The cost to go fully off-grid… NO MORE BILLS!
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 22 ต.ค. 2023
- Off grid living in rural thailand, the full cost breakdown…
Life in Thailand after leaving the UK.
Join me on my Thailand adventure as I attempt to create a fruit farm on five acres of land, build a house, dig a well for my own water source and install solar panels to become completely off grid!
Watch me generally fumble my way through every process, trying to keep positive and upbeat throughout 🧘♂️
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To avoid a possible disaster in your plunge pool, install a hand rail please 🥺 If you slip those steps are a killer.
Do not cover your solar equipment as the heat it generates will kill the system. Ideally it should be air-conditioned by a solar aircon. Should have been in a separate room or garage on the cool side of the house
a timber frame with a couple of full size doors would make a large store and cover your inverter and batteries also giving them plenty of space around them, thank for sharing
And I like the fact that you don’t let negative comments bring you down
£10K sounds reasonable. Especially when the installation work is protected by a warranty. We have one of those Chernobyl supply/switch boxes lol. They look like something from the 70s 😂 great video.
The total price seems quite reasonable considering you a diesel generator that would cost between 40 & 50K, and two big batteries that probably amount to another 100K or more depending on the size. All the solar companies are wanting around 300k for that size solar array grid tie. Enjoy :)
Find a cabinet on have one built that is tsll enough and wide enough. Remove the back of it. Add some bracing inside the cabinet so it doesn't get wobbly. If it's heavy put some wheels on it. Tou may need to add a fan on top of it if it gets hot inside of the cabinet.
My old man said on spending a bit more for professionals : “ horses for courses”
Always ends up cheaper and better to leave it to the pros.
Get someone to build a special cupboard around the batteries etc. There must be a local company that would love to have the job 👍
Very good deal i think, my cost $23,600.00 in US.
You can hang a rail with curtain over it for your son and aperture for your electrics just an ideer sos for bad spellings
frame it and put sliding doors to cover your solar system
Two things, put a chair at your private spot along the pond. Make sure the chair has a beer holder on it and your golden. Second, your rice looks to have rebounded, doesn't look like its as damaged as it was right after the flood.
Lol I will do, and the rice is a bit hit and miss I think. Maybe some is salvageable 🙏
Beautiful system. Proper installation = peace of mind, priceless. :) Keep smiling and have fun.
It is usually the inverters that fail on Solar Power systems.
I doubt if the generator will kick in if you have enough batteries and don't overuse the air conditioning.
I'd fit large sliding doors to cover your electrical cabinets, a bit like the ones you get in sharps bedrooms, top and bottom rails, and possibly and end panel easy 😁😁
Agree with others and simply get somebody to make a custom enclosure with some sort of false front with door so that components can be serviced. Proper venting high/low for air flow as well. Perhaps even work in a fan or something to pull in air. I know however, nothing "simple" of getting a craftsmen out but I think that will be the only hard part. Alternative would be to simply hang a couple of those carved wooden vertical panels They sell them at most furniture shops. Easy to remove and build in vents.
cover the electronics with vertical blinds like you would put on a patio door.
Hey Ben
Sweet solar set up.
Please, please, please, google charging lithium batteries indoors!
I'm in Australia and sent the MotoGP message.
We have the highest uptake of solar in the world, all our set ups are external to the house. I have no idea why they have put the inverter, switchboards and batteries in a living area.
Please do some double checks!
If the batteries let go, they cause 🔥 🔥 🔥 🔥.
Love the vids mate, stay safe.
Cheers
Simon
Nice set-up mate.
Unbelievable how quick it goes. Have a great week. 💞💞
Looking forward to seeing you move in and living in your new home.Hope you make it to 10k subs soon.
My husband and I have been following you for a long time. Glad your builder has made great …all be it slow, slow. We like your sense of humour and patience about ‘Thai time’.
Maybe get a metal cage for the unit but have it with a mountain picture on it or something so it looks nice or a pull down covering. Love the vids mate
Ben, I’ve been waiting for this video. Thanks for breaking everything down the way you did. I’ve been considering a system like this for a long time now, much cheaper than I thought it would be!
