Title : Battery Bank Sizing (How to choose the right size battery bank for your solar system)

Objective : To provide enough stored power for loads without having to regularly discharge to an
unhealthy point.

Date : 16 Jan 2020

Solar battery sizing (otherwise known as battery bank sizing) is one of the most important
considerations when choosing the specifics of your solar electric system. By wiring multiple batteries
together in different wiring arrangements you can design a battery bank that's right for your solar
power system and thus correctly perform solar battery sizing.

N Description
o
1. Amount of money possess that can spend on the solar project.
2. Number of days that able to use before needing to recharge the batteries.
3. Amount of power needing for all of the appliances.
4. Amount of volts of solar system produces,
- If system produces 48V, then need enough batteries in battery bank to store 48V.
- Actually a little less is better (eg: 36V system with a 24V battery bank) just to be sure
the system ca charge the battery bank even in the case of a sudden voltage drop.
5. Amount of Storage capacity (Ah) that battery bank need,
- If the area gets less hours of sunlight in the day, more batteries need so that it can
store more “amp hours”.
- The more amp hours, the longer total power reserve would take to deplete.
6. Rate of discharge you want to have,
- The slower the batteries can discharge, the more hours you'll get out of them
- The way to find out a battery's rate of discharge is by looking at it and finding the
value marked: (C-?).
- If (C-10) then this means the battery takes 10 hours to discharge fully, if it's (C-5) then
the battery takes 5 hours to discharge fully.
7. Depth of discharge you want to go to before recharging,
- This is decided by your specific power needs / capacity and affects the battery's
lifespan.

Table 1: Factors affecting battery bank sizing

Note: When sizing a battery bank, always size your solar panels bigger than your battery bank to be
able to compensate for factors such as voltage drop, power fluctuations and energy loss due to wear
on the system.

Let's say you go out and buy a battery for your solar system that is 12 volts (push) and 105
amp hours (storage capacity). You could find out approximately how much energy this battery will
store / provide by calculating the watt hours.

Example: Multiply the volts (V) x the amp hours (AH) and divide by 100.

Volts x Amp Hours / 100 = Watt Hours

12V x 105AH = 1260 / 100 = 12.6 Watt Hours

This means is that you can power a 100 watt appliance for 12.6 hours on a fully charged battery.
Source: http://www.altenergy.org/renewables/solar/DIY/battery-bank-sizing.html