: Schools and Monastery Project Experience :
Butterfly Early Childhood Home
The butterfly home is a non-profit providing 24/7 care facilities for kids in Nepal in a very unique situation. To read more about the work they do please visit this page.
We worked with the butterfly home during their construction period to design this solar system into the core of the facility.
We were able to design the solar structure as a shelter over the toilets and hand-basins for the kids and provide high quality automatic street lighting that is maintenance free and runs all night for safety and security.
The power system itself feeds a protected loads switchboard in the compound, this powers critical loads throughout the compound with uninterrupted and clean solar energy. In this location the grid is unreliable and power quality poor, so the solar PV system provides essential power to indoor and outdoor lighting, CCTV surveillance, security systems, office computers and network, kitchen, medical and study areas.
- SMA Sunny Island Hybrid
- 7kW AC coupled PV
- 1500 AH of deep cycle battery storage.
Druk Amitabha Mountain Phase 2
Another project at Druk Amitabha Mountain based on AC coupled SMA multi-cluster system, this system was built out on the Temple once it had been retrofitted after the 2015 earthquake, we worked with the contractors to re-design the roof of the temple to integrate the solar components into the building design. The power system is located in the basement of the Temple this includes PV inverters, multi-cluster system and large deep cycle battery storage. From this location power is distributed to specific buildings in the compound to run protected load circuits. We also worked with the contractors to re-wire the entire temple to address bad wiring and other installation issues.
This project is a game changer because it enables uninterrupted clean power without all of the power quality problems that come with the Kathmandu grid, it also reduced the need to run the site generators during power outages. The Monastery worked with professional lighting engineers, all of the interior is lit by customed designed OLED or LED lights, it also has professional audio, video streaming, CCTV surveillance and IT equipment. None of this equipment would work well or survive running on Kathmandu power under normal conditions.
- SMA multicluster system
- 100kW AC coupled PV SMA STP 25kW PV inverters
- 8000 AH of deep cycle battery storage.
Druk Amitabha Mountain Phase 1
This was one of those landmark projects for us, we worked very closely with the Druk Amitabha Mountain to design and install this SMA based solar system. It was the first SMA Multicluster system in Nepal and we actually flew an SMA employee out to Nepal to commission the system and assess our installation work.
The project was a large investment for the Druk Amitabha Mountain and was a game changer for them in terms of solving the “power problem” they had at the site. Being AC coupled meant we could basically disconnect the grid and diesel generator and hook-up the solar system, we soon found that there were other areas of the distribution network to rectify. One of the benefits of having this project onsite where Joel lived for so long was that he was able to get the in-depth knowledge and experience of operating a system like this-what goes into keeping it running month after month. There were a lot of learnings from this one, including an earthquake.
This project really gave us a lot of hands-on exposure and is why Peak Power are the experts in SMA and Victron systems.
- SMA multicluster system
- 120kW AC coupled PV
- 8000 AH of deep cycle battery storage.
- diesel / grid hybrid
Monastery Off-Grid Solar
This remote community where residents do the traditional 3-year retreat is tucked away just outside Kathmandu with limited physcial access and extremely poor grid connection. Peak power designed and installed this system many years ago.
The site has a very poor grid connection and no generator, access is difficult and the residents are not able to take care of the system, therefore the system has been designed to be extremely reliable and administrable via the internet.
It powers critical loads such as security lighting, security systems, internet, telecoms, water pumps, and other essential loads. The site has been known to be frequented by Leopards so having 24/7 lighting is important.
We also did extensive earthing, direct strike protection system and surge protection throughout, although the compound is small, there are several different buildings within, all are supplied with a grid feeder and a protected loads feeder, this ensures we can distribute clean and reliable solar where it is needed.
- 1 phase Outback Power hybrid system
- 10 kW DC coupled PV
- 1500 AH of deep cycle battery storage
Pushpasadan School
Pushpasadan English Boarding School in Kathamndu has around 1,200 students, this system was installed to provide reliable power to office and student IT equpiment - one of the first Victron systems we did in Nepal.
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