** great scott ** 1.21gw

I have solar in my house for the last 5 years, and I am approaching a ‘Goal’ of 1.21GW (Gigawatts) in solar production, and am designing a plaque to Celebrate the ‘moment’


(this is a photoshop rendition, not the actual meter)

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Hmmmm, BTTF?

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YUP - you got it!

Probably best to break it to you before the plaque is done…

It’s 1.21 gigawatts.

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well… shiiiiiiii i’m that much closer :stuck_out_tongue:

Also, that meter is showing 122 megawatts. I know it’s a Photoshop, but that’s not even photoshopped to the right wrong number.

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1000kw = 1 MW <?>
1000mw = 1 GW (!)

Also, if we’re being pedantic, it’s watt-hours, not Watts.

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Watt(evah)

:stuck_out_tongue:

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Say Watt???

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Assuming 1.21GWh over 5 years, that’s 663KWh per day. Assuming 8 hours of useful sunlight per day, that requires the solar array to be outputting 83KW when the sun is shining. That’s delivering almost 700A at 120V, which is a lot.

Seems like there is at least an order of magnitude error here. Sorry. You cannot be at 1.21GWh after 5 years unless you’ve got a really, really big solar array…

But as pointed out, the meter is actually reading 122MWh, not 1.21GWh. So that’s a more reasonable 70A@120V number. You can definitely be hitting that milestone. Not quite a “Back to the Future” milestone, but a good one none the less. And you only have to keep it up for another 45 years to get to where you wanted to be today! :slight_smile:

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Hmmm… its a 12.4kw system, and I did check the math, but you may be on to something!
(i was always bad at math) :frowning: The meter is accurate… so you are saying then I have generated only 113 Megawatts ??

So it’s the Omega 13…can only go back in time 10 seconds to redeem a single mistake? (Extra points to the first person to name the movie.) :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

Galaxy quest!

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Ding, ding, ding, ding! We have a winnah! :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:

"By Grabthar’s Hammer, by the Suns of Warvan, you shall be engraved."

I guess I have a name now for my Glowforge!

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Yeah, I think I am. The meter can read a maximum of 99,999KWH. It currently reads 13,196KWH, which is 13.196MWH.

I think the power company can’t “roll back” a meter, so when it rolls over 999999, they replace it with one that hasn’t rolled over, then they take the rolled-over meter back to their meter service department and they put a “1” sticker on it to record the fact that the meter rolled over, and then it goes back out to replace someone else’s meter that’s failed or rolled over.

Power companies are slowly replacing these mechanical meters with solid-state meters so they don’t have to deal with this maintenance headache (and also, so they can read the meter remotely by driving by the home, they don’t have to get out of their truck and go physically read it).

When I had the solar system installed, I had them install a meter in my garage, so I can ‘keep’ everyone honest, the power company say’s I generated ‘x’ - I can check my meter and see if that is correct, my solar company says I generated “y” - again I can check, when the meter hit 999999 I opened it up and added the sticker :slight_smile: – made it a big event, Seems I was off by tenfold :frowning:

I’m getting a new roof soon, so I think I’ll add solar. Looking forward to it. Maybe I can lower my thermostat and not pay an arm and a leg for electricity. I’d be happy with just an arm. These tucson summers are brutal!