All Energies

FAQs

2015-06-20T11:25:00.000-05:00

The following is intended to cover some of the most common questions we hear about off-grid solar systems. Please post your questions in the comments for a Part Two!

What is the most important component in an off-grid system?

The charge controller.

This is actually a hard question to answer, but if you consider that your battery bank is usually about 1/3 of the total cost of your system, it makes sense that you should do your best to protect that investment. Buy the best charge controller you can afford, and avoid controllers that don't have a reputable manufacturer's warranty to back them up. Warranties are generally 2-5 years for the good equipment. Even the smallest micro-solar systems should at least have a Low Voltage Disconnect built in so that you cannot discharge your batteries to the point of damaging them.

Why don't I have enough power in the summer?

Because you didn't size your system for the summer.

The most common problem we come across in the summer months is that people don't realize that they are using more electricity when the weather gets hot. Summer is when most homes in the Big Bend use the most electricity, and the same applies to solar-powered homes. In the summer you are likely running fans all day and into the night, and also your refrigerator has to work harder to maintain its temperature. This is why solar systems should be sized for a Worst Case Scenario.

A system that is adequate in the winter may struggle to provide enough electricity in the summer. Big electric companies often have the same problem, which is why brownouts are more common in the summer (when everyone's air conditioner is running at the same time).

I want more power. Should I buy more batteries?

No.

While adding to your battery bank may seem like an easy way to enlarge your system, what you are actually doing is upsetting the balance of your system. If you make your battery bank bigger, your solar array may not be able to charge it adequately. If this happens your system will stop working once the batteries are drained, and if you cannot keep the batteries charged, they will quickly become junk.

Also, it is not advisable to mix new batteries with old batteries because it will shorten the lifespan of your new batteries.

I want more power. Should I buy a wind turbine?

Probably not.

Wind turbines are a great renewable energy technology, but it is both difficult and expensive to make them work on the residential scale. Per Watt, wind turbines are much more expensive than solar panels. Plus, you have to build or buy a very tall tower and install the whole shebang. This can get extremely expensive if you are paying a professional installer, and it's not a ton of fun to do it yourself either.

If you have your heart set on a wind turbine, you should adhere to the following guidelines:

Choose your site wisely. Being near a hillside or structures will cause the winds to swirl unpredictably and not get you a good electrical output. You want your turbine to be either on the top of a hill or in the valley. A wide open expanse with a strong prevailing wind is best.

Buy a reputable brand with a good warranty. Anything with moving parts is prone to problems. Buying from a well-known and respected company can help you avoid those problems, and a good warranty will save you a lot of headache if issues do arise.

Get your turbine as high up as you can. At least 20 feet off the ground is recommended, and the higher you go, the better the wind conditions are.

Brake your turbine. In powerful storms, it is best to stop your turbine spinning. Otherwise it could over-spin and get damaged. You will also want to brake your turbine if your batteries are fully charged and you don't have a dump load ready to accept the extra power from the turbine.

Ground the turbine well. Wind towers are lightning rods and if your system is not adequately grounded with over-current protection, a lightning event could destroy your system in part or in whole. Not to mention the possibility of setting your house on fire (rare, but certainly possible). It doesn't even have to be a direct hit to do severe damage, so you're definitely better safe than sorry when it comes to lightning protection.

I want more power. What should I buy?

More solar panels.

Even if you don't have enough batteries to store the extra juice that additional panels will make, you can still use the extra power if you are mindful about when you run your heavy loads. If you use your energy-intensive appliances (washing machine, vacuum cleaner, etc) when the sun is high in the sky, you will probably be running them directly off the solar array and not dipping into your batteries at all. This is very good for the batteries, and allows you to have more power at night. You can always increase your battery capacity later, when finances allow or (better yet) when your battery bank is due to be totally replaced.

Make Hay

2014-10-20T17:06:00.001-05:00

You may have noticed that we haven't posted in over a year. That's because we have had so much else on our plate lately.

