Could you not get a DC pool pump and a couple PV panels which only supply electricity to the pump. So when the sun shines, the pump pumps. Thus, it is independent of the grid and interference from Enerdis etc. You can buy the pumps on Amazon and there are a few youtube videos showing the setup. Seems ideal since the long summer days when the pool is being used, then the pump works the hardest. Don’t have to worry about the electricity costs or timers.
https://suministrosdelsol.com/en/swimming-pool-solar-kits/1608-15755-solar-kit-for-pool-purifier-kdp-100.html
You certainly could but why would you?
8x 460W solar panels. my pump is running on around 60w it requires 1/6th of one panel! €2640 for the whole kit!!! You would need to be certifiable! 2CV pump is way too large for most domestic pools.
I wasn’t sizing a pump for his pool. I was showing what is available there are others.
Agreed, I was just adding my comment that its an expensive way to go and still doesnt deal with the too high flow rate for filtration. You only need full speed for backwashing.
Please understand that to get to the standard of low energy was not an overnight thing, I spent a fair amount of money, airmiles and time testing and buying suposedly green kit. By making the mistakes I have hopefully saved others from making them.
Yes HC are 12:30 to 16:00 and 03:30 to 08:00 for us as you say different for others
Yes you are right I was using the pool pump that came with the house when we bought it. Need to look at adding a speed control.
The panels were mainly for heating the pool but I thought hybrid panels were a good idea to get some electricity as well. Plus we have a heat pump and hot tub that need power. In fact the hot tub is probably the most power intensive.
The pool water flows through a heat exchanger to take up the heat from the solar thermal glycol circuit.
When we changed from fioul house heating to pellets a couple of years ago we added two glycol solar panels and now get all our home hot water from about March to Oct.
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Thanks Nick, good to know. You are the 1st person I know with the hybrid solar so interested in your thoughts on them?
In terms of the hot tub, they normally have a 2-3hp pump to make the jets work and a slower speed in between times. But on the same filtration circuit. That means filtration apart from the larger stuff gets pushed through the filter. For my old customers I separated out the flow so filtration was maintained at a constant rate and booster was not on the filtration circuit, thats how most commercial spas are done or should be. That meant high power in use for 10-15 mins as requested and 35 watts of electricty for the filtration cycles. For customers that could, we connected the hot water supply to their boilers via a thermostatic mixing valve set around 32c.
I found you could get just as good massage jets using an air blower which were less energy using and to compensate for the cooling effect of the bubbles added a heat source into the air flow.
Hi Corona
We bought the 8 hybrid panels in about 2103 when we first moved to France. They came from a company in Newcastle (Solar Angel) who I think have since folded. We installed them ourselves. We have been fairly impressed, although perhaps we should have put in a couple more.
Initially we used a second hand SunnyBoy inverter also from the UK but it broke down with a Varistor error. I tried in vain to buy new Varistors, finally talking to a company in Holland who told me he had them on back order and that had been for over six months. We replaced the inverter with a Chinese one from AlloSolar for about 400€.
The solar thermal plumbing side was quite straightforward and we bought a pump station and heat exchanger which is plumbed into the pool system. It seems to produce hot water at about 40 deg and our pool is usually up to 29 deg by end of March.
The glycol seems to be a bit tricky as joints leak a bit, but we have found the same with a solar thermal circuit tied into our home heating system.
Not sure if anyone produces hybrid panels anymore.
Best Regards
Nick
There was a company near Basingstoke?? I was looking into but again not heard from them. I had a sustainability meeting with the British Library who used some on one of their offsite facilities. Good tech as they keep the photovoltaic part within good operating temperature ( for other readers reference) so maximising output whereas normal PV output drops with high temperatures.
Very interesting and I will dive in and have a search to see if anyone is still manufacturing.
System could also be useful for hot water supply then? Via another heat exchanger possibly?
Hi I found this online
https://academy.dualsun.com/hc/en-us
It is not very clear but I think it works on a glycol circuit and heat exchanger for the hot water part of the system.
Flat panels, will have to look into their winter performance. I was loking more towards evacuated solar so it can be used in winter as well as summer.
Be interesting to make a pool cover from flexible solar panels.
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Hi Corona
Just been out and bought a variable speed control for the pool pump for €299 and am in the process of fitting it.
How long would you recommend running it at an economic speed?
Regards
Nick
Hi Nick, can you remind me of a bit more info on your pool please? Size of plumbing, size of filter length of pipe run from plant room to pool, just roughly will do.
Hi Corona, the pool is 9x5 x 1.5 so about 68 cu m. The pool house is about 3m to nearest skimmer and bottom drain, then 7m to middle skimmer and 12 m to far skimmer.
We have a sand filter which we refilled with recycled glass grains last year.
The new pump control is fitted and working, I have put it on from 10 am to 8 pm for the moment. It has three programs but I am only using one for the moment on 1400 rpm ( it can go as low as 1200).
I upped it to to 2800 this afternoon to do a backwash.
Another question it seems a waste when backwashing to let the water go into the next door farmers field. If I fed it into a 1 m cu cuvée would I be ok using it to water fruit trees?
Rgds. Nick
Standard 50mm plumbing
On the subject of solar thermal I don’t see how you can integrate evacuated tubes and PV. Our system has PV panels with copper piping on the back for the glycol lines.
I think the sand filter(now glass) is about 80cm dia but I would have to measure it tomorrow to be exact.
Yes should be fine, if there is a bit of time between collection and usage the chlorine will have broken down. A customer dischrged his shock level water into his neighbours field, it seemed to slow down the wheat growth for a while but the wheat grew just as tall.
Not saying it isnt but 750mm is more common.
3 posts limit kicked in so had to add this to a previous post.
https://nakedenergy.com/products
These do exactly that.