The following diagrams show you how lithium ion batteries could pair with an RPS Solar Pump. RPS does not carry Lithium Ion batteries for our pump systems, but we’ve fielded a number of requests over the years about how to make this work! You will have to source an outside charge controller compatible with charging lithium ion batteries. We don’t have any specific recommendations for which charge controllers. Our charge controllers can not *charge* lithium ion batteries, but can pull power from them, see below diagrams. The left side depicts typical RPS systems with lead acid batteries, the right side depicts an alternative lithium-ion friendly set up.
Why RPS Doesn’t Use (or yet recommend) Lithium Ion Batteries
RPS has always taken pride in creating systems that optimize for our customer’s performance and value, not profit. While there are companies profiting off high margins of expensive Lithium Ion batteries, we feel the cost to value ratio is not yet acceptable. Customers rely on our experience and wisdom in spending their hard earned dollars on off-grid components and we feel Lithium Ion is not yet in the category we would strongly recommend, even in climates that are moderate enough to get desired performance. As RPS serves all of America, the hot and the cold climates in some really rugged environments, Li-Ion are not versatile enough and far too sensitive to temperature at this time.
