Green Energy Houseboat Adventure

Green Energy Houseboat Adventure

by Morris Merritt
(San Antonio,TX, USA)

The green energy houseboat is dry docked in San Antonio,TX

This houseboat adventure is how to make it green energy efficient? I bought a small 31 ft. houseboat that I call FREEDOM. I have it in dry dock where I live, while I redo everything to make it as green as possible.

When I'm finished, I'm going to live on it on the ICW (IntraCoastal Waterway). The real adventure is that I have no idea what I'm doing!

If you have any tips, let me know. Right now, I'm thinking Natures Head, Air X Marine, Sharp Solar panels and no idea for the generator yet.

Let me know if you'd like to hear more? Thanks, Mo / FREEDOM

Reply - Answer
Well Morris, congratulations on your decision on making your houseboat green as possible. It sounds like you're on your way to doing it right.

Some of my tips to achieve a "green houseboat" are:

1) Look at your consumption of 12v and 120 volt power, this is the starting point to making a green energy efficient houseboat.

2) You have chosen some of the popular energy producing methods, solar panels, wind generator, etc... The composting head (toilet) is an environmentally friendly choice also.

3) To give you an excellent source for more tips and information about living green, you'll find that Real Goods is unbeatable, and they have been doing it for more than 30 years.

Lastly, hopefully some of our readers will share and post comments about their green energy efficient houseboat experiences.

IAN - from www.all-about-houseboats.com

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Green Energy Houseboat Adventure

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Alternate power choice
by: Anonymous

What about a water wheel to generate power, it could be connected to an alternator. You could anchor in a river to get some moving water.

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Green Living & Houseboats
by: roger

Morris, glad to hear you are thinking about green energy for a houseboat. I wrote the article extreme green, and one on composting toilets.

My first houseboat I named "Freedom" after installing solar panels. Recently I have had some setbacks and I'll give you a quick overview on some problems.

First my consumption of electricity has increased a lot because of wanting more creature comforts. I thought I had enough solar panels and batteries to handle the load and everything, but I've recently had long periods of no sun.

Then when I did get some sun, I found that I had too many batteries in our battery bank to get them up to a proper voltage.

I am presently working on an article which I hope to post here in few days where I will explain what happened, and how I'm trying to prevent it from happening again in the future. Roger.

Reply - Answer
Roger, sorry to hear about your "no sun" problem. Just a thought, is there any way to "separate some of the batteries" in the storage house bank of batteries.

This way you could manually switch between the two banks of batteries, and control which bank you charge or draw power from?

This way the solar panels would be capable of allowing the batteries to reach the proper recharge voltage. Hmmm, food for thought.

Again, thanks for taking the time to post & share. IAN...

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Submitted by: roger

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Morris, glad to hear you are thinking about green energy for a houseboat. I wrote the article extreme green, and one on composting toilets. My first houseboat I named "Freedom" after installing solar panels. Recently I have had some setbacks and I'll give you a quick overview on some problems. First my consumption of electricity has increased a lot because of wanting more creature comforts. I thought I had enough solar panels and batteries to handle the load and everything, but I've recently had long periods of no sun. Then when I did get some sun, I found that I had too many batteries in our battery bank to get them up to a proper voltage. I am presently working on an article which I hope to post here in few days where I will explain what happened, and how I'm trying to prevent it from happening again in the future. Roger. <b>Reply - Answer</b> Roger, sorry to hear about your "no sun" problem. Just a thought, is there any way to "separate some of the batteries" in the storage house bank of batteries. This way you could manually switch between the two banks of batteries, and control which bank you charge or draw power from? This way the solar panels would be capable of allowing the batteries to reach the proper recharge voltage. Hmmm, food for thought. Again, thanks for taking the time to post & share. IAN...

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Green Energy Houseboat Adventure

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