While you may agree that energy situation has just bettered (during Ramzan) but we arent sure

if it is going to remain the same in coming days or not. I personally suppose that situation may
remain uncertain for at least few years.
Considering the situation, businesses and home users have long been working to find the best
alternate energy solutions to meet their energy requirements. UPS is a solution for some,
generators for others but both involve energy input in one way or the other, leaving the whole
equation somewhat unviable, especially when 16 out of 24 hours are spent without power.
Solar power is one avenue where Pakistanis have found the ultimate solution. It requires no
external input other than the sun shine and can operate flawlessly for years and years.
General impression is that solar energy is expensive. It is. But probably not as much as one
might think. Also the cost that solar energy can save you in the long-run brings you equally good
ROI for well-structured investments made today.
In this post we will try to give you an idea of estimated cost that setting up solar energy system
may require. So lets go straight away to the business.

Planning the Solar Energy Plant

First thing you would want to do is to plan the solar energy plant as per your load requirement.
That is, calculating the magnitude of electric load your solar plant will be required to produce.
For the purpose, the first thing you need to do is to make a list of things that you would want to
run on Solar energy. Naturally, more load will mean more investment requirement and vice
versa.

Power Required for Home Appliances:

To help you with calculating the energy load, we are listing below few things with the respective
energy load they consume to operate:

Energy Saver: 10/20/40 Watts

Fan: 90-110 Watts

Some Older fans consumer 120 Watts

Tube Lights:
o

Full tube: 40 Watts

Half tube: 20 Watts

LED Bulbs: 7 Watts

LED TV (Almost all sizes): 30 to 40 Watts

LCD TV (Almost all sizes): 90-100 Watts

Old TVs: 300-400 Watts

Iron: 1000 Watts

Refrigerator: They consume 250 Watts to 700 Watts depending on make and type

Deep Freezers: 600 Watts

Water Motor
o

half horse power: 325 Watts

One Horse Power: 750 Watts

Laptop: 15-20 Watts

Router/Modems/Chargers (Combined): 10-15 Watts

ACs:
o

During first half an hour or so when compressor runs at full throttle: 2800-3000
Watts

Rest of the time when temperature settles down: 1500 Watts

Invertor ACs:

During first half an hour or so when compressor runs at full throttle: 1800 Watts

Rest of the time when temperature settles down: 500-600 Watts

Items listed above and their corresponding energy requirements may vary for different
situations, depending on conditions, make and their age. But we can take above mentioned
values to plan our solar energy plant.
Just to mention, Invertor type ACs are comparatively a new thing, they cost little extra. For
example a 1.5 ton Invertor AC from Haier will cost you around Rs. 60,000 as compared to Rs.
40,000 for usual AC from the same company. But they save energy and are usually
recommended when your energy source is powered by a solar system.

Things you need for Solar Energy Plant

Below are three things that you will need during the entire setup of

Solar Panels

Batteries

Invertors

Solar panels are those black plates installed on roof tops. These panels are responsible for
converting the sun-shine into electric energy. These solar panels come on per watts basis, that
is, a solar panel can be of 100 watts. Putting two such panels will get you 200 watts and so on.
Batteries are required to store electricity for night-time load shedding. During day time your
system will power up the appliances, but you have to store energy to make sure that appliances
are powered smoothly during night time load-shedding when solar-plant isnt producing any
electricity.
Inverters are used to convert electricity into a form that is usable by our appliances.

Cost of a Solar Plant

Above mentioned three items will cost according to the electricity requirements we may have
depending on our needs.
As a reference, lets assume following situation:
We need to run following items on solar energy:

2 Fans

2 Energy Savers

1 laptop

and few chargers

Heres the corresponding load we will need:

2 Fans: 110 x 2 = 220 Watts

2 Energy Savers: 20 x 2 = 40 Watts

1 laptop = 20 Watts

and few charges = 10 Watts

Total: 270 Watts

Ideally speaking we will require 270 Watts of energy to be produced by solar system that we are
going to deploy in our example case.
Practically, we will deploy 540 Watts panels, because when on Solar energy during day time
we need to power our appliances with 270 watts, plus we need to charge our batteries too for
usage during load-shedding in the night.
Here is the corresponding cost for 540 Watts of Panels:

Solar Panel: Rs. 100 per watt = Rs. 100 x 540 = Rs. 54,000

Invertor we will need 1KW invertor = Rs. 26,000

Batteries: 2 x 200 Amp batteries: Rs. 13,000 x 2 = Rs. 26,000

Total Cose: Rs. 54,000 + Rs. 26,000 + Rs. 26,000 = Rs. 106,000

Note:

You can use one battery instead of 2, but that will store lesser amount of electricity
which will give shorter back-up time during nights. Same as we deal with UPS batteries
more the battery power will mean more back-up time.

With two batteries and the load requirements in our example case the back-up time will
be around 4-6 hours during night.

Please note that during day time you wont require batteries, so technically speaking
you can run this solar plant for assumed load for whole day (as far as the sun is up).

Since the load is 540 Watts, 1KW inverter will do the job. If load was 2400 Watts then
you would have to use 3KW inverter.

Pricers of bigger inverters are given below.

So you need to spend Rs. 106,000 for the solar plant to power up 2 fans, 2 energy savers, one
laptop and few chargers for seamless up-time.

Here are Few things to note:

Price of solar plant may differ. Above mentioned price of Rs. 100 per watt solar plant is
market average rate for premium quality Chinese plants

You can get European (German) solar panels for Rs. 150 per watt, but thats just
additional cost as Chinese panels work fine.

If your load exceeds 500 watts then you will have to use high-voltage inverters, that is 2
KW, 3kW or above. Here are estimated prices for bigger inverters:
o

1 KW Inverter: Rs. 26,000

2 KW Inverter: Rs. 35,000

3 KW Inverter: Rs. 45,000

4 KW Inverter: Rs. 60,000

5 KW Inverter: Rs. 80,000

10 KW Inverter: Rs. 200,000

P.S. Prices of inverters also vary, depending on the quality and made. Prices
mentioned here are for good quality Chinese inverters

Number of batteries will also depend on the load you may require to store. Heres the
desi formula for calculating back-up timing of a battery:
o

Amperes of battery x number of hours with sun-shine / load = Back-up time in

hours

Example: (200Amp + 200Amp) x 10 hours / 540 Watts = around 7 Hours

Amount of batteries required in your solar plant can be determined by using or rearranging above desi formula:

Back up time = Amperes of Battery x Number of Hours with Sun-shine / Load

Amperes of Battery = Back up time required / Number of hours with Sun Shine x Load

Further things to note:

Life of solar panels is around 25 years, however, with time the efficiency or electricityproduction ability of panels lessens

Life time of dry-battery is around 5-7 years

Life time of liquid-battery is around 2 years

Solar panels work fine below 45 degree Celsius

Solar panels work well even in hilly areas, such as Murree

Disclaimer: Anything mentioned above is produced after market survey with purpose to give you
an idea about solar plants and its pricings. These rates, however, may vary to any extent.
Special thanks to Waqas Khaleeq for helping us in preparing this post.
If theres anything un-answered or not clear, please go ahead and ask in comments below and I
will do my best to address them.

POWER = VOLT X CURRENT

POWER = 220 VOLT X 5 AMP
POWER = 1100 WATT
Practically, we will deploy 2200 Watts panels, because when on Solar energy during day time
we need to power our appliances with 1100 watts, plus we need to charge our batteries too for
usage during load-shedding in the night. If 100 watt one panel then we need 22 panel. But I
suggest to go for 250 watt panel then we need only 5 panel.