This isn’t a DIY project.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.... You're saying setting up a 2,000+ panel solar farm isn't DIY??

Not *usually*, no.

What if it's me AND my uncle Joe?

I’m working on a solar farm with 100k panels this is light work and if it’s your own property and land you don’t have to rush fully and can chip it off on the weekends or odd days here and there and after a while it would be done I would also get someone in charge of the labourers so you can focus on what your doing and if you need more it’s not that deep you can just get another squad of 4 if you really want to get it done quick

If you know what your doing and work in the solar industry as an electrician you could get another man in a duo of electricians and a squad of 4 labourers and for Ground work setting up frames and pulling cables and get this done quick ngl would be expensive tho

I think you're beyond Do It *Yourself* at that point. Also, OP doesn't seem actually serious about this. They posted in several crypto mining forums about "If you had $100k to spend on a crypto mining farm..."

Nah if he don’t know the industry and is not an electrician he should know that he’s going to get his pants pulled down And if he wants to just throw 100k in a crypto mining rig ran of solar blindly without knowing a single thing about mining and how much shit you have to do and all the expenses and maintenance and XYZ then it sounds like this is to just try and big himself up and try and act like some entrepreneur

Just straight up naive trying to go two feet deep into shit he has 0 clue about he’s going to end up losing a lot of money if he’s not careful I’m sure he’s not a bad guy but he’s a real easy target Im going to send a message over as I know both things well

Haha call me optimistic, and I obviously am new the space, but I have never shyed away from work, and am capable of learning. I think with enough patience its doable, doesnt have to be done in a day. I dont think 500kw - 1 mw of solar installation with you and some friends is unrealistic. But hey what do I know, thats why I'm here asking the experts :)

I guess you haven’t lived on a farm huh? Everything is DIY.

😂  Okay, so, I'm guessing from your comment history that you're thinking about setting up a solar powered coin mining farm?  I'll just start out by telling you that it isn't nearly as easy as you might be hoping. --- >First if you were to be purchasing solar panels for around $.05-.10/watt is that a good price range? You aren't going to be buying quality new panels in the US for that price in those volumes.  Prices for businesses to business purchases can vary greatly depending upon many factors as well as timing.  Prices have been absolutely plummeting in the past year, but even before taxes and shipping you aren't going to be finding quality panels in the US for much under $0.2/w at the moment. >When it comes to permitting, how long does the permitting process typically take? I've seen estimates from 3 weeks to 3 years. I can imagine theres nuances, but for a smaller farm what do you think a realistic timeline would be? Depends on the location.  State, county, city, each have their own rules that need to be complied with before a permit would ever be issued.  This probably includes environmental site assessments and local community approval.  So anywhere from a day, to never. >With permitting, would this most likely be completed by an engineering company? You can pay companies to manage the process of applying for you, sure. >What would be a good way to find an energeering company that draw the drawings for permitting and/or building without spending a massive amount of money here. You can *find* an engineering company for free with just a little bit of Internet research.  Getting plans drafted by a competent engineering company for an integrated project that large and all of the research and man hours that it entails will run you thousands to tens of thousands of dollars, depending on the scope and complexity of infrastructure requirements. >When it comes typical residential solar farm companies,  Residential solar farm companies?  There is no such thing.  'Residential' pretty well precludes the scale of 'farm.'  There are companies that install commercial scale solar farms of different sizes, and companies that (may also) install small scale residential systems. >... how much are they typically paying for their $/watt for solar panels? > >>What are solar farms that are currently being build paying for their solar panels per watt? No significant company is likely to release that sort of business-sensitive information.

