Can someone point me in the right direction to build a solar power system that can power my air conditioner for the summer? I live in a 700 square foot apartment. Any idea on the cost to build something like this? Any info would be appreciated. Thanks!

Best answer:

Answer by genscripter
Not to derail this question, but the future of HVAC innovation is not in PV’s; it’s in residential geothermal heating/cooling.

PV panels are terribly inefficient, and it would take an ENORMOUS array to produce the necessary power to heat/cool even a small apartment.

Residential Geothermal (see the link below) uses the ambient temperature of the earth (around 50°F) to either cool the air temp in the summer, or heat up the air temp in the winter. Plus this is tapped into the ground, so that you don’t use up your above-ground space with dozens of PV panels.

But in the case of most apartments, you probably cannot dig into the ground and install a geothermal setup. If this is the case, you should look into obtaining a small wind turbine (in conjunction with a series of batteries). Even the smallest wind turbine is orders of magnitude more powerful than the average PV panel. This will use up less room on your roof or yard than several swaths of photovoltaic panels. Plus it’s much cheaper.

HTH 🙂

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