Are U.S. Utilities Trying to Delay Easy-to-Use Solar 'Balcony' Panels? (npr.org) 120
Plug-in (or "balcony") solar panels can also be hung out a window or be set up in a backyard, reports NPR. They channel energy from the sun straight into a home's electrical outlet, generating enough electricity to power a refrigerator or microwave while "displacing electricity that otherwise would come in from the grid..."
But what's holding up their adoption in America? For the panels to become more widely available in the U.S., state lawmakers are proposing bills that eliminate complicated utility connection agreements, which are required for larger rooftop solar installations and, most utilities say, should apply to plug-in solar too. Those agreements, along with permitting and other installation costs, can double the price of solar panels. Utah enacted the first law, last May, supporting plug-in solar, and now some 30 pieces of similar legislation have been introduced around the United States. [And Virginia seems poised to pass a similar law.]
But the drive toward plug-in solar is facing pushback from electric utilities. They are raising safety concerns and prompting legislators to delay votes on the bills. So far, utilities have won over lawmakers in five states and convinced them to delay votes on plug-in solar bills... Plug-in solar advocates say that safety concerns about the new technology have been addressed and that utilities are really just worried about losing business, because every kilowatt-hour generated by a plug-in solar panel is one less the utility sells to a customer... There are safety risks with any electrical appliance, and it's true that plug-in solar panels present some unique problems. But safety experts also say those issues can be managed....
German utilities expressed many of the same concerns nearly a decade ago when plug-in solar started to become popular in Germany. But with more than a million systems installed, no safety incidents have been reported for customers who used the panels as instructed, according to a research paper funded by the U.S. Department of Energy.
But what's holding up their adoption in America? For the panels to become more widely available in the U.S., state lawmakers are proposing bills that eliminate complicated utility connection agreements, which are required for larger rooftop solar installations and, most utilities say, should apply to plug-in solar too. Those agreements, along with permitting and other installation costs, can double the price of solar panels. Utah enacted the first law, last May, supporting plug-in solar, and now some 30 pieces of similar legislation have been introduced around the United States. [And Virginia seems poised to pass a similar law.]
But the drive toward plug-in solar is facing pushback from electric utilities. They are raising safety concerns and prompting legislators to delay votes on the bills. So far, utilities have won over lawmakers in five states and convinced them to delay votes on plug-in solar bills... Plug-in solar advocates say that safety concerns about the new technology have been addressed and that utilities are really just worried about losing business, because every kilowatt-hour generated by a plug-in solar panel is one less the utility sells to a customer... There are safety risks with any electrical appliance, and it's true that plug-in solar panels present some unique problems. But safety experts also say those issues can be managed....
German utilities expressed many of the same concerns nearly a decade ago when plug-in solar started to become popular in Germany. But with more than a million systems installed, no safety incidents have been reported for customers who used the panels as instructed, according to a research paper funded by the U.S. Department of Energy.
Safety-- (Score:5, Informative)
The main safety issue with plug-in solar is that the solar panel must not feed power to the grid if there's an electrical outage. This is because repair crews for the utility company need to be sure that there isn't power coming in from the user side when they're repairing the producer side.
The Utah bill referenced (https://le.utah.gov/~2025/bills/static/HB0340.html) includes that explicitly:
(2)A portable solar generation device shall include a device or feature that prevents the system from energizing the building's electrical system during a power outage.
So, I'd think that as long as that is built into the system, and assuming it passes UL standards for consumer safety, I think the safety issue should not be a problem.
Re:Safety-- (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not the main safety issue. These systems do not have grid forming inverters and are simply unable to supply electricity (can't sync to a non-existent waveform) when there is no grid power available.
The biggest issue with plug-in solar is wiring safety. If you have a system that is protected by a circuit breaker, the idea IS any load downstream of that breaker cannot exceed the maximum load the wire is able to withstand without the breaker tripping. If you feed power in downstream of that circuit breaker you have the potential to draw a maximum power of what the breaker is capable of + whatever the solar panel is outputting over the wire depending on where in the circuit you're plugged into. Suddenly your breaker may not be able to prevent you overloading your wiring.