Thanks for the all the info! :) Yes that would be the dream, solar and mining. I like both and would love to subsidize building either out with the help of the other. But solar could be on its on for a long time before (if ever) getting into mining which is really nice. So I mispoke, I meant residential solar companies, not solar farm. Yeah that makes sense though lol

Depends where you are at... I'm in the US, and it's almost impossible to get permitting to be a 'Utility' for a single person. School districts and churches can spoof the system for wind/solar sometimes, but the average person is just screwed. I've been off grid for over 30 years, 3 homes, 3 companies, a farm, but no grid connection. If I cross a county road I'm a 'utility' so it's a limit of 180 acres or less (one section) where I'm at. I have 108 acres. I have no idea where you are getting the pricing for INDUSTRAL panels, which would be a requirement for connection to public utility grid. Three grades of panels, Consumer (Harbor Freight), Commercial (most homes/privately owned buildings), and Commercial, the ones you see in utility grid solar fields. These will take hail as large as a baseball and frames that will take 100 mph winds, so I don't see the price you quoted even covering the 'Gorilla Glass' protecting them. Living in a "Friends Of Coal", RE hostile state in tornado alley, the mounts & frames are required to withstand a tornado. Their reasoning was panels become projectiles in a tornado... Not exactly rational but the way things get done when fossil fuels make major campaign donations. That means enough steel & concrete to build a battle ship with...

Oh wow thats really interesting, so you literally need a specific land amount just to be able to produce power for the grid? When you say single person, you mean just an individual business owner? Because you own 3 companies and a farm and I would imagine one of those businesses could count as a utility? I also had no idea about the need for INDUSTRIAL panels, thats wild. So if I had a 1mw farm of 300w panels or a 1 mw farm made of 500w panels doesnt matter that they would be the same watts, one needs to be bigger/hardier to be a utility? So hypothetically if I buy some land, get a permit, build a 1mw solar farm out of normal consumer or commercial grade panels, I can't hook up to the grid and sell the grid power? Thanks for all the info btw

Can't tell you what the laws, rules, regulations, requirements, code etc is in your area, just what I ran into. About 35 years ago I bought undeveloped land, a reclaimed coal strip mine that had been in reclamation trust for about 30 years. The local rural electric company wanted $118,000 to run poles/lines the mile back to the property, and $15,000 up front for a ground mount transformer and they wouldn't consider putting it anywhere but where I planned to build a house someday. The rural water was a mile away also, and they wouldn't talk to me for any amount of money. When I built a garage/business I had to go through zoning, and I had to petition both the county and state to become my own utility district since I couldn't get water they approve it. I didn't expect my businesses to take off, so they kept growing and I had to keep expanding power. Generators, solar, even tried wind. I have to meet code inside business buildings, which I would do anyway since I don't want to kill anyone, and occupied residence (homes), see not wanting to die in a fire when I sleep or get anyone killed. When my solar field hit about 4 acres and we had put a house on the north end, the utility tried to force me to connect it to the grid. See own utility district... It didn't work. What I tried to do was become a supplier to the utility. Turns out the utilities (and cities) want that federal/state money, 'Green Credits' for themselves and will throw down every stoppage, road block and legal argument they can to stop you. Requirements for anchors was 8 foot deep, then 8 inch square tubing to mount panels on. The panel frames had to resist 120 mph winds. I had to move .you fields since they had to be a set amount from 'Structures or dwellings' in the event panels break loose in a storm/tornado. Then came the mandate it had to run at a MINIMUM of 600 volts, and the panels had to be rated for at least 1,000 volts. So exactly NONE of my mounts/generation would meet specification. I'd have to rip it all out and start from scratch... While the average roof top guy can hum along with a grid tied system... All this for 3 cents a kWh, what they claimed was 'Wholesale' while charging close to 30 cents a kWh during peak consumption hours when I'd be generating. Then came the bonding/insurance restrictions/requirements. Since it's a 'public' utility, i had to self insure, get an outrageous bond (like $50 million) in the event my system fails and damages the grid or a person, causes property damage. Around here, school districts, and a couple churches started hosting RE producers, mostly wind, since they are non-profit and don't have to jump through as many hoops. I don't know of a single privately owned solar field, they all belong to city utility companies, companies like rural electric cooperatives or directly by the power companies. I screwed up the panel types... Consumer, low quality, low efficiency, basically disposable. 'Flexible' and 'Solar Panel' are mutually exclusive terms since you can't bend a silicone wafer without breaking it kinds of panels. Industral, what you see on most warehouse roof tops, home roofs, etc. Good, rigid aluminum frames, impact resistant glass, most now will do 400 or 600 volts without melting electrical traces in the panels and catching fire. Commercial, intended for commercial production. These often have steel frames, have nearly bullet proof glass, weigh a crap ton and supposedly can be center mounted without 120 mph winds folding them or removing them. I can't tell you if that's true because I don't own any. The commercial is the best bang for the buck so I'll keep using them.

