Home Office

Stu · Joined: 28 Jul 2009 Posts: 1

Hi there fellow Energy Producers/Energy Savers. We are moving into a brand new house which already has solar hot water panels and I hope to add Solar PV too.

My question is: how do I work out whether it's feasible or even desirable to stay on grid or try to get off grid for my home office?

I work from home currently in my garden office a re-purposed pre-cast concrete structure. I wanted to put an office in the garden in the new house, probably a wooden built structure (mainly CLS and OSB) but maybe take it off grid. We're moving to an "Eco-town" where all new houses have to have at least 10% on site generation of their energy needs so any planning permission should be straightforward, however the wind map tells me that there's a wind speed average of of 4.6, too slow for effective on site wind turbine, however Solar PV would work well in the position.

My equipment is:
2 Laptops
1 2Kw DeLonghi electric oil heater
1 Inkjet Printer
1 scanner (occasional use
4 external back up Hard drives
26" TV (CRT)
Play Station 3
Some lighting (2 low energy bulbs of course)
A DECT phone and answering machine
Midi Music system (although I don't mind losing this entirely)
I also charge up my mobile, my video camera and use a shredder (light home us one) from time to time.
Plus use a hoover once a month but would be willing to use an extension from the house.

I usually spend most days on one laptop, printing the odd email, backing up to hard drives (which I am willing to reduce the number of but increaser the size to a big 2Tb and put in the home on the network and back up over the wifi) My current office is quite well insulated but isn't perfect (the new one will be much better), it does have double glazing as will the new one. I would be willing to explore alternative heat sources as I usually have the heater set to the frost setting, boost it when I get in in the morning and then leave it on the lowest setting all day on cold days in the winter, during the summer maybe just a quick blast to take the edge of first thing.

So how do I work out my energy needs and whether it's actually more desirable to put in a ring main to the new building, and put the Solar PV on the roof of the house and just benefit from the overall reduction?

Help and advice is gratefully received as I am new to this but my move to a new house is the kick start I need!

RichardKB · Joined: 08 Oct 2009 Posts: 3 Location: Cheltenham

Unless you spent an absolute fortune on solar PV you would not be able to produce enough power to run the heater let alone the rest of it.

2KW PV system is going to be more that £10k and will produce this value best assuming correct solar irradiance and no losses, in the winter you will be lucky to produce 10% output on overcast days.

So in short use Solar PV but go grid tied so you always have power.

Rich