I have a 100 W rigid solar panel including a charge controller that I currently only use for camping to charge batteries (also useful in an emergency at home). It strikes me as a waste that I could be generating more clean energy with equipment that I already have, but I don’t have anything in mind to use this energy for.
Obviously I could try to tie it into my home to run more of my household on solar, or buy more/bigger batteries to charge, but with 100 W of generation, it’s probably not worth it without a significantly increased investment.
I tried searching around online, and I found plenty of discussion for what to do with a whole house that generates excess capacity (mainly sell to the grid), but nothing really on what to do with small scale DC generation.
Anyone here have thoughts?
Awesome effort! If not done already, you may want to look into venting that outside box. I believe there are examples of the out gassing of enclosed lead-acid batteries causing corrosion of nearby metals. Hilarity ensued.
It doesn’t exist anymore, but yeah, good call. I never replaced it once the batteries finally gave out, and I moved less than a year later.
It did have vents on the sides for airflow, but that was more of a consideration for heat build up and keeping the controller from cooking in the summer. It was also less a “box” and more like a small doghouse (including shingles lol). I atually gave it to a neighbor after I was done with it; they cut a hole in the door and used it as a cat house.