Has anyone got a solar system (grid tie in / net metering) that the home is heated with electric baseboard?

I want to reduce the amount of oil heat that is used in my home. $4000 per season in oil is getting outrageous.
(I am hoping that someone steps up with a lower cost bio-diesel for heating oil in the future . . . . . .)

( I.E The greedy ones in Washington. Families are freezing to death)

I am thinking of putting a system in that "runs the meter backwards" during the summer to hopefully "break even" during the winter.

Any thoughts.

I have also thought about geo-thermal also.. or a small cylinder style windmill

GABY your math is a little off.
260,000 / 350 is 743 panels.
So using your math here's the logic.

In a Iowa cold winter I'm using 6700 or 233 kWh per day
233,000 per month or $261.00
They have 200 watt panels now.
200 * 7hr of sun light = 1400 watts per day per panel

233,000 / 1400 = 166 panels @ $800.00 ($4 per watt) = $132,800
$132,800 / 261 = 42 years to pay for themselves.

If they did a fair deal at $2 per watt
66,400 / 261 = 21 years pay back

In Spring Summer and Fall I average 1400 kWh at $130 electricity per month so lets say I just worried about 9 months non winter average of 47 kWh per day.

47,000 / 1400 = 34 panels = 27,200 (@ $4 per Watt) / $130.00 = 17.5 years payback. 20 years for 9 month seasons. because you still got to get help in the winter from the electric company. They charge
All electric discount plan.
.07 for 1st 1000 kWh and
.03 for every kWh after that.

At a fair deal of $2 a watt panels it's
47,000 / 1400 = 34 panels = 13,600 (@ $2 per Watt) / $130.00 = 9 years payback. 10.5 years for 9 month cheap
seasons. because you still got to get help in the winter from the electric company.

Panels are suppose to last 25 years

Still not a great investment but if that's your dream it may be dueable someday when they offer a fair deal at $2 a watt.
I think that 30 panels would fit on my house and my back roof faces south.

If the hours of sun light change per day the math will change.
But there will also be cloudy days.

powered by Yahoo Answers

Tweet This Post

How will America cope with $250 a barrel oil costs? What will be the price at the pump? What will be the costs of heating oil and natural gas which will surely follow with cost increases? Can it be possible for Americans to pay over $ 8.00 a gallon and how will that directly effect the economy and those who are unable to afford those increases? What will become of America under these conditions? Can America as we know it now withstand such high-prices and continue to exsist without having a massive crime-wave of those trying to have a basic-standard of living to sustain their lives, while facing hunger & homelessness? What is the answer to out of control energy costs that seem to have no solutions anywhere in the near future? Will President Bush be able to do anything before leaving office or has he already been rendered helpless? Will the U.S. Congress address this vital National Security issue or has the U.S. Congress surrendered our security? What are the answers?

Thirty days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the US began churning out tanks, planes, guns and munitions of biblical proportions. We went from a military of under 100,000 to several millions in under a year….trained and ready to fight. We went from a job short economy of millions of poor people to a job rich environment that cried out for workers. The point here is that we're Americans, and Americans can do ANYTHING they set their minds to do. Expensive oil? So what? We can do what Brazil does and run our transportation on alcohol. We can institute rationing if that's what it takes. We can begin to build fuel sipping vehicals within 30 days, just as we began to build trucks and jeeps in that time frame in WW2. We can rebuild our passenger rail service in 60 days. We can put ten thousand hybrid buses on the streets of our cities….all it takes is to knock off the whining, accept the reality of the situation and demand leadership from 'our' government. In WW2 everyone and their brother planted Victory Gardens….nobody got fat, but nobody went hungry either. Within 30 days we could be building and installing as much solar and wind power as needed to keep the wheels on the road and the lights on. Sure, we may have to turn off a lot of our excess lighting, but in WW2 we had legally enforced blackouts….nobody complained because Americans don't complain….they turn to and get the damned job done. For me, this is a wake up call for the United States and an opportunity for a new industrial revolution. If the United States can't turn on a dime and do what has to be done then we're not the United States we were. $250.00 a barrel oil is a problem, but not a problem we can't get over, go under or go around. Yes WE Can! No kiddin'!

