DocAndersen
There are many ways to create power. The easy one is the sun or solar power. There are however some other ways. The concept is called Micro-Grid, although in fairness I am stretching the term a little. Instead, let’s call it a personal micro-grid. A Micro-grid is a self-contained power generation and consumption system. A solar array on your food that is during the day the only power your house consumes is a micro-grid. Not a resilient micro-grid such as what power companies, governments, and others are considering. Rather a simple and easy personal micro-grid. You can go even further however down the path and move into that space of personal power generation. All of us have devices we use. Those devices require power.
Generating on the fly power can be a lifesaver. Personal power production is an interesting application of that Micro-grid. For the sake of this discussion today we are going to focus on the three formats of personal power production. The first is wind power generation. The second is solar power generation and then finally similar to wind is water power generation. In the wind and water generation movement is a requirement. Either the wind has to be blowing, or the water has to be moving to generate power. For solar, you have to be outdoors, or near a window. That means I can’t generate power in my home office, or my work office because I don’t have a window in either location.
The important thing about creating a personal micro-grid is to understand what you are charging. For example, if you are planning on charging or using and how much power it requires. If we are talking a cellular phone or tablet most solar, wind or water turbines can easily support charging the device. They normally present their information as we generate enough power to charge your cell phone 2, 3 or more times. Normally you want to make sure that all the energy captured is moved to a battery. The advantage of doing that makes your Micro-Grid able to work online or offline. The reality of a battery, of course, makes the device much heavier. But weight is worth it when you are at 2%, and urgently need to make a call!
In the future, the concept of personal Micro-Grid will fit nicely into the ever-expanding reach of Transactive Energy (TE). TE is the future!
I think it’s a great idea to take advantage of existing technology to become more personal. This technology will definitely grow and will be very user-friendly in the future.
Micro-Grids are the first step towards the concept of Transactive Energy. At some point, the power company will be able to accept your solar overage (you produce more than you consume) today that is often power that is lost. Eventually, they will be able to use it locally (your neighbor) at that point they will give you power credit for future use!
I think the power company is overwhelmed enough to meet the needs of the ever-increasing, and the concept of Transactive Energy greatly potential for the needs of today’s society and in the future.
we really need to rethink the way we consume power. Interesting developments along this front in Deutschland…
Germany today has the largest home solar implementation in the world. Impressive and amazing!
Doubly impressive considering how far north of the equator they are…
It really is. They and Holland have found the one fatal flaw of commuters and solar, however. Adding electric cars to the mix causes a spike around 7 pm or so. As your solar system is slowing reducing production everyone plugs their cars in and pulls power from the grid.
Hopefully this can be addressed with a storage offset
Great information about this most valuable topic.
Thanks. As solar power catches on in the world for homeowners more and more people will be considering how to I manage my power!
Funny you wrote about charging and power. My charger on my Mac went out yesterday. I just wrote about it. I did not have a back up so my time here is limited for now.
Sorry to hear that – power cables have a habit of going bad when you need them most!