Small, “balcony solar” units hold particular appeal for renters who cannot install rooftop panels and could take portable units with them should they move.
Small, “balcony solar” units hold particular appeal for renters who cannot install rooftop panels and could take portable units with them should they move.
For context, I’ve got experience with midsized solar and currently have a balcony-esque 500w array mounted for the correct angle for my latitude. My panels are free but the battery and inverter were about $600. I save 10-15 cents a day in summer. That’s a ridiculously long payback and it doesn’t give me enough for a backup. If I had 2-3kw solar it would be different, spreading the inverter cost more thinly.
It depends what your consumption is I suppose. If I am able to generate 20% of my consumption that’s a help, maybe I’m wrong, I feel the 500kw balcony vertical install won’t cover 20% of a household.
I’m really wondering what your situation is then. That sounds like a worst-case scenario. Do you have a tree in front of your panels? Are you only running electrical equipment at night? 10-15 cents a day in summer either means your electricity is damn cheap, the panels don’t generate much for whatever reason, or you are not using it when it is being generated.
Also for 500 Watt peak a battery does not make much sense, if at all it should be a small battery to buffer peak demand (the refrigerator compressor turning on or other similar high-power short duration load, but that’s definitely not worth it unless you are trying to go off-grid, but that’s a completely different topic.). That’s obviously gonna decrease your ROI.
But just straight up saying that you doubt whether balcony solar is making its money back is detrimental to the whole cause, especially since there are enough people out there using it that are easily getting their money’s worth.
That depends on your household, but again - since you were emphasizing ROI - the balcony solar not being able to cover a lot of your consumption means their ROI is better! This does not mean, that one shouldn’t install bigger systems, I’m just trying to convince you, that balcony solar does have a very reasonable ROI in most cases.