Originally Posted By: expat
I installed a Turgo type Pelton wheel last summer, it produces about 30 amp from 100 feet head through one 3/8" and one 1/4" nozzle. Most power produced (during the course of a day) gets dumped, due to the batteries being fully charged.
Your plant seems MUCH bigger, how much power are you producing?
Do you Dump power or cut the water supply?
I read he's producing about 5k watts, but he can ramp it easily up to 7, and even hit 10 - but that's the limit of what the system he's using can handle without overloading it.
I have to confess that part of what I liked about his success story, was just seeing someone apply that much of drive, determination, and ingenuity to getting "off the grid." That's a side interest of mine; not so much for eco reasons, but more for self-sufficiency reasons. If I ever do go that route here, it'll likely be using wind: that's the one resource we have in abundance almost year round. Alternatively, his approach is doable here too, but you'd have to build in the right place, and well outside the city. Solar isn't cost feasible here because of too much cloud cover and fog.
My grandparents (on one side, before my grandfather died of a stroke) lived entirely off the land, 18th century style: they used wood for heat exclusively that was cut and stockpiled in the summer, and similarly, all food consisted of that which they grew themselves, supplemented by hunting, trapping, and fishing. This was pre-confederation, and in the early days of it, when this was the norm here (and cash currency was a little possessed and rarely used item, with the barter system being the predominant means of exchange).
-Spyder