This scares me a bit in America. At least in Germany (where they note there's few safety issues) there's a tendency to have over spec'd wires with undersized breakers. Indeed most circuits have a 16A breaker with an installation design that could withstand 27A. Plugging in a 2000W panel (which these balcony panels won't do) simply won't burn your house down unless you plug multiple into the same circuit.
American wiring does not feature the same over-design.
Re:Safety-- (Score:5, Interesting)
Replying to self: UL seems to have recognised the big limitation in America as well. Plug-in solar installations such as balcony panels which do *not* have dedicated circuits with unique non-standard electrical outlet appear to be limited to 391W, which is quite shitty. Forget the microwave, you're barely running the TV. The limit in Germany is 800W.
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That's so interesting. What would the equivalent gauge be for the size / type of wiring that's used in Germany? We use 12 for 20a circuits and 14g for 15a.
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It would be 14AWG. But that's not the end of it. The actual ampacity is determined by method of installation and insulation. There's practical differences in wiring between the places which would in theory at least give German houses a higher safety margin (mainly mostly conduit based installation with V90 insulation).
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Germany runs on 230V, so 800W draws about 3.5A. That's a trivially light load for any household wiring. Even the thinnest standard European residential wire handles it without breaking a sweat.
The US runs on 120V, so 800W would draw about 6.7A, still well within what 14 AWG (rated 15A) handles safely, let alone 12 AWG.
So the wire gauge concern is essentially a non-issue in both countries at these power levels. The 391W American limit isn't being driven by wiring capacity - 14 AWG at 120V could handle double
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The biggest issue with plug-in solar is wiring safety. If you have a system that is protected by a circuit breaker, the idea IS any load downstream of that breaker cannot exceed the maximum load the wire is able to withstand without the breaker tripping. If you feed power in downstream of that circuit breaker you have the potential to draw a maximum power of what the breaker is capable of + whatever the solar panel is outputting over the wire depending on where in the circuit you're plugged into. Suddenly your breaker may not be able to prevent you overloading your wiring.
Panel fires due to hotspots caused by microcracking and diode failure from persistent shading are far more likely risks than this sort of piling on of unlikely events.
Plugging in a 2000W panel (which these balcony panels won't do) simply won't burn your house down unless you plug multiple into the same circuit.
It is generally a few hundred watts max. You are looking worse case at an extra watt/meter of energy dissipation on a typical 15A circuit using 14AWG romex. This isn't a real issue.
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It is generally a few hundred watts max.
Yes, precisely because the standards limit the power due to safety reasons. It's 800W max in Germany with a specific requirement that only one be attached to any circuit.
This isn't an unlikely situation. People overload circuits constantly which is why safety regulations are in place.
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This scares me a bit in America. At least in Germany (where they note there's few safety issues) there's a tendency to have over spec'd wires with undersized breakers. Indeed most circuits have a 16A breaker with an installation design that could withstand 27A. Plugging in a 2000W panel (which these balcony panels won't do) simply won't burn your house down unless you plug multiple into the same circuit.
American wiring does not feature the same over-design.
Not to mention the unique "split phase" system used in North America.
Most of our house devices operate on 120v, however our homes get a 240v handoff from the transformer on the pole, along with a dedicated neutral that taps into the center of that transformer.
This lets us derive 120v between neutral and one of the hot wires.
But these two 120v circuits (hot A to neutral, and neutral to hot B) are NOT the same, they are a full 180 degrees out of phase with each other.
Normally an attempt is made to "balance" t
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One possible work-around is to charge a battery, and use its outputs to power appliances. The battery can be charged from the mains as well. Obviously it's an additional cost and takes up a bit of space, but it will never feed energy back into the home wiring.
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The problem there is the usefulness of a system that only runs limited appliances rather than just feeding your house.
Re: Safety-- (Score:2)
The risk is there, but assuming the devices are limited to a certain size, the risk of wire overloading should be minimal.
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The American safety codes don't have near the margin the German ones do precisely because wiring is installed in a different way. But in any case it looks like the problem is largely resolved by making the systems borderline worthless. UL listed panels are limited to 391W.
