Solar powered inverters

[Tom F.]

When we brought in the equipment to install systems for community or nonprofit type activities you can get the stuff in duty-free. We had a heck of a time getting customs to accept all the paperwork one time for an anonometer and it's tower for a training one time. A couple of trips and hours of waiting.

As far as for the general public and businesses you bascially show your invoice and the shipping papers, you can begin the back and forth between the carrier and customs. The inspector will check your shipment and will sometimes revalue what you have and ignore the invoices. You pay 10% on panels and 30% on everything else. Then another banco central charge and sometimes they want to know how you converted your pesos into dollars. With all the charges it ends up closer to 20% and 40% when it is all said and done.

When we used a shipping company, I ended up looking at about 10 different shipments over six months. Same types of things on every shipment. (panels, ballasts, compact florescents and a few other things). There was no rhyme or reason on how they applied the charges. Many people pay off the inspectors, submit fake invoices and pay a lot less. We always played by the rules, but it is clear the shipping companies do some strange things. They used to tell that weight and volume can get factored in and sometimes it is straight by the invoice. I didn't believe too much of it but it was costing us the same or sometimes a little less. Besides not having to spend the day hanging out at customs.

 

[gmiller261]

Killed the golden goose

Tom,

I am sure you know more about the real world solar business in DR than I do. But.

Taking the 1.2kW array sold by SoluzUSA; using $4 per watt the array should cost ~ $5,000.00. With your 20-40% import, at high end, it?s $7,000.00 for just the panels. Now with the high end %40 profit margin you are talking about $9,800.00 USD for the solar panels alone.

That means $13,590.00 +itbs - $9,800.00 = ~ $3,790.00 for framing, parts and installation.

1) That?s still insane. The company already put a %40 premium on the solar panels. Which in my opinion is sufficient enough $$ for the installation.
2) The installation costs (~$2,500.00) are %25 of the already inflated (%40) price for the panels. Another insanity.

As far as I can see, it is another business plan that can only fail. They have literally ?shot themselves in the foot?.

A 3kW array will not provide me with off-grid capabilities and I will surely not pay $40,000.00 for it. Now I would pay $20,000.00 for a 4000 watt solar panel array.

http://www.beyondoilsolar.com/solarpanels.htm

 

[Bolt]

This solar situation has been looked into many many times on this board but I still doubt it?s cost effective enough to use on an average house or apt dwelling. How many of us that live here can honestly say we will still be here in 15 years time to appreciate the potential savings?

The use of an inverter is a pleasure in itself as the switching on mine is so fast there are no interruptions in supply whatsoever. My PC's and TV's etc remain on and I still run full size fridge freezer, fans, lights, microwave oven and full size washing machine all at the same time if I want.

Thing is though how much power do you really need during the day? A fan, PC and TV is the average load with few mins of the microwave to heat my Pot noodle. At night, just use power saving bulbs everywhere.

When the batteries get low just crank the Planta to recharge the batteries. My inverter is a 2.5K system with 4 T105 batteries and I installed my self within 3 hours price $900 about 9 months ago.

I have a 6.5K diesel plant, which is more then enough to put juice back in the batteries.

Ed: To add if anyone is thinking of building your own house then design in a solar hot water system, which can be a simple batch collector tank. That will save 30% on your electric cost immediatly on heating water. We have more then enough sun here to bring the water to near scalding temperatures during the day.

 

[gmiller261]

I do not disagree

I will not live long enough to see the long term benefits, but I hope my family will.

My reason for investing in this and other alternative energies is many fold.

1) Running diesel generators even short term, every day, is environmentally unsound. This is from the use of oil, the noise and soot. Driving through POP when you come to the valley, there is, on more than one occasion so much air pollution from the ?taxis? you can barely see the sunset. Now add a large part of the populace running generators. It would down right unhealthy, everywhere.

2) The cost of DR electrical production has to at least double over the next few years. In the US some states are over $2.00 per gallon and that was at $40 a barrel, most are in the $1.90 range. For the DR to get out of the serious problems they are in today the have to ?minimize? the subsidies on energy.

3) The price of gasoline and diesel fuel will follow #2.

