How many kilowatt hours does a 180 watt solar panel make in one month?

Question

How many kilowatt hours does a 180 watt solar panel make in one month?

Answer 1

OK, let's say you live at the equator and get twelve hours of sun a day and you have your panel on a motor that aims it at the sun so there is no loss and it is the desert so there is no clouds where you are at.  In a month with 30 days you would have 360 hours of sun making 180 watts or 64800 watt/hours.

Divided by 1000 = 64.8 kilowatt/hours.

Most likely you have to take loss into account so you can get 1/2 that in summer and 1/4 that in winter.

Answer 2

Refer to the Average Insolation table for your location.  This is available on line from the US Department of Energy or the National Weather Service.

For example, in most of the American Southeast, the average insolation is five (5) hours per day, or 150 hours per month (30 days).

So 150 x 180 = 27kWH per month.  You can make it a little more efficient by adding a tracker, but in most cases it's not worth the extra complexity.  To get the figure above, you need to tilt the panel back from the vertical by 90 degrees minus your latitude.