Don't worry, All Energies is alive and well!
Sara, Arick, and I have acquired a piece of property on State Highway 118, just south of the Terlingua Ranch Road intersection. We have recently erected a 1200 square-foot building on a concrete slab, and we just need finish it off over the course of the next year.

The next order of business is to install a solar system there, which we have in stock. The planned system uses 1700 Watts of PV, a 4400 Watt MagnaSine inverter and a MidNite Solar "Classic 150" MPPT charge controller.

For updates and pictures please check out our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/AllEnergies

Jelly Time

2013-08-19T20:00:00.000-05:00

Summer is coming to a close and autumn approaches, which means that canning season is here!

While we have always enjoyed these preserved-at-home treats, we have only just made our first foray into canning. While were twiddling our thumbs, waiting for the garden harvest to mature, our neighbor Dan from the Shady 80 fearlessly went into the wild to harvest nature's bounty of prickly pear cactus fruits.

Armed only with a plastic bucket and a pair of grill tongs, he collected some of the prickly pear tunas and made a fruit juice at home with a little sugar. He raved about how tasty and refreshing his juice turned out, which inspired us to grab the tongs and a bucket, too.

Not surprisingly, perhaps, it turned out that gathering the spiny fruit was actually the easiest part. Then the tunas had to be cleaned, cooked, and pulped with a potato masher.

Finally the mess was filtered through cloth and we had over a gallon of primo cactus fruit juice in one hand, and about ten pounds of leftover skins and seeds (pomace) in the other. The pomace went to the compost, but one day we could dry it out and pulverize it into flour (apparently people are doing this with wine pomace, already).

Now that we have so much tuna juice in the fridge (disclaimer: no fish were harmed, only cactus tunas were used), we have a lot of jelly to make. Cooking the juice with sugar and pectin isn't hard, or very time consuming. Priming, filling, and processing the jars is a little intimidating. Doing both and having everything ready to go at the critical moment is hard (so is not making a huge, sticky mess).

Eating the finished jelly is really easy, though. Casey's on his second 10oz jar. And we've got a lot of beta-testers out there, chowing down on the cactus confection. We're looking forward to their feedback (and hoping to get them hooked so they'll buy some at the farmers market later!).

A Texas persimmon at the Lake Ament picnic area.

Meanwhile, we've been looking around and noticed how well the Texas persimmons are doing this year. We found another Texan blogger who has successfully made jelly from the dark, sweet fruit, and perhaps we can give his recipe a try this summer. It probably wouldn't be a bad idea to plant a few female trees around the homestead!

Dark, sticky, messy, and delicious!

Calabasa

2013-08-03T20:00:00.000-05:00

Since we began in earnest this spring, our garden has been a wonderfully fun experiment with a respectable amount of success, to boot. Above are our first two pumpkins harvested. The one on the left weighs 14.2 pounds, and the one on the right weighs a little less, 11.2 pounds.

But after those first two were harvested a couple weeks ago, there seemed to be no more pumpkins, sadly. So I decided to brush up on my third grade botany, and quickly realized that the male and female flowers are easy to differentiate.

You can see above that the male flower on the left has a single anther, and the female on the right has a stigma with several fronds. Behind the showy part of the flower, the female flowers have a very noticeable ovary, or as I like to call them, proto-pumpkin (below).

After observing the flowers over a few days, I noticed two problems. Not only did males flowers outnumber female flowers three-to-one, but the female flowers were not developing into fruit! Instead, the little proto-pumpkins shriveled up a day or so after the flower withered.

So in retaliation to the poor reproduction rate, I have used a soft paintbrush to pollinate the female flowers myself during the past few days. Yesterday, while searching for female flowers to pollinate, I found this sneaky little pumpkin growing in the shade of other plants:

Woo-hoo! These squash plants have been so easy and fun to grow, I can't wait to try some interesting heirloom varieties next time. I have a particular weakness for Cinderella (AKA fairytale) pumpkins, which are supposed to be as tasty as they are pretty. I also have a passion for Halloween and Dia de los Muertos, so I am really looking forward to autumn this year.

