I am looking to mount my solar panels on an uninsulated pole barn about 30m from my house.
Does it make more sense to route my 48V dc lines to my climate controlled house or should I build a climate controlled space for just my solar inverter/batteries in my barn?
Are there any off the shelf containers for battery storage? Like a chest freezer designed to keep the interior at 15c?
The system will be hybrid grid tied with about 7kwH of battery capacity. My house is very shaded, but the pole barn is not. That is why mounting panels on the house is not an option.
Conclusion: After reading all your input I think I’m going to build a tiny room in my pole barn with insulation and a ductless mini split in there to maintain a stable temp/humidity over the year. It’s a headache, but it’s going to be cheaper than giving up 25% of my power to DC resistive losses or killing my battery’s life.
Thanks for everyone’s input.
Efficiency in the percentage of energy returned vs the amount of energy put in.
I hadn’t looked this up before ,but you’re right on this. The difference isn’t huge though, about 5% apparently.
It’s not a deal breaker usually. Costs should drop pretty quickly, and I’d imagine efficiencies should improve as well. Certainly better for the planet than Lithium batteries. I’ve only looked into it because my situation is pretty weight/efficiency biased. Might have to plan on another panel to offset the loss, or it might be acceptable for someone’s use case. It’s just something to be aware of if someone is going that way. I shouldn’t have to update my situation for a few years, so I’m hoping to go the sodium route when the time comes.