Full height, Sliding doors in front of the electrical panels Head and footer roller rails and large doors made up from MDF add some architrave then paint or vinyl wrap.
Hi,
Can u please share info about your sewage system and planned internet access at the house (if any). Apologies if you have already covered.
Great secret hiding spot! Just need a lounge chair and a cooler for the beers!🙂
One thing about the floods , they dissipated very quickly under that hot humid Thai sun .
Design an build the cabinet or wardrobe yourself, four simple doors! Just for looks! I talk too much! Lol
Thanks for creating and sharing have a nice day greetings from the Netherlands
Good investment to be off grid and independent. Would imagine by the time you get utilities connected there it would cost you a chunk of money.
Electric and aircons. Very exciting! Now you can enjoy the home. Well done and best of luck. Please let us know how your solar does powering all the household electrical load. I’ve been on grid my entire life, so would be nice to hear about your experience.
Make banana flower salad!
Bargain price. Solar is not easy, a Bad DIY instillation of a big system like you have can be dangerous. You chose the right choice to get it done professionally well done. Things are coming together best wishes for you for the move.
well said everyones a fucking expert
Your house it looking great!
If you can't find a cabinet that fits you could always get a nice curtain to cover the electrical boxes.
Very excited to see it fully furnished and set up 💯
Or possibly pay a carpenter to box it in for you.
A nice decorative bamboo artwork curtain will cover Chernobyl nicely 😅
Better still, a bifold door. But a cabinet maker could easilt build something simple.
Large fold out bamboo room divider could do the trick
Sliding doors with mirrors on, so the dog can watch the other dog...
I spent bout $25 US thousands in 2002. My home is in Culebra, PR. Very tiny and isolated. I gather my own rain water as well. Back in 2011 I got water from our desalination plant, we got a line!
Yes, now I sell power to my little island and never run out of power. A blessing during Irma and Maria disaster! Among many other hurricane!
Happy for you!
We have panels and a wind turbine. Yes, we have replaced panels. But never lost a turbine wing to any hurricanes .
Excellent price! They have gone down so much. But, I still came out great, years ago. You will benefits within just a few years! Best wishes to you and your wife.
We get our solar installed at our home in Phitsanulok this Wednesday! Still on grid, so no batteries or diesel generator. Please tell me your generator is not being mounted in the kitchen too!!?!!
Lol no, it’s in its own little shed outside the house 😆
Congrats for your own setup BTW, that’s awesome
Great to see the update! I am full of envy. I am convinced this will be a good investment. As you say, what you choose to spend is your own business and yours alone. Cheers from Bangkok.
That's good idea for energy free.
Hello Ben! looks good, now enjoy your house and beautiful surroundings. greetings from Holland and Napong Khon kaen😎
Have you got any specifications for your solar system?
Give tip with Gen set, give run every two/three weeks don't let stand for long length time.
That price for the off grid is less than i paid for my swimmingpool.
I'm fairly competent when it comes to most DIY projects but I do not mess about with gas.
When I needed my garden fence replaced I thought about doing it myself but decided to get a company to do it.I'd have taken about a week(or more) to do a job which(amazingly) took them about 6hrs.True!!😂👍🇮🇪🇷🇺🇷🇺
To cover the electrical wall I get frame with sliding doors.
Excellent content mate ! ❤
555, no worries. You just gave me a rough cost on how much it would be for my house in Sakon Nakon. BTW, forget the haters.
I think it would be good if you trim the broom before you use it. Nice home! Love it! 🙏
I like it..great set up. It is a lot of doe..but eventually it will pay for itself..well done..gaz
Awesome
That seems like a good deal. I’ve disregarded solar, not good at math, don’t believe it’s worthwhile to invest time to research it.
My wife tells me it’s what she wants to do when we build.
I don’t know if it will cover our usage still think will be burning dinosaurs
You’re right, electricity is so reasonably priced in Thailand, it’s unlikely you’ll make any kind of financial saving over the life of the solar batteries. We just didn’t have any other option because the land we bought is so off the beaten track. The big plus with an off grid system though is the ability to buy land anywhere. We were able to purchase this 5 acres simply because there was no utility access. Equivalent plots of land with electricity close by were at least double the price.