But that's not to say I want summer to be over too soon. So far, the summer of 2013 has brought us a lot of rain. In July alone we were lucky enough to get 3.6 inches of precipitation.

Rain also spurs almost every desert critter to reproduce. We've tolerated the mosquitoes and other annoying bugs, but the worst plague so far has been an onslaught of caterpillars that came to a head last week. The green monsters decimated both the pepper plants and the cabbages in our garden. Thanks to their rapacious appetites, our first promising pepper was a very sad, premature harvest.

If you like our Facebook Page, then you might remember that back in March we were gifted a cutting from a Terlingua Creek cottonwood tree. We planted that cutting (basically just stuck it in the dirt and watered it) in front of the Last Resort, and it has really been growing like a weed, despite the constant nibbling of insects.

On the left is the original cottonwood tree cutting just after we got it home. It was just over 12" long back on March 20th of this year.

About four months later, it stood four feet tall and didn't show any signs of slowing down. It has already grown inches in the days since the photo on the right was taken.

The sapling is a reminder that despite the many challenges, it is possible for something not only to survive, but even thrive. Every day we learn more about gardening in general, and about the peculiarities specific to growing in the mountains of the Chihuahuan Desert, but there is still so much wisdom yet to be acquired.

Solar Hot Water

2013-06-29T10:46:00.005-05:00

Existing solar-thermal array.

We are very pleased to tell you that the swimming pool at the Lajitas RV park is now solar heated! Using an existing array that was never fully installed, we were able to complete the project, meaning that the solar-thermal collectors pictured above are no longer only decorative.

Lajitas Pool

Solar-thermal is also part of our Grand Scheme for a low-impact home, for both hot running water and hydronic heating in the winter months.

The concept of solar-heated water is pretty simple, and has been used for over 100 years.

Everyone should be using solar-heated hot water! We are always surprised to find people using electric or gas water heaters out here, where there is so much sun and heat.

A basic solar batch heater can be made inexpensivly using an insulated box with south-facing glass and a tank of your choice. Plans can be found on the Mother Earth News website.

Best of luck y'all.

Terlingua traffic

2013-05-14T16:51:00.002-05:00

Please caption in the comments :)

Presto Pesto

2013-04-24T21:56:00.000-05:00

Homemade pesto from the garden -- delicious!

Our purple prickly pears are getting ready to bloom.

Rescue Ranger

2013-04-18T23:38:00.000-05:00

A very exciting trip to Alpine today. We were just 15 miles or so away from town when the clutch gave out on the little Ranger. Truthfully, we knew it was due to quit but wanted to eke out every last mile before replacing it.

But on the way to Alpine, with a bed full of trash and recycling, was a very inconvenient time to die!

We are very lucky, though. After a few cars passed us by, our friend and neighbor Kevin Elmore (of Green Scene land restoration demo fame) stopped to help. We managed to get a tow back to the Ranch, and we'll be ordering up all the necessary parts soon.

Looks like we'll be in the shop this weekend.

Scene of Green

2013-04-07T12:00:00.000-05:00

April 6th was the 5th annual Green Scene, and we got to power the event for the third year running. We built a SunStation just for the job, our smallest and most cost-effective model ever. Version 3.0 has 570 rated watts of PV modules, four deep-cycle flooded batteries, a digital PWM charge controller, and a 2300W 24V modified sine wave inverter.

We always have so much fun, and this year was the best ever. We gave a demonstration explaining the basic principles of solar power and living Off Grid. Our friends and neighbors Tim McKenna and Kevin Elmore teamed up on a very informative demonstration on reclaiming the desert land using simple techniques and proven principles.

There was so much else, I can't even begin to cover everything. Between the stand-up comedy and belly-dancing, there were lots of great demonstrations and educational materials. And as always, tons of great, fresh food.

Easter eggs

2013-03-31T20:30:00.000-06:00

Instead of the normal five eggs we get each day, today we got seven and a weird little bonus huevo.

