0le

Benedict A55h0le

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R13... said:
They probably don't want to sully the beauty of their homes with unsightly solar panels on the roofs. But you're right, much more efficient if they just installed per home. Maybe just the solar with each owner deciding if they want battery storage as that's the expensive part. I suspect they won't be going for a mega pack. There are micro grid solutions with storage I think.
Click to expand...
The looks thing is just false rule to exploit the home owners. It would be cheaper for the home owners to go solar by themselves, but now they will be at the mercy of the prices set by estate management.
 
Arzy

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It's simple enough to do. Know of a couple of complexes where the bulk supply is managed by the HOA and the roofs are fitted with PV and no storage is installed.

PV feeds in between the bulk meter and the residents, effectively only drawing from the bulk supply if the solar production is insufficient. Residents get a discount of 5-15% on tarrif and that's it. Any "surplus" is to the HOA's benefit to maintain the system and reduce levies.

The issue is that this model would only apply to sectional titles schemes. There currently isn't a mechanism in place to provide power across erf boundaries unless you install your own microgrid.

We've been looking at doing something similar by utilizing residential roofs to supply nearby commercial tenants but can't get by the regulatory issues. Holing back o the PV now as it is because the residents can't use it all. If the framework allowed it though we'd be up at 50MW very quickly.
 
Senor

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That's what I love about some communities, they see a problem, come up with a solution, and move on.
 
Benedict A55h0le

Benedict A55h0le

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Senor said:
That's what I love about some communities, they see a problem, come up with a solution, and move on.
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Yes but in this case it is just another governing body who limits the freedom of people to take care of themselves in the most efficient manner, for their own financial gain.

"Residents get a discount of 5-15% on tarrif and that's it." - and there will be enough added to the levy to more than make up for that 15%.
 
R

richjdavies

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The_MAC said:
3 reasons I can think off that makes sense to centralise:

1) Maintenance
2) No need to retrofit each home
3) centralised billing
Click to expand...
I'm sure billing is already centralised.... All of these estates and even blocks of flats are done by 3rd parties.

The reason it's not on the roofs is because the estate doesn't own the roofs! The individual owners do!
 
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