My Solar Farm, Its looking less and less likely

**The Fresh Prince** · 06-05-2009, 03:50 AM

I had a plan to start construction of a small solar farm on a 12 rai plot of land that I have in Phitsanoloke. I had a NASA site survey done on the place and it all looked promising. I met with an expert today and his opinion was that you need to combine sun and wind power to get the desired results.

With sun only your looking at a 10 year r.o.i but if you combine it with wind you may be able to reduce that to 5 years return on investment which is obviously a better option. Threre's no chance of hydro as there is no water going through the land.

Are there any Teak Doreres here who are in the same game?

From my chat today it sounds like the government has a 40 kw minium if you want to sell back to the grid and they'll buy back for 11bt a unit which also seems odd. I'm looking at making a 75kw operation and maybe combining air and sun to give me a 24 hour output.

Does any one have any accurate figures on what the current rate is that the goverment will pay back?

There is a second phase (charity based) to the project that I will reveal later if I get a few answers on here.

**nedwalk** · 06-05-2009, 05:42 AM

i,ve entered the solar game recently too, unless you are in a high wind area, wind generators arn,t going to be much chop, i got a bit of land also [here in ozzie], they are/were giveing fairly generous rebates for installation on grid systems, this may change in the next budget,and will defenitaly do so june 30, at the moment the export tariff is 44 cents a kw here, we are currently installing 6x175kw systems as entry level systems for domestics, at home i have a 3kw system and are currently running at 1.5 kw till i can afford more panels. i,d like to fill a 2acre plot, but we have to wait until the govt puts us over to gross metering, a little pension plan i hope.
good luck with it all anyway

**dirtydog** · 06-05-2009, 07:16 AM

On one of waynes threads there are a load of links about solar power, the Wayne goes upcountry thread, I went through the prices and it looked like solar would cost more than the house to build in Thailand, I then started checking through all the small solar panels, I think with the prices of electric in Thailand it would be 100 years ROI

**hillbilly** · 06-05-2009, 07:39 AM

DD is right. I originally looked into solar/wind power up in P-lok at out resort. By the time I got through jacking around with EGAT, it wasn't worth it.

**The Fresh Prince** · 06-05-2009, 08:20 AM

Originally Posted by nedwalk

unless you are in a high wind area,

The guy I met with yesterday said that you only need between 8-12 meters per second to have the perfect amount of wind and that any more than that and the machines shut down (hang). I've been on the NASA site again but cant find the bit that gives you a wind calculation.

**DrAndy** · 06-05-2009, 02:33 PM

The point is, do you have any wind at all!

and solar panels are stupidly expensive, making the return being 100 years or more

**Mr Brown** · 07-05-2009, 01:08 PM

Sure this ain't one big scam FP?

**Gerbil** · 07-05-2009, 02:00 PM

24 hr security would be critical (and more along the lines of bank security than some guy asleep in a shed). That's going to add to operating costs a lot.

The buggers steal my sodding phone cables, I can just imagine how quick all the solar panels would be nicked if unguarded.

**good2bhappy** · 07-05-2009, 02:02 PM

solar is for hobby farmers, who have too much cash

**Mr Brown** · 07-05-2009, 02:06 PM

FP's estimated R o I doesn't add up to me. I've heard of scams regarding this - FP are you sure you haven't been approached by a scammer?

**The Fresh Prince** · 07-05-2009, 02:30 PM

I took the information that I got from the australian company and went to see an expert in Thailand who could explain to me the calculations and who would be able to tell me if its viable or not. It was following my conversation with him I started the thread.

Basically if you produce the minimum 40kw that the government requires you will make about 2000bt a day, which is bugger all really.

**Happyman** · 07-05-2009, 03:26 PM

I was involved in an interesting combination solar wind powered installation built by an Israeli University in the Sinai desert during the 60's.
Don't know if it was ever commercially successful but I havn't heard or seen anything about it since.

Probably only of academic interest to this thread but I thought it was a clever approach.
If you are interested - read on !

It was installed in a small farming research station and only used to run a water pump and charge batteries for the lights at night .