@@LifeinThailand777 in your case it was necessary being in the jungle and all, really cool to have your own self sufficient home that’s totally off grid.. but I wonder how’s the Internet and aren’t you afraid of living so naked out there? As much as I love my own space and having no neighbours sounds awesome.. Every foreign sound in the night would have me in a panic 😱 my dog barking oh ho!
Great stuff not long now yay
Do you have the specs on the system? I am planning myself and I am curious for the battery capacity and total watts of panels.
Awesome house
As someone who has a house nearby Bangkoik, I'm curious whats the price of your property and house if you don't mind sharing? Obviously you got a place that is way bigger than mine, but living close to the city its a bit more limited.
The land was 600k baht and is 12 rai. The house build cost about 3.3 million baht. 🙏🙏
Hey Ben
Solar looking good mate - give it a solid 12 months and you will get a better idea as to how it holds up. Then you will know if you need a few extra panels or an additional battery to minimize the use of the generator. Only actual "real life" use will be able to give you a better idea.
I am guessing those 2 batteries combined are somewhere between 20Kwh and 30Kwh which can go a long way in a modern energry efficint house especially with energy efficient Air Conditioners.
BTW - I am headed to Nong Bua Lamphu from pattaya around 6th of November if you fancy any "expat / UK treats" from the local expat shop Siamburis.
Dan
Cheers Dan. I’m ok for any expat treats, but thanks for the kind offer mate
Cheap noodles and cha manao, love it.
how many kilowatts is your system? i will be curious as to how well it works and how those batteries will keep your power needs going at night. i think your costs for the system are well worth it.
The price includes the aircon install as well? I wish we had then prices here in the UK for a whole setup like that.. a battery itself is 5k 😅
What's the spec on the system? Battery Size? LFP Batteries?
Inverter Size?
Starting to look like a home. Great job on the solar system 👍. Enjoy😃
Usually, solar does not make sense because of the initial high cost.. and it would take like 10-20 years before the investment would return, but in your case it make sense.. not that you have any other option :-) btw where did you install the generator? Show us the diesel generator in action.
Awesome i was waiting for this video, did they give you an estimate of hours running off the battery's usage for at night or a sunless day before the generator kicks in?
Great content! 👍🙏 I would like to install an off grid solution also. How much capacity does your batteries provide? And where to get a system like that?
We have 2x 10kw batteries, we went with a local company with great recommendations. 🙏
If you cover all that electrical stuff, it's going to get even hotter. You might want to just let it "breathe."
Good set up did they mention how long the battery is good for/replace? @11:49 that price $12400 was American? Aussie dollars Apprx 20k
10 years 🙏 yes thsts US dollar price. TBH ten years of PEA monthly bills would not cost us as much as this setup, energy is fairly cheap in Thailand. But it’s not far off, and it would have cost x5 the amount to bring the electricity pylons closer to the house 🙏
That cute little chernobyl look very well done in the end
Perhaps you could put a cupboard (on wheels) in front of it
I wouldn’t cover it…….I think it looks pretty cool!
oooh happy days 🥳
I miss those grilled pork-sticks!
We LOVE y’all! Hahahahaha
A couple of MDF Bi-Fold doors, floor-to-ceiling would look ideal there, not take up too much room, and allow easy access to Number One Reaktor Kontrol Facility.
PS. The reindeer candle holder - Did you get that for a line or a full house? 😅😅
😆😆😆😆😆
Am i right in understanding you have to use Solar because the PEA dont supply there? I think solar is great, I see a comment below where someone says you dont have enough panels..........I was thinking the same. I guess time will tell. Personally, I would not use solar, not at 400k price, reason being, if my normal bill was 2k a month with PEA, it would take about 18 years to get my money back...........I wont live that long........ ha ha. But its looking great. No problem to cover all the boxes. Any decent handyman will do that for you. Personally, I would have had them in a cabinet on the other side of the wall, on the outside of the house........but thats just me.......