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They all got a cut-off for that: Unless they detect voltage and frequency from external, they have nothing to sync to and will not inject power. This really is a pseudo-concern.
Re:Safety-- (Score:4)
Yes, this is a huge issue.
But it's also not an issue. Because islanding (which is the technical industry term) is something built into microinverters and regular inverters used in solar. The technology is mature and the microinverters used in balcony solar are basically smaller versions of the same microinverters used on rooftop solar with the same islanding protection.
Balcony solar often involves an external islanding protection as well. And this is for safety because the German and UK ones use suicide cords, so unplugging the solar from the wall outlet means exposed prongs which need to be immediately de-energized so if you touch the prongs you won't get electrocuted.
The technology is sound and is the same for rooftop solar. The danger of backfeed is less with solar and more with generator users since generators almost never have islanding protection and you're relying on safety cutouts to prevent backfeed.
The complexity of balcony solar is more with the split-phase nature of North American electricity - you really don't want to feed just one side and neutral - it's fine for low wattage uses, but it can cause a severe imbalance in neutral currents. But plugs offering both phases are rare in most homes - usually limited to AC, dryer and stove.
For one or two panels that likely offer only 500W or so, it's not a big deal, but it's something to watch for since the neutral conductor isn't supposed to carry much current in a properly balanced system. (in a properly balanced system, neutral current is zero)
Such BS overselling (Score:2)
Re:Such BS overselling (Score:4, Insightful)
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An average American home consumes close to 1000KwH of electricity per month. Assuming its sunny, and is rarely cloudy in your area, that would still be only about 7.5% of a typical home's electrical needs. Where I live, that would save me about $8-9/month....or about the cost of a couple of loaves of bread. And of course, very few places are sunny every day all year long.
Granted, not everyone lives in a single family house that uses a lot of electricity in a state with relatively inexpensive grid power.
Re: Such BS overselling (Score:2)
I have a massive 23 kW PV in California. It generates about 1000 kWh in low winter motnhs, and over 4000 kWh in peak spring/summer months. The storage that would be required to fully go off grid with my massive home with 2 EVs that consumes 2200 kWh/month just doesn't exist. It wouldn't be just for rainy days. It would need to work across seasons. We are talking at least 3 MWh worth of batteries to support winter. Even if cost was no object, it wouldn't be physically possible to have that much on my lot.
Re: Such BS overselling (Score:2)
There must be something wrong with your installation.. my 9kw system generates 5.5kw peak and ~55kwh/day in the summer. I charge my 20kwh battery and then export for several hours. Also SoCal
Re: Such BS overselling (Score:2)
NVM. Tired brain. Ignore me ðY...
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Forgiven. I'm in Norcal also, so less sun in winter. I have seen as low as 4 kWh produced on rainy winter days, and as high as 145 kWh produced on peak summer days. But no battery. Last year, I had net grid exports of 6030 kWh. But actually imported 17200 kWh, and exported 23200 kWh.
Of course, PG&E punishes us now by paying much less for exports than charging for imports. I just setup with 2 OpenEVSE to do load following from my Rainforeast Eagle with an HA automation and MQTT. I also got a local LLM ru
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Are you thinking of getting enough batteries to escape the grid or just balance your imports and exports? Also, I know a lot of cities in California will not let you disconnect the grid and others that do let you disconnect first require a lot of steps to appease government. I looked into it 5 years ago and was surprised when I learned some of that. My initial reaction was pretty much "Illegal to disconnect from the grid? Fuck you!" since it's really just forcing me to be a customer of the local utility, SD
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You probably could, but you are still paying the connection fee they rolled out last year along with all the other government taxes they put at the bottom of your bill. The whole point would be to avoid all that by taking care of yourself.
Don't get me wrong, it's probably worth staying connected just in case, but the real problem is the lack of choice. We shouldn't have to come up with methods to circumvent the system.
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Perhaps with a "massive home" it doesn't work. How many "massive home" people are out there? I suspect that's a standard deviation or three away from the bell of the curve.