4) Short term I am more concerned with my daily run rate than I am in future ROI. If, and I know it is a big if, I can save my self $75.00 - $150.00 a month in energy cost (using alternative energies) on a day to day basis I feel I will be ahead of the curve and ?saving? money.

5) I think re-sale would be much easier and higher if the solution works.

6) For mostly selfish reasons I would like nothing more than to NOT have to use oil.

I do understand that the initial cost of the PV arrays is not nearly everything. Batteries will cost me $9,000.00 to get the amp-hours I want, dual inverters and accessories will be $6,000.00 and a new diesel generator another $7,000.00. All with maintenance and MTBF issues $$.

And, again, for those who would say put that kind of money in the bank and pay the energy with the interest - that is not me, save yourself the trouble of replying.

 

[Tom F.]

gmiller

Hey, I'm just trying to explain where the costs come from. I doubt whether you can get US$4/watt, retail, in the DR. Yesterday I saw a Sunwise, 75w for US$400 in Washington Heights; add the shipping costs, taxes plus other costs, and then compare to the cost in the DR. Going to Soluz, Tecsol, Solelec or Cogram, you will find similiar and sometimes better prices. If there is a problem it is a little easier getting it fixed locally.


As far installations are concerned, they used to be included in the package types. You have to remember there used to do one of these types of sales every few years. Our bread and butter are the 50-100w systems for the dominican farmer. Soluz may not have the local capacity for one of these large systems and have to fly someone done from the US to install it.

Look around and compare prices.

 

[gmiller261]

Tom, meant no disrespect

I guess capital letters and too much information always seems to mean discord.

I was just trying to answer Bolt as to why I still consider alternative energies.

Obviously not at any price.

It does bother me that there are alternatives but (IMO) greed gets in the way. Businesses should start thinking ?economy of scale?. If more people used alternative energies there would be more jobs for installation and maintenance.

And if we were to find out these solar arrays last 20-25 years, the experiment would be invaluable.

Sorry if you thought I was challenging, I did not intend that.

IMO if you could afford 5-6kW of solar array and had the space you could be off the grid even with air-conditioning. (25-30kW/day). Of course add one hell of a battery bank and inverters

 

[MrMike]

For the last 4 years, business in the DR has been more about survival than greed, I can assure you.

Trying to get a 30-40% return annually on your inventory is the only way doing business in the DR makes any sense, since the bank will give you that much with significantly less risk (and no operating costs). So when you are dealing with equipment that only sells once a year or so, 30 or 40% markup is generous on the part of the seller, 100% or more is more common.

As far as economy of scale goes, there isn't any in the DR, no government incentives to produce your own electricity, and to the contrary I have heard you can even be billed for producing your own electricity here, although I don't know the details.

I guess capital letters and too much information always seems to mean discord.

I was just trying to answer Bolt as to why I still consider alternative energies.

Obviously not at any price.

It does bother me that there are alternatives but (IMO) greed gets in the way. Businesses should start thinking ?economy of scale?. If more people used alternative energies there would be more jobs for installation and maintenance.

And if we were to find out these solar arrays last 20-25 years, the experiment would be invaluable.

Sorry if you thought I was challenging, I did not intend that.

IMO if you could afford 5-6kW of solar array and had the space you could be off the grid even with air-conditioning. (25-30kW/day). Of course add one hell of a battery bank and inverters

 

[gmiller261]

MrMike, I do not disagree

I?d have no problem with a 40% profit margin for the reasons you had given. Even at 100% the cost would be at $7-8 per watt. The $11 figure (IMO) is way too high. In terms of ?economies of scale? I would hope ?installers? could make less profit (not 100%) and sell more units and service to make up the difference.

I?ve emailed SoluzUSA and got this response.

?$12/w to $14/w is the price for a complete system including PV array, charge
controller, inverter, batteries, accessories, PV module mounting structure,
transportation, import duties, installation and warranty.?

I asked them to give me a quote for the type of solar panels, inverters and batteries I would like. I also asked that each component is broken down, e.g. transportation, import duties etc.

 

[gmiller261]

can even be billed for producing your own electricity here

Sorry missed commenting on that.

In a separate thread someone asked the question of being "off the grid" and someone said there were 'hotels' doing that.

I would hope to think that they can't legally bill you, but then again, it is the DR.