Yes no PEA here. The cost to bring pylons to the house was millions of baht. It made sense to pay for off grid system. It wasn’t to try and save money on our monthly bill, it’s impossible to have that option where we live. The setup is inside the house for security really. I wasn’t keen on leaving half a million baht locked in a cupboard on the outside wall, especially when we’re in the Uk etc 🙏🙏
The solar system looks great! Did you have to put in a multi-string inverter? I thought you needed to if you put panels facing different directions, but yours looks like a single inverter?
what size batteries did u get?
8kw
Why are you not installing the electric on the second floor in case of flooding 😅
What size generator do you have there?
Nice setup how much will on going maintenance costs be for the solar system? I suspect batteries will deprecate in performance over time and need replaced, I hear anything between 5 to 15 years and guess yours will have heavy use as thats main source of power. As you say no option but £10,350 for full solar with diesel generator I would say good price that as its a necessity where you are.
Ten years for batteries, and we will likely have the option of PEA close by before the batteries expire, in which case we will go on grid 🙏
@@LifeinThailand777 good stuff
“Lady boy socks” hahahahaha Love it! 😂😂😂
Fantastic! Every decision does not have to be based on return on investment. Some people focus more on what things cost vs. what they are trying to accomplish. Your ability to be independent and also the experience/learning of being off-grid has immeasurable value.
Thank you for the detail on the solar install, very informative. Side question, do you worry about snakes when you wander through your fields?
No I don’t worry, I make sure to walk quite heavy footed so as to make plenty of noise. Any snakes will bugger off before I arrive 👍
On ya bike monocled cobra! Lol. Thx.
🌴🌴< < < LOOKS LIKE YOUR WEATHERS IS IMPROVING THERE MATE. > > > 🌴🌴
So after 15 year's the solar will pay for itself
So given a cost of on-grid of about 1500 baht a month, less in the cool months we are looking at 25 years worth of bills equivalent for your set up. Not including fuel for the generator, replacement of panels etc after about 10 years. You have to do it but no way will it ever pay for itself.
It won’t quite pay for itself over a ten year period, but that’s not why we opted for it. We wanted the land and the cost to bring PEA to our house was going to be millions of baht 🙏🙏
@@LifeinThailand777 Exactly, I payed PEA 210.000 Baht for cover about 100 meters with 4 cement pylons plus 1 inside my property and 1 transformer. And I know they charge more than double the price... 🤬 So for the people that stay very far from electricity line the only option is to go off grid.
fwiw, the batteries would also cover for the outages that the normal on-grid (such as myself) would experience.
Will you be able to run 24 hours a day air con with the solar panels - should you need to?
No we couldn’t do this, but we never run aircon all day. We have gone for this particular setup based upon our energy needs. To run aircon all day would need a much bigger system 🙏
What capacity does the batteries have?
8kw 🙏
@@LifeinThailand777 Nice :)
That should be enough for most of the year :D
Well, this glorious human being thinks it a fair price for the size of the project. Like someone said below, get a carpenter to box in your hardware. Look forward to seeing you move in. It's been a long time coming!
Thanks so much 🙏😆
How much did it cost? My Internet connection is awful and I can't load the vid
400k
Sorry I got distracted, 460k baht completed 🙏. Batteries should last ten years
Cheers mate. House is looking amazing. Hope you and your family get to enjoy it to its fullest soon
@@LifeinThailand777I am curious, how much do the batteries cost?
I need some ladyboy socks so I can be the top lot lizard at the truck stop!!
10kw ???
no way you have enough panels for a off the grid system, I have 26 BIG panels, yours are babies, Have 2 /5 kw inverters, some months the sun does not shine, you have to have mains power, our place is far bigger than yours and the bill is still 2,5 bhart a month, when the sun shines , bit of advice keep lots of fuel for the generator
It works perfectly
Looking good mate
I'm looking fwd to his future solar videos. yea, I wish that more folks would share their spreadsheets with monthly stats, but they don't. Most don't over analysis like I do. lol.