No laughing here about AC! We only use the best SEER mini-splits for offgrid. Even large homes can be done this way with separate split units. I never use a multizone split as they are down the list energy wise from single 1 ton/12000 btu. Look for 30 SEER. Only the best models from LG, Fugitsu, Mitsu and a few others. Stay away from the cheaper models from any of these makes.
Most grid people in NA think that you need to cool down a home in 15 minutes or so. Hence 5 ton. Offgrid, in many places, we just cool from 7am to 7pm this time of year off the sun. We never let the house get hot. Because there are no ducts, we gain 30% with a split. Doing this since 2007 when Sanyo hired me to test for offgrid. Game changer! Reliving this again during recent wildfire seasons and smoke. I have done this in the tropics also. Even Florida.....You need a big array of 6KW or more or virtual/active track to keep off the battery. Even up here last week when it was 100f/80f, we ran 75 F and 78 at night 24/7 on a 200AH LFP battery, in a 1800 square foot house. You just have to scale it for larger houses. People just do not believe this. If you had a Schneider gateway you could watch it here. We can make 50+ KWH here if we need to but seldom do. That power use to be for winter and not needing a genset, but the last 5 years, it is needed during wildfire smoke cutting into available cooling power. I would say about 100 of my clients do this. Less is much more offgrid! The thought of building a power system to support a 5 ton ducted really is a off the mark these days, I think. Good Luck William. Take a drive up the park and see us! Fully vaccinated here! Dave Angelini Offgrid Solar "we go where powerlines don't" http://members.sti.net/offgridsolar/ [1] e-mail [email protected] [2] text 209 813 0060 On Wed, 23 Jun 2021 09:30:28 -0700, William Miller wrote: Friends: In the old days when a client suggested they might want to run air conditioning equipment on an off-grid system we would just laugh. Now I find I get that request more frequently and clients are willing to pay to acquire enough system capacity to run AC equipment. This means I need to size off-grid installations appropriately for the loads. I have a job pending with a 5 ton AC unit. I cannot find real-life energy specs. I do have a new, fairly efficient 3 ton unit at my grid-connected home and I do have energy monitoring. On a real hot day recently we used a little less than 11kWh in this unit. The max power draw was about 2.5 kW. Here are my questions: 1. Can I linearly extrapolate my usage to a 5 ton unit? 2. Do any of you have real-life, measured energy data on modern AC condenser units that you would be willing to share? Thanks in advance! William Miller Miller Solar 17395 Oak Road, Atascadero, CA 93422 805-438-5600 www.millersolar.com [3] CA Lic. 773985 Links: ------ [1] http://members.sti.net/offgridsolar/ [2] mailto:[email protected] [3] http://www.millersolar.com/
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