Plasma

2013-03-15T17:28:00.002-06:00

A few days ago we traded some solar equipment for a used plasma cutter and finally got around to trying it out last night. Can't wait to put this thing to work!

We also helped out a neighbor this morning and she was kind enough to give us this small dog pen. We don't know exactly what we will do with it yet, but it is very nice and in excellent condition. We sure have some kind and generous folk out here.

Primavera

2013-03-12T17:30:00.000-06:00

Spring has officially sprung! And thanks to all that glorious winter precipitation, the vernal flowers seem to be exploding! Almost every yucca is blooming or about to bloom, there are bluebonnets up and down the roads, ocotillo are putting out red buds, and the whole desert is starting to green.

There is still a lot of dead foliage about thanks to the drought, but plants that did survive seem to be recovering very well, now that we have had some precipitation. Another rain would do us all some good, though, as the roads are getting pretty dusty again.

And while the flowers are very confident that it is now Spring, the thermometer is less certain. The weather keeps bouncing between balmy 70-80 degree days and 60 degree nights, to cold and windy days with near-freezing temperatures at night.

And of course the turistas know that it is Spring, because they have flooded into the Big Bend for Spring Break vacations. It is good to see the shops and hotels and restaurants bustling with activity, but I think we'll just keep working on Solar and avoid town for a while. Although it may be hard to stay away from the National Park with all these gorgeous flowers blooming...

Cabbage Patch Chickens

2013-03-11T16:51:00.001-06:00

Lately we have been having some problems with the birds in our main coop. Since they weren't free-ranging during February, they started eating feathers and picking on each other. As soon as we noticed the injuries, we dressed them with WoundKote and started searching the Internet for ways to remedy the stress and boredom brought on by confinement.

Chicken run, March 2012

You may recall that we used to have a 10x20' chicken run attached to the coop, which provided the birds with shade and space to explore. But the coyote that massacred our chickens last year made short work of breaking into the run before digging under the concrete footing of the main coop. So in desperation we tore down the framework of the chicken run and threw ourselves into fortifying the coop.

The coop is now a ferro-concrete fortress, but the girls crave time out in the world with bugs and dirt and seeds and grass. And when they don't have access to those things, they can develop some really bad habits, like feather-eating and picking.

The easiest and best solution is let the birds have long periods of time to free-range, but that isn't always a viable option. Because of all the problems we have had in the past, we don't let them out of the coop except when we are working outdoors and are nearby to deter predators.

Since the picking started, we have made a point to let them out for at least a few hours each day to explore nature. Time outside the coop has definitely helped, but the best discovery we made is a simple and inexpensive chicken toy that is also a healthy treat.

In our neck of Texas, green cabbage will usually cost us about $0.60 per pound, but the entertainment value is priceless. Hanging whole cabbages in the coop provides a fun food source that will keep the girls occupied for hours. The cabbage has the added benefit of improving their nutrition, which means they produce a higher-quality egg, too.

We have always given (and continue to give) kitchen scraps to the girls, but living in a desert environment limits the fresh plant material they can eat, even when they are on the range. The can't eat most of the native desert plants, and the grasses that they can eat are limited, and only available some parts of the year.

So I suppose this means that the girls may be getting their own dedicated cabbage patch in the garden next season!

Mini Egg

2013-02-03T22:10:00.000-06:00

Remote Monitoring

2013-01-31T14:45:00.000-06:00

Just started getting the remote monitoring set up on one of our PV installations, using Apollo electronics and monitoring. The information is really useful. Here is just one of the parameters:

The graph below shows the battery bank voltage from 12 am onward. You can see the solar input jump up at 9 AM, then the battery bank does an absorption charge, and then finally a float charge.

I love the way the alternative energy technology gets better every day.

Delivery

2013-01-30T16:55:00.002-06:00

We just received a shipment of Suntech modules. We will take these to the site and unpack them tomorrow.

They look really well packaged.

Our Homestead

2013-01-26T18:00:00.000-06:00

Here is a picture of our spread from the left: our home, our shed often containing solar panels, chicken coop, shop, and our future animal barn.