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Our massive home is also quite efficient. 2200 kWh for a 4600 sq ft home that includes 2 central ACs, a sauna, a hot tub, and 2 EVs, is actually very spartan considering all the loads. GP states the average US home uses 1000 kWh, and the average US home is about half the size, and does not include any EV.
To fully cover the average home's 1000 kWh usage, you would need to be in my sunny Norcal climate, with my 70-panel 23.2 kw PV system that wouldn't fit on the average home's roof. You would also need a coup
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I'd LOVE to know where they get those averages. Maybe it's just the case of living in California for so long, but most homes here just aren't described as massive. Sure, plenty of single family homes are decent size, but not like yours. I find it pretty hard to believe the average use is 1000kwh a month. I mean, as a condo/apartment dweller, I think the most I ever managed to reach was 350 in a particularly hot summer month (wasn't normal, didn't happen the prior year or year after). I only remember it beca
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> The storage that would be required to fully go off grid ... just doesn't exist ... it wouldn't be physically possible to have that much on my lot
You say "massive home" but how massive are we talking? I reckon you could stack 3MWh of LFP into as little as 300 sq.ft. (including BMS but not chargers/inverters). Exactly how much space would depend on ceiling height and layout to account for isle space. :)
=Smidge=
Re: Such BS overselling (Score:2)
Massive house, but not massive lot. A quick gemini chat states i would need more like 1200sq ft and specific clearance. I would not have on my inclined lot. It is moot since the project would cost at minimum $500k, probably closer to $1M. Possibly more. Too much. My electric bill is currently negative annually. I also don't want to have that much battery at home due to fire risk. I live fire risk area, and fire department is at least 10 mins away. I don't think off grid is practical unless you live way sout
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It's not ideal, but it's the only option for people with apartments who can't fit solar anywhere else. I don't know what the rules are like in the US, but typically adding solar to exterior walls is not allowed. Balcony solar really is the only choice.
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Some apartments will let this fly. Other's probably won't. Anything with an HOA is definitely going to shoot this down. "They are ugly"....sigh. Hate HOAs. We had to pass laws in California to *force* HOAs to even allow traditional solar. My last condo association wasn't to happy when I wouldn't give up but they knew I was correct and had to let me get the work done. So glad I sold that place. The new owners are lucky the roof isn't that old, because they will have to take the solar down when the HOA decide
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A refrigerator? A microwave? I've got 4 full-size monocrystalline solar panels on my roof and they might run a mini fridge, or an inverter microwave at 75% power on the sunniest of days.
This.
I'm gonna call bullshit on balcony-grade solar powering the average American-sized refrigerator. Last time I tried to power my neighbors with a gas generator it was popping circuits. Damn thing drew eighteeen amps.
Re: Such BS overselling (Score:2)
It's not supposed to power anything in particular. The point is to offset costs. A kilowatt you're generating with those panels is a kilowatt you're not paying the power company.
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It's not supposed to power anything in particular. The point is to offset costs. A kilowatt you're generating with those panels is a kilowatt you're not paying the power company.
At that level of greed, I’d expect all types of solar panels to become illegal for consumers to use or possess.
You know, because “safety”.
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If the utilities thought they could get away with it, they would be.
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If the utilities thought they could get away with it by making a few electrical backfeed martyrs, they’d allow that legit problem to fester just long enough to warrant making all solar installations illegal unless done by the electric company.
FTFY. Just in case you were still wondering why they’re still legal. And the profits they plan on the ass end of a few strategic wrongful death lawsuits.
We don’t just make safety laws anymore. We justify them. With blood.
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"It's not supposed to power anything in particular. "
People I know mostly use it to cool their homes when sun is at its peak.
With E-prices in Germany, 2-3 of these make sense.
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That was either the start in-rush or their fridge was made in the '50s.
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It was popping breakers because you put a 5 amp fridge on 300 feet of thin extension cord
Huh. I wonder if my 50-foot 12/3 extension cord is large enough to carry your assumptions about in-rush amperage during start-up.
I doubt it.
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My refrigerator draws 200 watts. Starting current is the issue.
The freezer draws 165 watts even though it's colder.
I can and have run them both at the same time on an 800 watt inverter. Start the refrigerator first then a couple minutes later start the freezer.
