Building the array, Day 1 (a.k.a. hard work in the heat)

I want to share a picture of Tegucigalpa. Yesterday we took a day off to do some sightseeing and we were able to go to the top of one of the surrounding peaks, El Picacho. From there you can see Tegucigalpa and Comayaguela, two separate cities that have grown into a single metroplex of sorts over time. The cities are separated by a river (Rio Grande O Choluteca, according to Google maps, but I heard Rio Bravo when we were discussing it...). What a view!

View of Tegucigalpa from Parque Nacional El Picacho

Today we performed the first few steps in building our array. This involved installing the wiring and placing the supports for the 38 photovoltaic panels. Thankfully, our UPi partners were available to help, so we got a lot accomplished. I will include a picture below, and it may not seem like much. However, the work involves placing 50 aluminum bays, lifting and placing many (90, to be exact) 25-pound bricks, connecting  40 wires to the PV panel breakers, 20 wires to each of the 24-volt batteries and associated buses (these are what connect to the DC-AC inverter). The electrical work involves being inside an unconditioned room for hours at a time - it gets pretty hot! Tomorrow we will do some heavy lifting. We'll unload 38 (40-pound) solar panels from the container, then will secure them to the bays. Then, we will place the remaining 25-pound bricks on the bays to fully secure them.

Here's a picture showing most of the bays and some of the bricks. These two UPi students, Victor and Victoria, volunteered their time today and I am very grateful they were willing to delay their studying for their finals to help out. ¡Buena suerte mañana!

Setting up the Solar panel supports

 We wanted to post a fun picture of the team today. This is the best of the ones I took. It's great to have a fun and social team.

UTEP - UPi team