This past November marked the completion of our third year living in the Chihuahuan Desert, and we couldn't be prouder of everything we have accomplished.

Seriously, I have been to ski slopes with less snow on them

2013-01-04T12:04:00.000-06:00

Update:

The birds are all OK, a little frosty and bedraggled, though. We boiled some sugar-water to thaw the drinkers, which they appreciated.

Driving was surreal, but we had plenty of traction in Big Red, which has two new tires and 4WD. The visibility is almost nil, so I'm hoping that folks aren't driving around today.

We're really glad we drained the water system yesterday, because everything could have frozen. Temperature is still below freezing, but thankfully the breeze is pretty calm.

Ski Terlingua

2013-01-04T09:23:00.000-06:00

You really could 'Ski Terlingua' today! At least, in our neck of the desert you can. We got over five inches of gorgeous powder last night. This is the most snow we have ever seen out here, and it is amazing. Naia is loving it, and Wrinkles won't go anywhere near it.

And we turned our satellite telephone off to conserve power, by the way. You'll be able to call us when the sun comes back out (which looks like tomorrow)!

We opted to spend the night at Cafe Colando yesterday evening, and it is a good thing, too. Having a house on stilts is great most of the time, but when there is bad winter weather those stairs are deadly! Now we are headed over there in the 4WD pickup to check on the birds. I'm sure the Buttercups are miserable, but the Brahmas are probably fine. They are hardy in all sorts of conditions, whereas the Buttercups prefer mild weather.

Will report their status soon. Over and out. ;)

Snow Day

2013-01-03T09:23:00.000-06:00

Can't even see the Christmas Mountains today.

A very gray day here in Terlingua, with thick snow clouds weighing heavily around us. It is always exciting to get snow in the desert, since it only happens once or twice each year. If the sun comes out, the snow will not melt, but sublimate, meaning it skips the liquid phase and go straight to water vapor because of the incredible dryness of the desert.

But there is no sign of the sun and little hope it will show itself at all today (check out our local forecast here). Bad news for photovoltaics, but if we are conservative with our power, our battery reserves can last for days.

When we began studying photovoltaics back in New York, the standard was to design the systems with enough reserve to supply at least a week of power with no input. This means everything has to be oversized, not just the battery bank but the array size that pumps in the juice, and therefore all the components that handle the current as well. This is one of the main reasons that solar power is so much more expensive in cold, cloudy New York State.

2008 NREL insolation map of US

Here in the American Southwest, we get some of the strongest insolation in the nation, and very few cloudy days. This allows us to size systems smaller, usually preparing for a maximum of three days without sun. But sometimes, even here in the Chihuahuan Desert, we exceed our reserves and have to have a backup plan. So once in a blue moon, we have to run a generator to keep our batteries charged. It is so important to keep the batteries above 50% charged, or else we risk damaging the batteries, which are the most expensive and weakest link in the system.

In the future, we hope to use a renewable fuel like biodiesel or woodgas to power the generator. But right now we don't have a diesel genny, and the woodgas apparatus is too big and cumbersome to run alongside our house on the hill (moreover, the desert sun has really taken a toll on the plastic components!).

But so far, so good. We haven't used all our power yet, and we plan on being very careful with what we have got until the sun comes back out.

Drizzly day

2012-12-30T22:27:00.003-06:00

We visited our friend Dennis today and picked up 12 battery cores he donated from his defunct bank. We also got to check out his latest project, repainting the dome exterior using this fancy 'Koolcoat' additive. Supposedly it can add up to R2 insulating with these tiny foam beads (think fluffy grains of superfine sand).

In other news, we have been letting the chickens out to scratch and explore a few hours per day. But because of our tenacious coyote, these outings must be closely supervised!

Things to See in Big Bend

2012-12-23T23:00:00.001-06:00

Juan de Leon grave, BBNP

Ernst Tinaja, BBNP

Museum of the Big Bend, SRSU, Alpine

Cattail Falls, BBNP

Chimneys, BBNP

Gilberto Luna's Jacal, BBNP

Santa Elena Canyon, BBNP

Tuff Canyon, BBNP

Dark December

2012-12-15T22:21:00.002-06:00

Sorry for the long gap in entries ... we are just feeling overwhelmed lately.

