Not Quite the Apollo 13 Rescue, but Some of the Same Ideas! David E. Clark & Associates And Sally M. Woliver & Associates One home, two businesses and three outbuildings. 10 years to sustainability in 28 slides.

“Earth receives more energy from the sun in one hour than the entire human race consumes in a whole year”. Ben Bova, Naples Daily News, 7/28/2013 So what did we do about it? How do you make a 30 year old, 3000 square foot+ space energy efficient?

First Goal: Efficiency Our first priority was to reduce power usage, by increasing the overall efficiency of our home and businesses. We did this by:  changing out incandescent bulbs. Incandescent bulbs are 10% efficient at producing light. The waste heat that they produce (the other 90% of the power that they use) must be removed by air-conditioning.  replacing compact florescent (80 % efficient) with LED bulbs when they became more affordable (90% efficient or better).  adding a whole house fan for summer evening and spring or fall cooling (much more efficient than AC).  adding better insulation, thank you Mayor Sorey!  replacing some older appliances with newer, more energy efficient units.  adding switched power strips to instant on equipment (computers, TVs, etc. )adding timers and motion sensing switches on lights and other equipment.  Adding smart thermostats to the heating and air conditioning.

First, power, water and light. Unlike the solar panels, the windmill can produce power during a storm. Our first panels, placed on top of our pump-house and office roof, were installed in early 2004.

Controlling Power: The old and the new. Current Events! Some of the 16 storage batteries.

Lightning Protection Dark Days? No problem! Water you waiting for? Upgrades

We added a whole house fan, which translated to less work for the Air Conditioning. AC not needed in winter months. Here’s what we did to make the house and businesses more efficient:

Next, lights! From this…80% efficient To this…90%+ efficient!

To further reduce energy consumption, we added a more efficient air conditioner and icynene insulation.

Our “high-tech” solution to drying clothes. Every hour we ran our electric dryer, it added two dollars to our electrical bill even though it is an energy star appliance!

2012 and 2013 Solar Projects

Now we’re in hot water! In late 2012, we added a solar hot water heater. It effectively reduced our utility bill by 10% and parboiled us too!

2013: Power First! First, the panels or “arrays” harvest the sun’s energy.

How Solar Power Works! The suns emits energy in the electromagnetic spectrum that our eyes “see” as light. This energy can produce electricity when striking certain chemical elements. Solar panels may use one or many different types of elements or compounds to produce electricity. Monocrystalline panels, used in our array, use one element: silicon.

Solar Cells Each of our panels is made up of a number of solar cells, connected in an “array”. The cells produce power when the radiation from the sun causes photons in the silicon to knock electrons out of their orbital path around the nucleus. The electrons are collected to produce power. Each cell produces a maximum of 4.5 watts.

AC / DC The power collected by the arrays then goes through an inverter. The inverter changes the power from DC (direct current) to AC (alternating current).

Last, But Not Least The AC from the inverters is matched to the same voltage and frequency as the power used by Florida Power and Light, and it’s combined here. This now usable sun power is sent on the to the house where it is used directly, or sold to FPL.

The following slides show the process it took to complete the solar field.

The project supervisor… Each panel has it’s own “smart” invertor. The invertors can call for warranty support on their own whenever a problem is detected.

The 42 panels were mounted on the ground for two important reasons: available roof space faced the wrong direction, & ground mounting reduced the possibility of wind damage.

Between the efforts of Advanced Solar & Spa and Florida Power and Light, our total time without power during the installation: under 10 minutes.

The bottom line: our latest bill was $71.65 down from an average of $ per month.

A Powerful Choice…

The Goal: To produce 100 percent of the energy we use. Currently we are 66% to 75% there, depending on weather. Next Steps: o Adding evaporative cooler shroud around our existing Air Conditioning units for a 20 – 30 percent efficiency boost. o Convert our backup generator to run on propane and/or natural gas produced by an on site digester. o Cooking more efficiently (like maybe eating out more!). This is a work in process…

Fin