powered by Yahoo Answers

Tweet This Post

This being an election year, what do you believe will happen within America this year when it has been predicted a barrel of oil will sell for over $200 by July 4, 2008 & that it will be over $6 to $7 dollars a gallon in America at the pump? Diesel fuel will be over $8 & home heating oil will go to over $9 a gallon next winter? Saudi Arabia says, " OPEC will sell oil at whatever price it brings on the market, whether it is $80.00 a barrel or $1000 dollars a barrel!" America & Americans need to learn a lesson, they are no more special than any other nation where oil is a lot more costly. America needs to learn how to better conserve oil & stop being such "Oil consuming hogs"! This was stated on Arab TV, along with footage of George W. Bush visiting Saudi Arabia in an attempt to get them to produce more oil & bring the costs down to which the Saudi's told Bush…we will not increase production, America must learn to live within its means as oil may go over $200 a barrel in the future!

"Speculation" indeed. Who's doing the speculating? Where do you get this news? FOX? CNN? Who owns FOX and CNN? Do you realize that commodity speculation (i.e. gambling) drives the price of oil up independently of actual supply and demand?

Speculators in vital commodities are leaches. They perform no productive service to humanity, and in fact by driving up the prices of vital commodfities, to no other purpose than to make money, they do YOU harm.

Commodities speculation should be outlawed. In a truly free market, it would not exist, except maybe in back-room bookie dens.

powered by Yahoo Answers

Tweet This Post

Canadian Stocks – Each day at this time Stephen Whiteside of theuptrend.com takes a look at the major trend changes in the Canadian stock market. This analysis includes gold, crude oil, the Canadian dollar, and the US dollar. For more information please visit
www.theuptrend.com/energy/canadian-energy-stocks.html

Duration : 7 min 51 sec

Read the rest of this entry »

Tweet This Post

Technorati Tags: canadian

I've looked through other questions about where oil "comes from" (I didn't like the "middle east" as an answer). But another explains about the prehistoric animals/plants/etc under enough heat/pressure eventually turn into the 'hydrocarbon' we generically call _Oil_.

Does the garbage we've been burying for the last few decades in big repositories we call 'Garbage Dumps' fill that place that the animals/plants/etc did way-back?

The Earths surface was much more active millions of years ago than it is today, will this have an effect on the amount of time it would take? (since we aren't covering those dumps with more than the EPA (or whoever) says is the minimum amount of dirt I suspect we won't get the huge amounts of pressure that a shifting land mass would provide. How long does it take to turn from rotting biomass into oil?

I'm afraid no… We will not be able to get oil from garbage dumps ever (besides what we leave in there as "garbage"), but as the bio matter degrades and decomposes, the garbage does create methane gas (natural gas like we use to heat homes and run power plants). Oil actually comes from decayed oceanic plant matter mostly. It dies, falls down to the bottom of the ocean, and in the right conditions, is preserved. With time, the right temperatures and pressures, and with a proper reservoir, it becomes free oil. One thing about garbage dumps though. As steel, aluminum, and other metals become more scarce, I fully expect us to one day "mine" our garbage for resources we foolishly throw away today.

powered by Yahoo Answers

Tweet This Post

Never mind worrying about birth certificates that will have to be proven before either is sworn in anyway, but the important stuff like candidates stepping up with their plan to deal with this home heating oil price surge and gas price surge where is that info published we really need to focus on whats important to ALL our futures, I have no idea how I am going to pay 1000 per month for 200 gallons of home heating oil come winter….lets hear it people where is the answer to that question?

It's going to take several presidents to fix the mess either Obama or McCAin will inherit. And it is an inherited problem, please remember that. Don't expect any real relief anytime soon. It may take decades. Be realistic on this.

The environmentalists have got to be defeated first. They are the powerhouse lobby that has caused our leaders to not allow domestic drilling. We must begin our own drilling here at home. We must build more refineries & dramatically upgrade those that exist.

If we don't drill here and not build & overhaul refineries, then no President can ever fix the problem, or at least get things under control.

But still don't expect substantially lower prices when/if that happens. Inflation is what it is. It won't be cheap labor doing the work. It will be skilled & highly paid people.

powered by Yahoo Answers

Tweet This Post