UV Index

Another glorious day despite the very early morning clouds lingering from last night's storm. I think we have had thunderstorms every night & tonight another one is due but will bring two or three days of unsettled weather before Germany has forecast 35-38°C temperatures next week.

Weather or rather health warnings been popping up on the mobile since yesterday with extreme UV levels. So as a frail, aged person, I took their advice & stayed indoors & did some cooking & lots of social networking.

Some may remember that back in 2017, we had a new roof on the house & at the same time installed PV units with a battery storage system. It has now been "live" on the grid for 2 years and one week.

Apparently, we have saved the planet 14 tons of CO², generated 70% of our own electricity & sold enough excess (at a ridiculously low price) for 3 family houses. All this was promised us by the various salesmen back then but while I believed it could help reduce bills, I had no idea it would really achieve the performance forecasts. It has turned out even better after we tinkered with our personal lifestyle and indeed improved the quality. We now use more electricity than before & the CO² saving is much higher as we no longer use fossil (wood) heating for our hot water for at least 6 months a year.

Would encourage everyone to get a quote . Technology is now so different to the days when you needed a south facing Saharan hilltop villa. Our house is dreadfully placed for that, in a hollow, surrounded by huge trees & a forest and the roofline runs south/north i.e the panels face east & west.

The Blip is of today's performance, I had wanted to do this on 21st June, longest day but forecast is mixed.

The top graph shows our consumption in green when we are running directly off the PV & the orange from the battery. The 10:00 am peak is the 3 kWh electric immersion heater kicking in to heat 300-litre water tank & which is intelligently controlled.

The bottom graph shows the PV generation in green, the battery recharging itself in orange from about 7:00am and is full by the time the immersion heater is given permission to kick in at 10:00am. From there on, all the surplus in yellow goes to the grid.

The aim is to try & generate as much as possible spread over the whole day rather than total kWh. We have a nominal 10kWh total on the panels (ie what they would generate at midday if all facing the sun directly) & although we are legally bound to not generate more than 70% at at one moment, (too much PV generation in Germany), the split east/west  achieves that without the system turning down the flow. The battery is also nominal 10 kWh.

Naturally, in winter the system can't cope with the consumption although cold weather, without a foot of snow on the panels, is actually much more efficient at converting sun/light to electricity.

Every bit counts and while I don't pretend I am a green angel, if everyone did a little we could do a lot. I am actually concerned that the green movement which I generally support, may overcook matters with demanding heavy cuts into people's lifestyles which will put "ordinary" people off.

Tomorrow holiday here in Bavaria & the other catholic dominated States. She/he up there, won't be rewarding us according to the forecast & so I won't be in the pool which is now at 29°C are dangerously close to the 30°C mark that requires me to take a dip.