We are working to develop the Princeton Field Reversed Configuration (PFRC) nuclear fusion power plant. We’ll be at the IAEA Fusion Energy Conference in London this month to present the latest news about PFRC.
We also build SunStation solar power systems. This probably makes us the only fusion company to have delivered fusion power (albeit from the sun) to the grid.
The following figure shows 24 hours of operation on a sunny day. The web interface is provided by the Outback OPTICS RE software.
The area from 14:30 to 17:30 is when cars are being charged. Power consumption is around 300 W including dishwasher, induction cooktop, refrigerator, lights, Internet, and a large screen TV. All of the lights are LED. The house has a geothermal heat pump. The heat pump also preheats water for a gas hot water heater. The house has an energy recovery ventilator that exchanges air every 3 hours. Over three times as much power was sent to the grid as was taken from the grid!
The black bars are the load. Note the jump when a 2021 Ford Mach-E is connected. The Mach-E uses an Aerovironment L2 charger. A 2018 Toyota Prius Prime is also charging. The Prime uses a wall plug and a charging cable. PSE&G has a new program for discounted electric power after 9 p.m. for electric car charging.
Here is a partly sunny day.
The following image shows the power flow. The Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries are at 95%.
4.1 kW is being delivered to the grid. A snapshot of the solar array and\ power flow is below.
You can get a lot of power later in the day. Here it is at 4:23. The high load is due to EV charging.
The solar array is composed of Sharp and Panasonic panels. The Sharp were the original panels and the Panasonic were added when the system was upgraded to a SunStation. SunStation can operate even when the grid is down. It has a transfer switch that automatically cuts the link to the grid when the grid goes down. The battery capacity of 14 kWh is sufficient for about 5 days of operation when the solar input is zero. With normal sunlight, the home can operate indefinitely off-grid. There is no need for a fossil-fuel-based generator.
If you have an existing solar power system you would need to purchase a new inverter to charge batteries. An alternative is a Tesla Powerwall that connects to your AC wires and charges batteries by first rectifying the AC power. Some solar systems use micro-inverters that convert the solar panel’s DC power to AC power at each panel. These would also require something like the Powerwall.
The installation is shown below. The Outback Inverter is on the left. The Outback charges the batteries directly from DC power. The inverter is connected to the Mate3 interface which is connected to a NETGEAR range extender. The batteries are on the right in the cabinet. The battery management system is in the middle. The large boxes on the top prevent arc faults and are required by code. The box on the upper right is the power supply for those boxes. That functionality is now built into the inverters.
Here is a view of the roof. Notice the slight difference in color of the panels.
Contact us for more information and to get a quote!
You can find more information on geothermal from the linked blog post.
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