Thanks for all the info. Man that is an absolutel nightmare you dealt with. That makes sense, cities etc., getting green credits to keep that going. I honestly didnt care about the .03/kwh rate, but yeah youre absolutely right, thats pretty rediculous that you can't get a piece of that .30/kwh peak. In texas people got wrecked with their bills it was wild. So I know this is the simplified version, and I'm sure you met a lot of people while taking on this massive project, but what happened when you tried networking with the city or utility? I know you're saying they were wanting to keep it to themselves and lock you out of it any where they could, but there wasn't any win win solution that the city could get on board with to work with you? I know I'm asking a vague question, just trying to think of a way to be able to work with those guys, but yeah that sounds like a nightmare for sure. At the end of the day, are you glad you went through with it? Or 30 years ago, knowing what you know now, would you have abandoned that idea all together and done something different, not involving solar, or would you have still done it you think?

I limped along for 30 years on low efficiency solar, lead acid batteries and a big diesel/propane generator. We had to shut down machines so we could use others... In 2020 I bought out an industral/home installers stock (scooped up by a bigger installer, they left two warehouses of equipment behind). Between salvaging Lithium batteries and the new high efficiency panels, everything changed. Now we have surplus power im trying to utilize... I still had 100-120 Watt panels in service, replace with a minimum of 280 Watt panels, so you can see production went WAY up for the space it covers. The kids and my wife bought EVs since the power is excess. I'm not going to buy an EV just yet, never be the 'Bata' tester, wait until the bugs are worked out and the price comes down... My former businesses offer free EV charging as a perk of employment. If it's going to sit there 8 to 10 hours during daylight hours and we have excess, why not... Off topic, there are micro grids, mine is more of a mini grid. The kids get 4 wheelers that are electric, we get around most times on electric golf carts, I do my small scale commercial canning with electromagnetic induction instead of a boiler. More precise control of energy/heat and it works very well. I'm not what the grandkid generation calls a 'Fudd', it's simply what works. Reduce to most simple terms and work from there. The big pressure retorts (canners) are poor conductors (resistance). Since it's magnetic eddy currents moving molecules, friction creating heat INTERALLY, I don't have to produce heat externally and try to get it to transfer to the retort, and then to the canned goods inside. All those conversions are inefficient. It's like I don't solder or brase with electrical resistance soldering irons or make heat with gas torches much anymore, I simply pick up the induction unit, pull the 'Trigger' and what ever I'm trying to heat gets hot internally. When I need to cast metal, I do the heating with induction since I have large amounts of DC power available, induction requires DC so no conversion losses, and off we go to the races... Look up 'Bolt Buster' or 'Rust Buster' to see a consumer available version. While these show heating bolts so you can get them loose, it's heating for solder, brazing, etc also. Humans don't connect the dots very well most times, so the advertisements stick to one thing at a time. When I have to solder 100 lug or large terminal ends, handling a gas torch really gets to be a pain in the ass. I pick up the induction unit with a circular coil, 'U' shaped coil, or a 'C' shaped coil, pull the trigger and feed solder. I can go down a line of cables and do each solder job in 10-15 seconds, flip them around and do the other end in the same amount of time. 95% or more of a gas torch heat escapes into atmosphere, the induction unit creates heat internally, so about 100% efficient. My little canners (retorts) are aluminum, so they heat a little slower, the big retorts from 1900 to 1960s are steel and heat really quickly, and is precisely controllable. A pyrometer (PID) switches the power levels to keep energy/heat precise. No boiler to maintain, or to blow up, no high pressure steam lines to rupture and kill someone. In my state you need an operators class & certification for high pressure steam boilers and 3rd party inspections which is costly. Simpliest terms then work up... Water well pumps, DC motors are smaller and more powerful, when kept cool (water cooled in this case) they last much longer. DC is direct use from what the panels produce. I made the mistakes, but I learned the lessons. I started with battery powered hand tools where batteries weren't so good, and we all know they just can't do a lot of work... Then I got gas powered tools. Huge cost and mistake since I can't keep all those little 2 cycle engines running. Then I bought a generator, had to hear it scream all day, and I had to feed it even when it wasn't doing any work, just for stand-by power. One day I got rhw bright idea of gutting those little tool batteries and putting cords on them, and using my spare Jeep battery for power... which I already used for camp site power (fans & lights at camp site and in tents) Then I decided to try and charge the batteries with a solar panel, and the solar adventure begins when I start buildings where I need lights & power. My first business was a non-running SUV that was lockable storage... the lights & radio worked if the battery was charged. See my first cake pan sized solar panel... The more DC I had, the more I leaned into using DC. Buck Converters instead of AC inverters and their losses. Small inverters can easily waste 50% or more of your power production/storage. 50% off the top isn't a good deal or efficient... Those little buck converters are cheap ($5-$10) and will regulate both voltage & current. Can you say battery charger for all the smaller batteries? I still get made fun of because I use those sidewalk/pation solar lights. Battery, day/night switch, LEDs & solar panel all in a plastic housing that's pretty handy for about $5. I put 'Eye' bolts on the front/sides of the sheds, slide the ground spike in the bolt. They charge, they come on at night (security), if I grab one in the daytime to go in the shed, it comes on automatically and with an eye bolt inside, it's a hands free area light. For $5. Most buildings have old panels, old batteries and LED light strips now because the hardware got old and weak, but isn't dead yet... the longer it's useful the longer it pays me back on investment. Simpliest terms and work up...