But it is good to be busy, and we are happy to be moving forward on many projects at once.

The shooting yesterday at Sandy Hook Elementary reminds us that every moment is precious, and every day a gift. We hope that everyone is holding their loved ones a little closer.

Before the massacre in Connecticut, we celebrated Sara's birthday at Big Bend National Park. We visited Boquillas Canyon, near the border village of the same name (and the embattled border crossing -- will it ever open?).

Perhaps this brief serenade by Victor will lift your spirits:

TURKEY day

2012-11-23T09:42:00.001-06:00

Happy Thanksgiving, from a couple of turkeys.

Fall Behind

2012-11-18T18:30:00.000-06:00

It's been an interesting past few weeks since the last blog entry. Sorry for the long gap, there's just been so much going on here that writing got bumped to the bottom of the To-Do List.

The abundance of flowers continues, even though we haven't had any recent, significant rain. The ocotillo left is one of the few we have spotted blooming, and since the photo was taken, almost all the ocotillo have changed to autumn colors or lost their leaves entirely.

We are still enjoying lots of fresh chicken from the harvest in August. Our two favorite ways to cook the birds are oven-roasted ("naked" roast chicken!) and tequila-lime marinated.

We have also started a container garden growing carrots, spinach, cabbage, cilantro, and basil. The community garden is also very active right now, with lots of edibles growing in the yard. We stopped by the Terlingua Farmers' Market last week and got to see all the wonderful vendors and farm-fresh food for sale. It is still fairly early, though, and there will be even more vegetables available in a few weeks. We would love to have enough eggs to sell there (once the girls finally start laying!) and Casey's pater wants to buy drought-tolerant tree seedlings to re-sell.

We are really excited to see what we can harvest in two to three months! The growing season here in the desert is the opposite of what we are used to in the Northeast, and we have never done a container garden before. Containers have the benefit of reserving moisture better, but the disadvantage of being more sensitive to temperature fluctuations. We have already had some near-freezing temperatures this November, and we brought each container inside overnight to protect the seedlings from cold (only hope and prayer protects them from the cats & dogs!). Today seems to be the start of a warming trend, so we hope we can safely leave the containers outside overnight again!

We also recently bought an annual pass for the Big Bend National Park (why did we wait this long?!) and have been attempting a new hike each week. We completed the Grapevine Hills trail and the Lost Mine trail, just the two of us, and then this week we took Casey's parents Kathie and Bob (along with Gigabyte) down the Window trail and around the old Sam Nail Ranch.

On the list for future hikes are the Ernst Tinaja, Santa Elena Canyon, and many more...

Another project that has been taking up a lot of time and effort is closing off the Workshop. As of tonight, the remainder of the back wall is all framed out and waiting for metal sheathing. We coated the wall with a special cement product called "Quikwall," which is a super-strong, fiberglass-reinforced surface bonding cement. The product is intended for dry stacked block walls with mostly hollow cores, but also has many other uses. The Quikwall went on easily and finished nicely, with a smooth, stucco-y look.

OK, it's not all-natural, traditional goat poo plaster ... but we don't have the goats yet and this was much easier and faster.

Anyway, aside from these developments, there have been a lot of exciting things going on in the world. For one, the Superstorm Sandy hit the Jersey Shore, where Sara's maternal family lives. Everyone came through the storm OK, but there was a lot of damage and the electricity was out for several days. Luckily, none of the many trees that fell landed on their homes or vehicles, but there was an obvious (and in some cases, desperate) need for portable solar systems.

And Alpine threw a big, annual bash called ArtWalk, where people and artists came from all over to have a good time with food, friends, and art. We made it just in time to catch the parade, which featured a multi-person rattlesnake skeleton cycle (with red-stocking tongue!) and spinning butterfly cycles.