Has anyone here used or tried solar for some or all of thier power needs for an indoor grow?
If so, tell about your setup and how well it worked and any problems/solutions you came up with.
I would live indoor growing but the increased energy bill would kill me and it would likely raise a flag at the electric company.
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Anything large enough to raise a red flag with power company is probably going to take some capitol to build out in solar.
You need to plan out your desired grow room size and power consumption. Then check solar resource in your area. From there you should be able to find some calculators online to tell you what you need for either on grid or off grid system. On grid system for a small grow isn’t that bad, but you always have grid to fall back on. An off grid system has to be sized for days of your lowest resource so that you can ride out a couple of bad days without interruption.
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So unless you’re growing a warehouse full you’re not going raise any flags with todays led technology power consumption is not really alot.
Your typical 110volt space heater is 1500watts.
I got over 10 plants at any given time under 3 lights that only equals 1300watts combined.
Add in my AC, fans, dehumidifier and i might maybe be pulling what 2 ceramic heaters would…
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Hey curr. The more I read about growing and all the shit you can do to raise the harvest just makes me eager to do more.
Going to solar to supplement grid power serms like a nice idea to me though.
My plans for my grow this year are going well, it will be outdoors. The two Ive already started are getting sunlight every day its available. I dont have any indoir grow equipment but I like the idea of it and the ability to tinker with different things to increade yield. Its also something interesting to do in winter.
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What do you estimate the montly cost of your grow to be for just electricity?
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@KnutsonBoltz, absolutely man. 
I was just s-posting a bit for laughs. 
My Dad has an array actually in his hay field. Pretty sure he got a grant or a tax break or something for installing one. May want to look if there’s anything like that available if you’re gonna do it.
His is sized for I think 150% of his power during the summer; he sends the surplus it to the grid and gets credits, which he redeems during the winter when he needs the grid power. He basically pays $0 for his electricity.
I suppose that’s the one drawback to the plan, during the winter is the low point in power production.
All that said, the power company isn’t going to care, they’ll be more than happy to sell you all the electricity you want.
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I honestly dont know but im going to say less them $100 a month.
I could probably do some calculations and get a number, but we just bought this place so i dont have a good idea of what power here would be without growing…
But i can say its absolutely miniscule compared to the smoke I get thats for sure.
Some places have a thing where you can actually get cash from them. They pay you say a dollar a watt and sell it back to you at $2 a watt. But if you produce more then you use, you can actually get paid…
It be great to have something like this available
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They dont actually pay you they just take it off you bill
Ive read all kinds of things like what youre talking about…people making solar and offsetting thier power costs and even getting checks from the power company. Then I read where the best the power company would do was just offset uour bill but would not pay you…I know that old meters were able to be reversed using solar to accomplish this. The newer ones wont. I guess best case is just no electric company power gets used and thats ok with me.
Ive looked into windmills made from rectified car alternators and using old washing machine motors in a creek to generate power…a lot of off grid type stuff. Its interesting.
Indoor grows for winter absolutely and increased yields from indoor grows also…
I just dont want to make the power companies anymore wealthy than they already are, its the asshole in me I guess.
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Ive never actually looked into it much. Alot of the videos we see where people get paid could be out of the US, and there could be some rare exceptions in remote areas 
.
But yeah I’d not be surprised that no US energy company would come off cash.
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This is my first grow here and its going to be outdoors.
Im going all out to camiflage my garden to hide my grow.
I cant wait till fall when I go back to Colorado and I dont have to worry about this.
Its nuts to have this kinda worry. Life is to short.
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@1HappyPappy, I think you’re right, it’s a bit more complicated than I explained it, I think they do buy it from him at some fair market price, and he needs to pick a month where they settle up or something. He didn’t have it timed right and ended up with a check the first year, but then had a bill over the winter.
You interested in soil growing? You won’t need to bottle feed your plants, if you grow your own soil too. Process still works if TSHTF.
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Lots of people in my area have solar none of them get anything other than credit on their account. If by chance they produced more electricity that month than they used, its credit towards the next month bill. It does offset their normal bill by a few hundred a month though. I wish I had it on my house.
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I rin in total about 2200w in true power of lights about 10 fans dehuey 4 inline fans 3 8 inch 1 6 inch and it’s only like 150 Xtra on my bill nothing bad at all like running a portable AC unit in summer basically. Go led and not hos or mh and it’ll save a ton on electric
In December 2020, Congress passed an extension of the ITC, which provides a 26% tax credit for systems installed in 2020-2022, and 22% for systems installed in 2023. (Systems installed before December 31, 2019 were eligible for a 30% tax credit.) The tax credit expires starting in 2024 unless Congress renews it.
Do it in 2022
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