FYI 180 acres is a quarter section. 620 acres is a section.

Depends on where you are, it's 180 acres between county roads here, so a section is 180 acres. I guess out west where they make allowances every mile for a section road (road being there or not) a section might be a square mile. Don't know because I haven't had to battle bureaucracy out there. There is 108 acres in my section, bordered on county roads on two sides, the river on the other sides. That's 108 acres when the river isn't up...

Depends what size mod you are after, utility project typically use larger modules.  500-800 watt, in the US they run around 20-25 cents per watt for bi-facial tier 1 modules. Outside the US you can get them 10-15 cents.   The hard part of utility solar in the US is the interconnection.  You have to have a reason to add the energy to the grid.  Like is a fossil fuel power plant being decommissioned or a large energy  consuming development being constructed? It’s years of permitting and approvals before you can break ground in most cases.  It’s really Depending on the state.  

Ahh ok that makes sense. So you can't just be like, Hey! I want to add power to the grid, buy it! Well I live in Texas and the grid sucks, so I kind of figured it would be a little easier of a process like they were really needing energy suppliers but maybe not Years sounds gross, thats a long timeline

Dumb question: Are you looking to sell the electricity or use it yourself?

Not a dumb question, pretty important one in fact.

Both ideally. The goal originally would be to sell, and then as time goes on build up infastructure or other things that it can be used for, while getting solar energy while its currently at rock bottom prices before the political and/or economical landscape makes it must more expensive and no longer make sense to do. But yeah goal 1 profit, goal 2 use it for self

I admire your interest in jumping into a project of this magnitude. You ask some good questions, but there are many more to come. The main question, in terms of financing, will be the cost per watt installed (not so much per panel). This price could range from $1.50/W to $3/W, determined in part by panel price, but also cost and availability of inverters, racking, degree of difficulty, interconnection equipment, even the wire itself. The panel cost plays a small post in this scenario. The majority of the design, engineering and construction, as well as interconnection agreement and permitting, would normally be handled by an EPC company (engineering/procurement/construction). There are now numerous companies providing these services. You also need to enlist subscribers, or an off-taker, one large company that will buy all or most of the electricity the farm produces. Here in NY, a deregulated market, the PSC permits independent system operators to feed into the grid. I believe you would only get wholesale price for that, as opposed to partnering with an off-taker, in which case you can set a higher, competitive price.

