Bogieblog

Solar News for March 2023

Got my electric bill yesterday, and it was stellar. I owed $0.00 and now have $34.67 as a credit. Since my bill for February was $35.65, that pretty much pays me back.

I expect to be banking credit until next fall, so I'm pretty happy. Oh, and the west side (actually somewhat WNW) is starting to show the rockstar status that I was sure would develop once the sun angle got higher. Yesterday was the first day that each western panel produced more energy than any of the east and south panels.

It pays to know your property and stick to your guns even when the "experts" don't like it. The east and south sides have shade challenges, but those are minimal this time of year while the trees are still bare. If you remember, which you probably don't, one company would not consider placing panels on the west side (alright, I finally got him to give a quote showing 3 panels on that side) and another company basically refused to come out to give me a quote even when I pointed out the western side has exactly zero shade. The representative for the company I went with was reluctant about the west side, but to give him credit he did eventually say something to the effect of, "I wouldn't normally suggest west side placement, but in this case, maybe it would work since it has no shade. Your house isn't that far off from true west."

Even in the low sun angle months, when I expected basically zero production on the west side because of house orientation and sun angle, it has always outproduced the east side. Here is the lifetime production that shows were the lowest producing western panel (55.2) is just shy of the highest producing panel on the east side (56.7). The southern panels rule the roost of course.

Yep, I'm pretty happy about this whole thing!

Redwing Blackbirds Spring 2023

I thought these pictures were taken last week, but looking at the time stamp it was actually a week ago Friday (3/17/23). Although the large gatherings of redwing blackbirds has been here for about 2 weeks, I was unable to see most of them and this was the first time I was able to take pictures. I counted just over 61 birds in the area at that time. The first two pics are trees in the back yard, the third is from the large tree on the north side.

Nor'Easter March 2023

The northeast got slammed by a nor'easter that started late afternoon of 3/13 and ended early morning of 3/15. The power went out at 11:30 am on Tuesday and was out until at 11:15 am on Thursday (just shy of 48 hours). Then it went out again at 12:30 am Friday morning, and was restored 9:30 am the same day. So a total of 57 hours without power.

Not only was power out, but my cell phone had no phone calls or texts from 5:30 pm  Tuesday until about 4:30 pm on 3/17. That is not entirely accurate as there was one point on Wednesday that I could text my sister and let her know I was alive on Thursday (but some texts didn't send so it was a very short window). Interestingly, I still had FB and other apps, although they did run fairly slowly. However, all I really wanted to do was keep up on the town FB page in case I could offer help to others - plus keep the 71-73 people that were on my particular outage area apprised of how it was going.

The outage started at the pole in my yard, so I always knew when the line workers were there. Pic from the second outage where they had to replace the transformer (first outage had 4 trucks there - 2 big and 2 small. 2nd outage there were 8 trucks). The power company claimed that both outages were caused by tree limbs, but as you can see, there are no trees even close (they had come out 2 months ago and cut down any trees that were there). Nor were there any limbs when I went out to look prior to the workers getting there. My bet is the transformer had just reached its lifespan.

I endured the outage pretty well with a Ryobi power station that I bought last fall. It ran the P43 for about 4 cycles before batteries gave out. The house bound elderly neighbor across the street, who I help with snow clearing, groceries and picking up meds, had power throughout the ordeal (yay), so I was able to recharge the batteries when needed and keep the main floor warm. I was feeling genius for getting the power station since the 800w gas generator that I bought way back in 2014 (and never been used) would not start. I had been planning on using the gas generator for the downstairs stove and/or hot water, but that obviously didn't happen. I will say now, that I sorely missed the old water heater since it didn't need electricity to run. At the same time, even a replacement water heater (instead of combi-boiler) would have required electricity per the new codes, so it is what it is.

I ended up with 30" of snow. A person I know in the next town over (and higher in elevation) received 35" of snow and I've heard reports from others that received 40-44" of the white stuff. Before (3/12) and after (3/15) of the north side. That bank is about 4' tall in the first pic

The west side

The south and east sides

Ski areas and snowmobilers are happy anyway. Yesterday got into the 50's and somewhat windy, so there was some meltage, but today is supposed to stay near freezing. Then a gradual warm up thru the week. I'll take it since that will keep the melting slow so keep flooding down or non-existent.

