Graph of solar radiation in the US (Southwest is best)

Mark Frauenfelder 10:43 am Mon May 12, 2008

Mikey Sklar and Wendy Tremaine moved to Truth or Consequences, New Mexico a couple of years ago and have been "recklessly experimenting" with various systems for living off the grid. They've been powering their house with photovoltaic cells, and this graph Mikey found makes it clear that they've moved to the right place.

Today my PV solar panels must have been working extra hard. They produced 14.7kWhrs that is the absolute maximum they are supposed to be able to produce in my region based on the average latitude angle. When I scoped out the system I had been thinking about a 5 hour peak sunlight day. We are really much more like 7.2 peak hours of sunlight a day (this time of year). This chart might help. You can see what a total waste it is to buy and install PV solar panels anywhere outside of the southwest.

Link (Canada's Discovery Channel profiled Mikey a couple of months ago. Here's the YouTube.)

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