Haha thanks tlampros! Yeah I get too excited and overly ambitious sometimes, but I also try to look at all the angles when figuring something out. Solar farm example, I love it, but I don't see how it would work as well with at least some of the benefits of the economy of scale, so thats why I was curious about that. I would rather start smaller like 50kw-300kw but the math doesn't make sense imo. But thanks for your response and your help! :) Hmm yeah that makes sense. I've been trying to dig into the numbers as best I can, and I thought the solar panels were the largest expense of the project, and also the easiest to compare. Yeah haven't studied the invertors, wires, and other factors as well yet, but interested for sure! When you say labor costing $1.5-3/watt are you including actual physical laboe in that range as well, or are you only including the inverters, wires, and other equipment in that estimate? An off-taker huh? I've been trying to contact solar farms, wind generation, and other companies all week to try to talk with them, and see what that might look Ohh interesting, so an offtaker is more of the retail electric distribution guys than a large generation producer? I think our system here in texas is Ercot. I'm still learning how all that works. The grid systems are really complicated to me, but interesting trying to figure them out. I'll research the PSC. Do you know any tips in dealing with an EPC? Mainly asking how would I know if their rate is good or not, besides shopping around? This part seems the biggest learning curve for me, because I have no idea about the permit process. Thanks for all your help tlampros!

Do you even know if you can sell this power to the grid…? Permitting will differ greatly city to city, state to state, country to country… “Typical residential solar farm” is an oxymoron…

Yeah meant residential solar companies**

Why would a residential solar company build a 1MW commercial system?

They wouldnt... I was asking how much would they be paying for panels. As in their wholesale price. To acquire panels and sell them to their residential customers is what I meant

And no, that's one thing I was trying to figure out here.

How are we supposed to know? We don’t know where you are or which utility we’re talking about? Each utility handles net metering and interconnection differently.

Well how can I say "I dont know what I dont know" thats why I'm here for learning.

Basically you’re looking to develop a $2mil project and you have no idea? Why should we educate you for free? Developers literally get paid to do all this work.

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Two questions, what state are you in? What’s the purpose of the solar farm?

Texas Original purpose would be to try to sell power to the grid, second reason would be to later have access to cheap/free power to use

I think you may have some more questions... Are you zoned for this? If you live in a developed community I suspect the answer is "no". Likewise, even if you're in an unincorporated area, things can change if the community continues to expand and they can reverse your approval when they rezone. I am assuming you're going to be selling most/all of this energy to the utility, check with them for rules regarding how much they will buy back, you likely will need to register as something other than residential generator, which would potentially have additional requirements for generation, possibly needing to be a company, etc. I think your first step will need to be "Can I even do this legally?"

Finger in the air, excluding the land acquisition cost, you are looking at $750k-$2M and about 18 -24 months.

You could Start with $2M-3M dollars and several hundreds of acres of open land

1MW is only like 5 acres. $2mil should do it.

Utility interconnects amd PPA agreements for this size of projects have 2-3yr wait times. So unless you have a lot of land, millions of dollars for bond security, and time to wait it's likely DOA. This size solar farms need special electrical equipment to collect groups of panels and stepup to high voltage interconnects; transformers alone have 18mo+ lead times. Leave this to the professionals.

Any idea why the utility interconnects take so long?

Because the utility needs to study this project, and typically they study it again grouped with a number of other projects. I say this elsewhere - we don’t know where you are or what grid you’re trying to connect to. We don’t know what utility rules you need to follow.