Green without going new age or supertech

[AndyD]

By hand in 3 days with 3 labourers to assist. You're right, it's very deep, I used all our scaffold planks and then some for shuttering the sides of the hole. It's slow going, once you hit water you're pulling up mud and does make a mess of the garden with a surprisingly large pile of earth.

Before I started I asked around the neighbours and a couple of irrigation installers, the consensus was that there was water at between 3 and 4 meters so I never intended to go that deep. We only first saw water at nearly 6 meters. It was one of those jobs that with hindsight I probably wouldn't do again in a hurry.

[desA]

Hire labour & tie a rope around their ankle.

[tec0]

Honestly... Well I will just bite my tongue for now... Let’s just say if you don’t know where to start digging then on its own you may have some really horrible consequences like hitting a pipe.

Also 8m deep??? I cannot imagine you not hitting rock at that point. I strongly recommend you talk to the professionals. Find out where there IS pipes and more importantly how deep the water is before you find yourself a dinosaur.

[desA]

This could be a little off-topic, but, it is interesting nevertheless.

[SilverNodashi]

how about motion sensors in every room, which switch the lights on only when there's motion, and some of those rotating extractor fans for the heat?

[Dave A]

I'm reading this thread for the first time - been really snowed under
What a great topic! And pretty close to my heart. I don't have to go far to find some serious independance from municipal supplies - my parents have to fend for themselves for water and electricity. They do everything with solar power, even powering the borehole - which on a technical note is a single stage pump pushing a 32 metre head to the holding tank. It amazes me how much grunt you can get out of a solar panel if you use the juice the right way.

Other electrical demands were always an issue though and needed to be tightly managed - until CFL's came along. And now with LEDs they can watch as much TV as they like

Filament lamps/bulbs/globes are outlawed in many countries but still alive and well in SA. I wouldn't be surprised to see legislation here though soon.

It's just arrived - a R5.00 tax on each incandescent bulb - and I expect it'll grow faster than the sin taxes in future. Our government strategy seems to be you can have whatever (luxury) you like as long as you are prepared to pay for it.

Can you put a borehole in the garden, or well, & draw your own water? If there is a council bylaw prohibiting this,

There's no municipality preventing it that I know to, at least not yet. Too heavy a draw on ground water can lead to problems, so if it became overly popular I'd expect some regulatory measures would become necessary.

Still I want to come back to the luxury thing. I want running water because I pay for running water; I want electricity because I pay for electricity. I do not mind spending money if the property was my own. But with housing cost as it is... owning your own home will remain a distant pipe dream for a long long time to come.

That may prove to be one of the biggest obstacles overall for SA. Property ownership affordability is an issue and the most meaningful measures seem to involve an investment in the property. The incentive for a tenant to make that green investment is virtually nil.

I know of one or two places where the wells ware actually poisons. I strongly recommend that you test the quality of water before you start using it.

Particularly in Gauteng or if you've got mines with slime dams in your area. These pose a serious heavy metal contamination threat to ground water, and heavy metal poisoning is not pleasant. However, there are very good filters available nowadays.

Dave can this be made into a wiki as we progress?

Any member can start a wiki page. Just use the search box in the wiki for the page title, and you'll be led through the process of starting a new wiki page from there.

[wynn]

Will there be a fight over who owns the river water?

All one needs to emulate photosynthesis is 3 gal. of river water, four hours of sunlight, and an affordable cobalt-phosphate catalyst. Throw in a 30 sq m photovoltaic array and the artificial photosynthesis system produces hydrogen that can be stored for future power production via fuel cells or converted to liquid fuel. At this scale the system is available 24 hours/day for a typical western residence, observes PhysOrg. MIT chemist Dan Nocera expounds on the technology, which could resolve hydrogen transport issues, in this video . His start-up company, Sun Catalytix, received $4 million from the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy

[wynn]

OK I am about to build my first solar panel but first I need some advice from the electro techies.

What do I call a timer for the geyser that fits into the DB with an adjustable dial type timer, like the dials on those 15amp plug timer fittings?

What do I call and where do I get the circulatory pump with temperature sensors to fit 22mm copper pipe?

[daveob]

What do I call a timer for the geyser that fits into the DB with an adjustable dial type timer, like the dials on those 15amp plug timer fittings?

Not certain about this, but I would imagine that a digital timer would consume less juice than a mechanical one, as there are no moving parts ?

Anyway, I bought a digital timer for my geyser from Makro for just over R200. Has a host of programs that can be set for different times / days, etc. and manual over-ride buttons.

HTH

[hpb]

Breakdown of typical suburban home - electricity consumption

Water heating.....:. 45.9%
Washing clothes..:. 2.4%
Cooking..............:. 15.1%
Space heating.....:. 4.1%
Refrig/freezer......:. 15.1%
Lights................:. 11.4%
Other applicances:. 6.0%

Start with the big ones & reduce them first.

Yes water heating is biggest consumer of electricity. So update your geyser/ electric water heater is the most urgent. Currently solar and heat pump water heaters are two most feasible option.

[wynn]

Now here is an interesting battery run with salt water and no acid, they don't tell what the pricing is though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EhnmWo2CZ8

[SilverNodashi]

Now here is an interesting battery run with salt water and no acid, they don't tell what the pricing is though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EhnmWo2CZ8

salt water batteries isn't anything new, but they don't exist in the commercial market for the simple reason that they can't handle the higher loads, as explained in this video. These are fine for smaller loads at home, but that's about it. Stacking too many of those batteries will have new challenges with cabling, fuses, etc.

[Justloadit]

Now here is an interesting battery run with salt water and no acid, they don't tell what the pricing is though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EhnmWo2CZ8

Pricing here

Interesting alternative. Their statement of 1500 cycles for a lead acid battery at 50% discharge does not cover every day discharge, which is almost a quarter of that according to my experience.
I find that solar charging lead acid and doing a 50% discharge that next evening on a daily basis, yields about 200 cycles.

[SilverNodashi]

Pricing here

Interesting alternative. Their statement of 1500 cycles for a lead acid battery at 50% discharge does not cover every day discharge, which is almost a quarter of that according to my experience.
I find that solar charging lead acid and doing a 50% discharge that next evening on a daily basis, yields about 200 cycles.

Ouch!

Without import freight, import duties and VAT, it would cost me R103,054.74 to replace my current 48V/225Ah AGM battery bank! Let's use their 90% DOD example, or rather let's say I can halve what I have with these batteries, then it would still cost me R51,527.37. Without freight, import duties (+10%?) and VAT (+14%). So, R64,615.32 without courier / freight! Definitely NOT cheaper than Lead Acid.
And then support would be costly since you need to pay the freight back.
And you need to purchase a separate DC combiner box, which could probably cost another R6K

At R 57,060.00 I can get a Lithium Iron Yttrium Phosphate (LiFeYPo4) battery, with 7000 cycles, locally. This is from one of the more expensive distributors. It'll probably cost a bit less through my own company.