Iditarod Update 3/12/2023

The biggest news is last years winner of the Iditarod (and 3rd place finisher of the 2021 race), Brent Sass of Wild and Free Mushing, has scratched from the race at the Eagle Island checkpoint. He has developed a health issue, while not debilitating specifically to him, he has deemed as affecting him enough that he would not be able to care for his team in the way that he wants them to be cared for. I follow him on FB, and that seems to be in character for him. And get this, he scratched as he was LEADING the race. Kudos to him for taking his team into consideration when it would have been so easy to continue and try for the win.

Another scratch from the race is Gregg Vitello (one of the duo from NH). He scratched at the Iditarod checkpoint for the welfare of his team. Bailey Vitello is currently 26th.

See up to date standings at the Official Iditarod site. The following snip of the current to 10 (taken 5:45 am EDT 3/12/23) is from that site.

 

A New Rise and Shine

When I moved to this house in 2013, one of the first things I bought was a coffee maker. I think I got it on sale for something like $12 and it has done a marvelous job for my needs.

I don't drink a lot of coffee but I make a pot of coffee every 4-5 days and then store the excess in the fridge. Each day I microwave the 12 ounces I drink in the  morning After pulling a not so brilliant stunt while trying to brew a pot Friday, I decided to replace it. Oh, I know I can fix the old one, I just don't want to hassle with it on an emergency basis (I want to do it on my time).

So I went online to look for an exact replacement. I did find one, with updated controls that was in stock at Targe. Although I could get it cheaper elsewhere, I had a $25 gift certificate to Target (from my boss a couple of Christmases), that would cut my cost down to $5. I put the item in my cart, then decided to let it sit there overnight to determine if I really wanted to buy a new one or would get the motivation to fix the existing machine.

So, although that strategy works well most times (I still have stuff in my amazon cart that I put there months ago - LOL), this time it backfired a bit. Because, when I woke up yesterday morning, I got to wondering if there was a machine (in stock) that I could also make a cup of tea in. A couple of times a week I make tea in the afternoon and that involves nuking some water - and microwaves use a fair amount of electricity for that small amount.

So it was back to researching and I ended up ordering a machine that was just at $100 ($75 after the gift certificate). I was smart enough to measure to make sure it would still fit between the orange bowl I use for compostables and my phone charge station. So here it is, my new coffee maker that can do a pot, or a pd, or a cup of grounds (which will work for tea also).

 

Iditarod 2023 - NH Team Competes

A New Hampshire team is in this year's Iditarod. Team Bailey (Iditarod link to bio)is from Milan NH, and is a father/son team (not counting the dogs of course) (link to local TV station article and video)

Sunny News for February 2023

Note - wrote this on Friday but apparently never published it :D

 

Got my electric bill for February 2023. Considering the last 7 days of the billing cycle my panels were snow covered, I came out pretty good. First off, my production report for the exact time frame that my electric bill is for. The solar company and electric company are off just a little from each other. But let's just assume that the 330 shown in the circle below was my total consumption.

Power company says I pulled 244 kwh while solar company says I pulled 248 kwh. Electric company says I pushed 180 kwh while solar company says I pushed 176 kwh. All in all, close enough for me.

The power company shows my net usage as 64 kwh and total charges were $35.65

So in February, a low production month (but with the sun angle better than Dec. & Jan.), nearly 64% of the bill ($22.71) was the basic costumer charge and other charges that were not the actual cost of energy consumed.

Solar company shows, total usage was 330 kwh (just so you don't have to go back to look). Last Sept, prior to the array install, I used 338 kwh and my bill was $119.62.

I didn't pay the electric company $80 in a low production month (the math comes out to $84, but I subtracted some for the 8 kwh difference). Can't complain about that.

It has snowed every day this week and have a big storm coming in tonight, so won't have any production at all for March until some time next week. Actually, not technically true; had minimal production yesterday afternoon when some panels mostly cleared and should get some today. But with the sun angle getting better every day, production should be stellar when the snow finally stops and the array clears.