Basically it was a fibreglass chimney - shaped something like a power station cooling tower - sort of 'milk churn shape' about 30 ft high and 20ft dia at the bottom- the narrow bit was about 5 ft dia .
This was mounted on legs with the base about 40 ft from the ground.

From the base there was a heavy semi transparent plastic skirt that stretched to about 200 yards all round and was only about 4ft off the ground at the perimeter.
In the narrowest part of the 'chimney ' was a horizontal wind turbine about 5 kw output if I remember correctly .

It worked by the sun heating up the air under the 'tent' and this air rising up inside the roof sloping upwards towards the 'chimney' and escaping out of it turned the turbine.
The semi-shaded area under the tent was used to grow lettuce and strawberries !
Only saw it running once so never knew how it all ended up but seemed to work well that one time.
( Was working for a design consultancy at the time and we did the drawings for the chimney and went out for the commissioning )

Totally irrelevant to this thread but there is "more than one way to skin a cat !"

**mrsquirrel** · 07-05-2009, 04:03 PM

There is a solar research center at pitsanalok. At the university there or near to it.

Go speak to them. CERN or something they were called.

**The Fresh Prince** · 07-05-2009, 04:49 PM

Will do, cheers

**nedwalk** · 07-05-2009, 04:56 PM

Originally Posted by Happyman

Totally irrelevant to this thread but there is "more than one way to skin a cat !"

not at all, really interesting, would be curious to see if it was still in operation today and what improvements if any have been made

**Nawty** · 02-10-2009, 08:59 AM

How much was it going to cost to setup the 40kw required ??

The buy back amount seems odd...how much do they sell it for, thought a lot less than that.

There is a solar factory here in KY.....should call in and have a look and ask some questions one day, it is next to my kids school and has an interesting 'park' area where they have setup examples of all there solar stuff in a working environment of sorts.

**The Fresh Prince** · 02-10-2009, 12:22 PM

I think it was $120,000 but I'll have to check my records when I get to the office.

**baldrick** · 02-10-2009, 05:29 PM

Originally Posted by nedwalk

not at all, really interesting, would be curious to see if it was still in operation today and what improvements if any have been made

was plans to build a big one in Mildura - well I though it was Mildura , but the wiki article names elsewhere

Solar updraft tower - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

**Nawty** · 03-10-2009, 10:59 AM

Originally Posted by The Fresh Prince

I think it was $120,000 but I'll have to check my records when I get to the office.

Thats 5 and a half years not factoring in any repairs, replacements.

Not as bad as i thought it would be, but the buyback figure does not sound right.

**More Volts Igor** · 03-10-2009, 05:31 PM

Our friends at Boondee Labs (of Ghost Repeller fame) will sell you a 16-20kW solar tower for 45,000 Baht.

Solar tower energy

Bet it works as well as the Ghost Repeller

They also do a verticle (sic) axis wind turbine (of unknown output) and a hypnosis device to drive customers into your shop

**wefearourdespot** · 03-10-2009, 06:46 PM

The Stock Exchange of Thailand : Companies/Securities in Focus share price at 2005 end 8.95 baht , share price now 1.26 baht

**forreachingme** · 03-10-2009, 07:43 PM

There is a fair each year in Thailand about all those involved with those alternative energies...

2 to 5 June 2010 the next in Bitec BangNa

ENTECH

www.thai-exhibition.com/entech

**The Fresh Prince** · 03-10-2009, 08:37 PM

Cheers, will try to check it out.

**Takeovers** · 03-10-2009, 10:55 PM

The concept of solar towers has been floated for decades. One bonus of those woud be that they continue to produce power after sundown from the heated ground. But I had the impression that they need really big structures to be effective.

A small pilot project was running with

50kW Peak power
240m diameter
10m diameter of tower
195m height of tower

Link to german language site

built in spain.

**Nawty** · 04-10-2009, 03:22 PM

eyesore pops to mind

Thread: My Solar Farm, Its looking less and less likely

Thread Tools

Display

My Solar Farm, Its looking less and less likely

Solar Energy:a real bargain !

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

Posting Permissions