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Posted by Ron Rosenfeld on August 18, 2008, 4:32 pm
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On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 12:34:17 -0700 (PDT), kazkotx@gmail.com wrote:
>Hey folks. I think we're about to be introduced to peak demand
>pricing here in Texas along with a general rate hike. I run a small
>personal data center at home since we have fiber here with unlimited
>bandwidth. I use a good amount of power. I have been using my watt
>meter lately to record and trend devices and have made many power
>saving advances because of it, but nonetheless, I use power. We also
>have poor line power here so during rainstorms the power can be off
>for hours. I need a backup genset because of that, but Id also like
>to consider using it to produce my own power at peak rate times from
>natural gas.
>
>So I have some questions:
>
>1. How do I go about investigating and calculating the rate of
>consumption of natural gas on a genset that I havent bought yet and
>then calculate the cost of operation per hour to compare to line
>rates?
>
Good generators will have specifications from which this can be calculated.
>2. Is there a configuration I can use in place of an automatic
>transfer switch so that I can actually feed power back to the grid or
>at least reverse my meter if my genset isnt being fully utilized? I
>like the idea of staying connected to the grid to handle surge loads
>and such and also to accept excess power. How do these things sync
>up? I assume this is much the same type of setup one would need if
>generating excess solar or wind energy at home which of course I am
>interested in as well.
Power companies are only required to do this with RE sources.
>
>3. What is a good generator and what is a bad generator for this
>purpose? I assume I dont want a typical 3600rpm air cooled home
>backup system since I plan on running it a lot. I probably want a
>larger liquid cooled "brand name" system, probably a surplus unit from
>a hospital or such, and I want to oversize it somewhat for my load.
1800 rpm / liquid cooled. Consider diesel if you are going to be running
more than a few hundred hours per year. Look for something that is rated
to provide "Prime Power".
>
>4. When you have a genset that is single phase 240v to hook up to a
>typical split phase house to use as a whole house system, is it
>assumed that the generator has a center tap coil lead for neutral?
>Nobody ever discusses neutral on generators.
There are some issues with making sure it is properly bonded to your house
ground, but any licensed electrician should know how to hook this up, and
the generator people should check things out and do the intial startup.
>
>5. If I can manage to get some solar and wind systems installed here
>in the future, can I leverage them along with my generator to save
>money? ie: will those renewable system put out their power for me and
>then the genset can make up any remaining load need while conserving
>fuel as much as possible. Or do gensets typically run full throttle
>and suck the same amount of gas regardless of the load.
>
>
>Hopefully I made my desires clear. Minimally it will be a genset with
>a transfer switch to cover my line outages. Preferred would be a
>genset that can work with line power somehow and also allow the
>addition of future power generation devices with minimal effort.
It's hard to tell what would be best for you without knowing more.
If you can tolerate the short power outage between grid failure and
generator start, then a transfer switch and generator would be the way to
start.
If you require good power 24/7/365, and are serious about adding PV or wind
in the future, then consider an inverter and a battery bank at least
sufficient to tide you over until the generator starts. The inverter can
manage, automatically, the switch over to the generator; starting and
exercising the generator, charging the batteries (from either the grid or
generator), feeding the grid if it is legal in your area. When you add
solar and wind sources, you may want to change your battery bank to
something larger, but that would be down the line. The solar and wind
sources would be used to charge the battery bank, and would have
appropriate controllers on those systems.
--ron
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