Since my last post, winter has come and gone, and I added another half a kWh of lithium ion battery storage. Here's the big surprise.
It's comparatively difficult to generate solar energy in the winter than the summer. I could easily charge a kWh battery in the summer months. But in the winter even on a sunny day, I would do well to generate .25 kWhs.
One of the problems is snow cover. It's right outside my window, so it's fairly easy for me to scrape snow and ice off the panels. But it was a cold winter and it's not pleasant scraping ice off solar panels in the wind chills of winter.
The sun does melt some of the snow off the panels. But the black color of the panels doesn't melt as much snow as you'd like. Essentially a small pocket of air forms off the surface of the glass which makes it an insulator from the heat that would normally melt the ice.
The moral of the story is to spec your solar array for 1/4 performance during the winter months.
