How much solar power do I need?
Solar PV installations are becoming more and more important as South Africans attempt to safeguard their homes against Eskom’s increasing tariff hikes and their mismanagement of our national power plants.
The best and easiest way to work out how much solar power you require is to consult with a Solar specialist or to use a free solar calculator!
EVALUATE YOUR ENERGY REQUIREMENTS
Add up the power consumption of all the electrical devices in your house or place of work to work out how much energy you use per day in kilowatt-hours (kWh). Although simple to execute, it takes a little time.
List all of the appliances you have that utilise power, such as the wifi router, lights, TV, and refrigerator. Calculate your daily power usage for each device by multiplying the wattage rating required by the usage hours.
DETERMINE YOUR SUNLIGHT HOURS
The amount of energy you can expect to produce is directly impacted by the peak sunlight hours of your location.
Multiply your hourly usage by 1,000 in order to convert your hourly power requirement to watts. Divide your average hourly wattage requirement by your daily peak sunlight hours. This equals the total amount of energy you need each solar panel to generate.
CALCULATE THE NUMBER OF SOLAR PV PANELS YOU REQUIRE
Photovoltaic (PV) solar panels come in wattages ranging from about 150 watts to 370 watts per panel, depending on the panel size and efficiency in generating power.
That is a very big variant, it is therefore very difficult to create an accurate calculation on how many panels you need and which panels you will need.
That being said, you can calculate a rough estimate which you can investigate further by contacting a solar specialist.
To figure out how many solar panels you need, divide your home’s hourly wattage requirement by the solar panels’ wattage to calculate the total number of panels you need.