The microwave on startup daws more than 15 amps and the killawatt meter won't read the peak.
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"and a freezer on average 35 watts."
Many people have the freezer in the basement or cellar, where 'beauty' doesn't matter, just put 5" of cheap insulation around (obviously not the back, unless you put the condenser coil on top)
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Ideally you'll charge batteries with them and then use a low-frequency inverter to power the fridge.
But this is another $2k on the low end for something decent.
Does anybody know how they synchronize the AC waveform on these plug-in things?
I have been operating on the understanding that you can smash DC sources together but not AC. It sounds like I could parallel inverters with this tech. That would be cool.
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Does anybody know how they synchronize the AC waveform on these plug-in things?
I have been operating on the understanding that you can smash DC sources together but not AC. It sounds like I could parallel inverters with this tech. That would be cool.
Power electronics have become cheap enough that inverters, including ones that synchronize to an existing network, are quite easy to manufacture even for home use. And yes, running multiple such in parallel is possible, and actually supported by some of the "balcony PV"-inverters sold in Germany, not least to sneakily circumvent the 800W regulatory limit. You can even mix balcony PV with multiple home battery units, if you want. Of course one still needs to take care that the cabling won't be overloaded, an
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Break even depends on how terrible your utility prices are. I don't know what Germany charges per kilowatt, but California ranges from 40-50 cents a KwH depending on time of day. Of course that's *today's rate*. They push those rates up every freaken year and now we have a connection fee. That particularly pissed me off since it punished saving power. To *break even* with the new scheme, you have to be one of the higher power users. Such a racket and it's backed up by the state, with governor appointed peop
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A refrigerator? A microwave? I've got 4 full-size monocrystalline solar panels on my roof and they might run a mini fridge, or an inverter microwave at 75% power on the sunniest of days.
I'm curious, WTF kind of fridge do you have. I have what is comically called in Europe an "American style" fridge. It pulls 250W and has no problem running from solar on a *cloudy* day. I agree with the microwave though, there's no way you're powering that with a balcony solar installation, not the least of which because UL limits the plug-in solar systems without dedicated wiring to 391W which is not enough to run a microwave.
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I don't think "what appliance can you run on a solar panel" is the right question to be asking, since these solar panels will never be tasked to run an appliance by themselves anyway.
The right question to ask is, "by how much will plugging in one of these reduce my electric bill?"
Once you know that, you can decide if it's worth the purchase price or not.
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And this is why solar may never really take off in Quebec, where the vast majority (> 99%) of electricity is generated by hydropower and I pay about USD $0.05/kwh, or about 15% what someone in California, and 33% of the average cost in Germany.
Hydro Quebec was expropriated by the Quebec government in 1944, and even with the low cost of electricity it pays about USD $3 billion into government coffers every year. But hey everybody, let's privatize the essential utility to make it more efficient! (said no o
Re: Such BS overselling (Score:2)
These fuckers (Score:1)
They warn that the grid can't handle the influx of power needed for the upcoming data centers, yet are happy to pass the cost of new infrastructure onto the average US consumer. Then they want to fuck the average US customer for finding ways to help with this so called data center power crisis. Fuck them. Fuck them with a lightning rod.
Mixed feelings (Score:1)
I have very mixed feelings about home solar and grid-tying. Particularly with two-way meters where you sell power. Pushing power into the grids from homes is a challenge for grid operators to balance, particularly when for residential areas peak solar doesn't coincide wit peak demand. And the idea that home owners should sell power to the grid at retail rates is pretty silly, honestly.
On the other hand I think solar is awesome ad we should have more of it, along with battery storage.
If these systems simp
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The way it has worked out in Australia is the grid charges you around 35c/kwh, but pays you 3c/kwh. Feeding back to the grid gives you almost nothing, the only real savings is in scheduling household appliances to run during the day consuming the solar before it goes to the grid.
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Yeah I'm not surprised that's the way it is in Australia. Makes a ton of sense. In North America there's still an expectation by home owners that they'll make retail rates, which surely is unrealistic.
