Winter Solstice 2023 - Clear day provides winter maximum

[Matt-FL]

(Title should read 'maximum' ) Just thought I'd share this. Dec 21 was a clear day, which was great as it showed me what to expect as (mostly) best case for the shortest day of the year. Unfortunately, I didn't have a clear day last June 21st to compare, hoping this year will be.

 

[spsheridan]

70 kWh is a lot for a winter maximum. How many solar panels do you have and what wattage and type?

 

[jjrandorin]

(Title should read 'maximum' )

(moderator note - Thread title changed to read "maximum" as requested).

 

[h2ofun]

(Title should read 'maximum' ) Just thought I'd share this. Dec 21 was a clear day, which was great as it showed me what to expect as (mostly) best case for the shortest day of the year. Unfortunately, I didn't have a clear day last June 21st to compare, hoping this year will be.


View attachment 1003698

Thats huge. I have 90 panels, and I only get about 30kw now. Best is 185kwh in spring

 

[zƬesla]

The 21st was a sunny here too but we maxed out at 40kWh. Sadly, we lose almost half of our production winter mornings from tree shade and don't start producing until ~11am. That's about a third of our peak production.

 

[Matt-FL]

I have 51 T400 panels, 29 facing south, 11 east and 11 west. There is some shading on the east panels until about 11am in the winter (picture below is from GIS Jan 2023), shows that shading pretty well. I've since removed all the trees from my yard (roots were starting to break up my pool patio concrete). But the vast majority of shading is from my neighbors' trees.

 

[GregBallantyne]

Here in MD we also had a very clear day on the solstice. Our system produced a big 14.1 kwh..... big difference between northern edge of Maryland and the Jacksonville area on the winter solstice I'd say.....
That solstice number is larger than my best number close to the summer solstice, which was June 13 when 65.3 kwh was generated. This system has only been in operation since June 10, so I have yet to see the "Best" day, but am thinking it might be close to Matt's winter solstice production.....

 

[Grayson73]

Here in MD we also had a very clear day on the solstice. Our system produced a big 14.1 kwh..... big difference between northern edge of Maryland and the Jacksonville area on the winter solstice I'd say.....
That solstice number is larger than my best number close to the summer solstice, which was June 13 when 65.3 kwh was generated. This system has only been in operation since June 10, so I have yet to see the "Best" day, but am thinking it might be close to Matt's winter solstice production.....

I'm in Montgomery County, MD and installation was on 12/26. My 14.175 kW system generated 12.4 kWh on 12/28.

 

[dandelot]

Dec. 21, the Solstice, we generated just 7 KwH, the best winter generation now is about 20 KwH. Best summer gen now is 40 KwH.
twenty 10-tear-old panels, ten 7-year-old-panels. 10 or so miles south of the border of the city of San Francisco.
With the sun so low some trees in the south-southeast direction do block the sun.
We learned the hard way that we needed critter-guards on all the panel edges to keep animals from destroying the wiring under the panels.

 

[DrSmile]

I have 13.2 KW of panels and made 42KWh on the solstice this year... the same amount that I made 5 years ago when the system was installed so that's pretty good considering degradation!

 

[h2ofun]

I have 13.2 KW of panels and made 42KWh on the solstice this year... the same amount that I made 5 years ago when the system was installed so that's pretty good considering degradation!

thats great