Solar power cells and trucking

Neat.

Looking forward to taking some classes once I get my own trailer and can get home often enough to attend. I took some online classes last semester and it was rough on truck stop wifi. Usually had better luck tethering my phone.

 

This is the perfect scenario to get some stimulus money from Obammy. Just promise to give some back for his campaign.

 

Actually, it would have nothing to do with the current executive or legislative offices.

Thanks to the Energy Policy Act of 2005 put forward by Joe Barton (R-TX) signed by good old Gee Dubya, I could go pick up some solar cells up right now with my federally mandated minimum ethanol (7.5 billion gallons by 2012) blended gasoline (none of which can come from the Great Lakes) in my car which had its design subsidized with $1.3 billion from that act, then take them to a nuclear plant so the employees and contractors can skeet shoot them before sundown, thanks to daylight savings time being pushed back 3 weeks, and I'd still get a federal rebate of 30%.

If I'd be putting it back into anyones coffers for doing me the favor, it'd belong to Bush Episode III: Revenge of The Jeb

 

As a solar expert at my previous job I'll give my 2 cents.

Lets make some assumptions:
A standard diesel APU Cost 5000 (depends on type and install cost)
A battery apu needs at least 10KWH of storage to make it 10 hours with heating and cooling.

First off, with APU's, getting power is not the problem. Storing power is the problem. Depending on alternator size, a truck produces anywhere from 10-30KWH of extra power over an 11 hour drive. A 150 amp alternator produces 19.8 kWH over 11 hours. Things like head lights, radio, engine, and charging starter batts uses this power, but there is still a lot left, especially after 15 min of driving. All this excess power gets wasted. My point is, why would you spend money on costly solar when the excess unused energy from your engine can charge your batts?

Now the next problem is energy storage. Diesel APU's create power as you need it. If you plan on using solar power or power from your truck's engine, you need to store it. Batteries are quite expensive, but most of all they are heavy. A 2.6 KWH AGM battery weighs over 250 pounds and cost over 600 dollars. They also should not be drained all the way requiring 5 batteries or 1250 pounds to store one nights heating and cooling needs. $3000 just on batteries isn't very cost effective either.

Lithium ion is a possibility but they are still pretty heavy (about half the weight of AGM). I also have not found a charging system designed to charge them from solar or a truck (or any other 12-24volt source). They are also about 3 times as expensive as AGM.

There are companies producing electric apu's, but they are pretty low power since they work off of only 5 KWH of batteries. they also last less then 10 hours using their numbers.

So, although solar is a neat idea, it has the same problems as any battery based apu. If your buying a bank of batts, using extra engine electricity is much more cost effective then solar and achieves the same result.

 

In response to the original post, smaller alternators could not be used with solar since it is to unreliable. Some days it may produce 1kwh and others it may produce 10 kwh. Unless you had a huge system and a huge battery bank you will likely end up with a cloudy day and not enough power to start your truck. Also (to my knowledge) there are no charge controllers available to charge Lipo or lithium ion from solar.

Houses do have similar sized systems but mostly heat using gas or oil. They also take power from the grid on cloudy days and send power back on sunny days. They use the grid as the batt. the amount of batts you would need to run the hvac of a truck is a lot.

 

Solar is designed to take golf ball sized hail at 65 MPH. There are many commercial solar arrays in use that are actually mounted flat, although tilt arrays will have better production when facing south.

 

if your truck has a 100 amp alternator it produces 13.2 KWH in an 11 hour day.

If your parked due south down south and you have the perfect angle your solar array produces .72 kwh (2/3 KWH) per day on average.

Compared to the charging capacity of your engine, your solar barely makes a difference in keeping them charged. Assuming this is a back up for when your batts are dead, .72 kwh would barley be enough power to make your starter turn. Even if it was, are you going to wait a full day for your batts to charge if you kill them?

based on my experience as a solar designer, 200 watts isn't going to make a difference in batts charge state. A 200 watt system never produces 200 watts. It is unlikely they put out a full 15amp at 18volts since that 270 watts. If they do, it would only be in full sun when it is bellow 25c (the standard for measuring is 25c) In either case, i used pvwatts to estimate your average production.

 

The price of solar panels are going down, and they are finding newer systems that are cheaper and easier to install and maintain all the time. The chinese are spending big bucks on it and will sell it to us when they figure it all out. I can see the day when the refer on a trailer would have an electric assist system to save fuel. Solar cells could be put on every surface on the trailer if they get cheap enough.
Trucks would have solar cells on the cab to assist the electrical needs of the truck, maybe an AC system that is electrically assisted. Anything that would save fuel, should be on the table.
Hybrid trucks work the cost is the limiting factor, companies like UPS and Fed-ex are spending money getting systems built to test the different systems. They are looking to promote the systems hoping to get that one little edge.

 

Be very very quiet carb might be listening or watching this and that's all we need some more laws enacted by the all supreme and mighty carb. And as we all know what Calif does so will the other nitwits who think they need to mandate laws for our own good. And just maybe they might require every truck have wind turbines too. P.S. already thought there was solar powered trucks seen any truck stops at night lately all filled up when Sun starts setting. Lol