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With netmetering 3.0 in California, they have vastly reduced the purchase price compared to netmetering 2.0, more then doubling the time it takes to break even with the system. Furthermore, if you add a battery to a pre-existing setup that's on 2.0, they'll update you to 3.0 because they are such nice fellas.
CPUC is corrupt and in bed with the utilities. Your best bet is to get a battery that can offset as much as possible so you use your solar energy while the sun is out, then the battery at night. You wil
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You'd need to examine the bill closely. 35c/kwh sure sounds like total bill divided by total consumption, but there's likely (if it's anything like my bill) a bunch of line items either not directly tied to kwh consumed (connection fees, taxes, 'adjustments' etc) or the kwh are partitioned into tranches and/or time of use pricing tiers.
3c/kwh sounds like the actual retail value of the electricity per kwh.
So basically they're buying the energy from you at what it's actually worth.
=Smidge=
who cares (Score:1)
IS IT GOOD? then they are against it (Score:2)
You know it's good because they are working against it and Trump is lying about everything good involved with it.
Also the delusional morons call everybody grounded in reality crazy. Not them. 1000s of experts risk professional sanctions diagnosing Trump as crazy and do we hear about it? Only President Epstein diagnosing everybody who disagrees as crazy. I'm surprised he is not calling everybody pedophiles...but he's keeping off that whole topic as much as possible; it has to be really really bad for him n
"every kilowatt-hour generated..." (Score:2)
"every kilowatt-hour generated by a plug-in solar panel is one less the utility sells to a customer"
No, that would be true only if all balcony panels were battery-buffered in one's home. But buffer batteries for home use are still quite expensive, so depending on how many years they actually last, they may or may not break even against the savings from power you did not have to buy. For most people, balcony PV is less of a profit center, and more of a virtue signal "look, I'm doing my part for non-fossil energy!". The utilities of course hate balcony PV, and while the safety issues are just a pretense, th
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"No, that would be true only if all balcony panels were battery-buffered in one's home. "
No, it would be true regardless of "battery buffering".
"...depending on how many years they actually last, they may or may not break even against the savings from power you did not have to buy...."
That is true of everything, it is not an insight. And profitability is not the topic, either.
"For most people, balcony PV is less of a profit center, and more of a virtue signal "
Well your narrative is certainly coming into f
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We're talking about a really small amount of power here, especially if the panel is capped at 391. Your households idle power usage is probably higher then what that 400 watt panel will produce in ideal conditions. Nothing is going to even reach the grid. That's how it's going to offset your bill a bit.
"As instructed" (Score:2)
"...no safety incidents have been reported for customers who used the panels as instructed..."
When I read a phrase containing a built in caveat, I always wonder what's tucked inside it.
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Essentially: Yes, if you are reeeeally dumb, you can hurt yourself with it.
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Well, yeah. That's what it says on the tin. :)
But there's a suggestion that some people did have safety incidents, we just won't mention them. I wonder how many, and of what nature. Were their errors understandable, and have steps been taken to correct the possible misuse, or at least the documentation?
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It is probably just litigation nation, where, say, somebody intentionally hammered their hand with a tin and then tried to recover medical cost and damages because it did not say "do not hammer hand with tin". In sane legal systems, courts do not even accept claims like that for decision.
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It's probably just the people saying it, putting in some weasel words to cover for the fact that they haven't bothered to check and are lying to support their narrative.
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... are lying to support their narrative.
That seems to be the default mode of many people today. Being seen as being correct is far more important to them than being actually correct. That is not how insight and understanding works. And then they assume everybody does it (because they do not realize they are operating on a level of personal integrity and honor significantly below others) and accuse people with actual facts of having made them up.
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Why should anyone believe that's the correct interpretation? Why would the OP even comment if that were true?
They manipulate risk (Score:1)
Additional bills necessary in some area (Score:2)
Some areas would need additional legislative work to eliminate bureaucratic hurdles. For example, where I live in California the physical installation of the solar panels requires multiple permits and a structural engineering design, review, and approval process. You can't simply prop some panels up on a flat roof, balcony, or in the back yard because of California's permit-based approach to public safety on private property. A required portion of the balcony solar legislation involves getting approval f
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Having done all that once before, I'd rather buy batteries and sell zero to the grid. You could have your power panel setup to use the battery for a portion of the house and leave the other portion on the grid even. Since you are not selling to the grid, you hide all this from the nanny state.
P.S. You could even charge stand-alone batteries that don't even tie to your house. Use them to power your devices. Since you are forced to stay on the grid anyway, the best you can hope for is offsetting the bill. Thi
The "danger" of overpower (Score:2)
Right, what I keep reading is if the panels provide more power than the breaker can handle.
For me, who replaced his electric stove a few years ago with gas, I'll just plug the panels into the stove circuit - which is set up to offer *two* 20A breakers.
Re:Most people don't know how they work (Score:4, Informative)
Simple - the inverters are grid tied so they don't work when the power is off. This is old tech.
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I'm under the impression that the way they solved that in German is to have the devices be equipped with a regulator that prevents feeding the grid during a power outage.
If it works in German, it should work in the U.S., right?
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If it works in German, it should work in the U.S., right?
There's an I.C.E. joke in there somewhere... /s :-)
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They don't realized that they feed power back into the grid. This causes a safety issue with linemen working on repairs. Also, since these are not reported, the power company doesn't know it is happening.
Plug in ones have no built in safety features.
This isn't the case. Any plug in solar inverter people are going to buy for balcony solar is going to have anti-islanding baked in.
Since people are using the power during power outages, they don't unplug them.
These systems are paper weights during power outages.
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These systems are paper weights during power outages.
True, and for justifiable reasons. I imagine at some point (when batteries get cheap enough) they'll start selling these in combination with storage batteries, so that people can use them as an emergency UPS and/or to recharge their EV when it gets in, and not have to bother with interfacing with the general electrical system.
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I could see charging a battery and using it to power my computer, especially since I do not leave my computer on when I'm not actively using it. Setup properly, it could offset a couple kilowatts a day. For someone that rarely breaks 180kwhs a month, 60 kwhs saved is a nice amount. Of course my utility doesn't want that happening. They aren't there to provide me with electricity, so much as they are they to extract money out of my pocket. Delivering energy at affordable rates isn't part of their program.
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LOL, Cheap chinese panels...the leader in solar and they are cheaper. Made in China isn't the insult it was in the 90s.
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This isn't the case. Any plug in solar inverter people are going to buy for balcony solar is going to have anti-islanding baked in.
Just to nitpick, it's not that anti-islanding is baked in, it's the lack of islanding that is missing. Grid-forming inverters are more complicated and expensive than grid following. They simply lack the capability to generate an AC voltage without a reference.
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Just to nitpick, it's not that anti-islanding is baked in, it's the lack of islanding that is missing. Grid-forming inverters are more complicated and expensive than grid following. They simply lack the capability to generate an AC voltage without a reference.
Balcony solar does not require islanding. People are buying into balcony solar as a simple cheap way to reduce utility bills. When you make it far more complicated and expensive by adding ESS you are negating the entire point of balcony solar.
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Inverters for solar have shut down during a power outage for many years now.
Personally, I would like to see one that shuts down by default but can come up standalone as long as the house is disconnected from the grid.
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Inverters for solar have shut down during a power outage for many years now.
Personally, I would like to see one that shuts down by default but can come up standalone as long as the house is disconnected from the grid.
That's how mine works. But to make it possible you need another piece of equipment, an automatic disconnect or what SolarEdge (the manufacturer of my equipment) calls a "backup interface", plus inverters that are capable of generating their own waveform if none is available to sync to, and will only do this when the backup interface tells them to.
So, the way it works is that when there's an outage, the grid-tied inverters instantly shut down because there's no grid for them to sync to. Then, after a sec
Re:Most people don't know how they work (Score:5, Informative)
They don't realized that they feed power back into the grid. This causes a safety issue with linemen working on repairs.
Speaking of people who don't know how they work, no plug-in solar systems do not have grid forming inverters. They are unable to supply electricity without a grid frequency to sync to and will not put out power or endanger any linesmen.
Also, since these are not reported, the power company doesn't know it is happening.
This is some of the dumbest text ever put to the internet. Not only do all electrical safety incidents involving linesmen get reported, all linesmen test circuits prior to starting work, all circuits that are off during work are actively shorted to earth, and those circuits very much are in fact monitored and the power company has actual visibility into this as voltage monitoring is always downstream of a breaker so the substation would literally record a back-fed voltage as well.
Home solar installations are coordinated with the power company, so they can take them into account during service.
Home solar installations usually don't feature grid forming inverters either. Even if they did have grid forming inverters, 100% of inverters which are UL listed will not feed the grid if it's down.
Plug in ones have no built in safety features.
Plug-in ones have plenty of safety features and are also UL listed. This includes power limiting and again not feeding a non-existent grid. No you can't use power during power outages. That's not how power works. If the power goes out your balcony solar installation, even if it were some magic system with no protections and a grid forming inverter capable of independent 60Hz operation would attempt to put it's pathetic couple of hundred volts out to run the entire suburb and instantly go into undervoltage fault.
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The "grid-forming" part is sold to consumers as an add-on, for example "Huawei backup box B0/B1". It provides isolation from the grid and powers a few chosen sockets to keep essential equipment during an outage.
Though a backup box isn't so expensive (~800 €), I guess it's not worth the additional cost for balcony PV, which are low power (~400-800 W) to remain below regulatory thresholds. Anyone can buy one from the local store, place it on a rented apartment balcony and and plug it to a wall socket, no
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"This is some of the dumbest text ever put to the internet."
Could be, but it doesn't compare to SuperKendall claiming right here that humans have natural immunity to COVID because otherwise everyone on the cruise ship would have died. And as far as I can tell, this post doesn't serve to enrich Donald Trump either. In the current scheme of things the post is merely ignorant, doesn't really rate among any of the MAGA posts that occur every day.
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US residential buildings already have air conditioners all over them.
Stop complaining.
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You're the head of your local HOA aren't you.
Sure Jan (Score:3)
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What a dumb comment. One of the biggest benefits of solar is that it can be generated close to its consumption. Rooftop solar is one of the perfect applications for it, far better than grid scale solar which just adds all manner of transmission costs.
Regular folks don't think about this any more than they think about their gas meter. They are just things that exist in the house.
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What a dumb comment.
Why is it dumb?
One of the biggest benefits of solar is that it can be generated close to its consumption.
Benefits of centralized production far outweigh costs. Rooftop solar costs 2x the same capacity in a utility PV farm.
Rooftop solar is one of the perfect applications for it, far better than grid scale solar which just adds all manner of transmission costs.
Transmission system is required regardless and transmission losses are an irrelevant 5%.
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If you have enough of a backyard, you can literally install the solar+battery yourself. Maybe pay an electrician for the last steps if you are in any doubt, but it's really not that hard. Any nerd on here should have zero problems building a rack for the panels, wiring them up and connecting to batteries. We do much more complex activities all the time.
The expense of roof top is typically the labor you are paying for, not to mention you better have a new roof or that's going to add to cost as well since you
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There is one thing a rooftop system provides that a utility-owned system never can: control over future expenses.
If I install a solar array on my roof, I know (roughly) how much the power it generates will cost me for the next (N) years, and I don't have to worry about anyone jacking up the price on me because of AI data centers or whatnot. If I rely on the electric company's solar array, OTOH, then I'm going to have to pay whatever rates the electric company decides to charge me for that privilege. For
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This is one of the most wrong posts I've seen... Maybe his account was hacked?
The building code should require all new buildings have solar; get a permit/waver to opt out. I have solar. they didn't make it easy. I still have billing fights over them trying to rip me off. Is it easy now? yes, the problem is the evil corp - who have been caught defrauding people without solar too.
I could put your argument on WATER or grid electricity too. Sewage is way better handled at centralized locations! People have m
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This is one of the most wrong posts I've seen... Maybe his account was hacked?
What is wrong about it? Do you disagree utility scale solar has a better capacity factor and costs 2x less than rooftop?
The building code should require all new buildings have solar; get a permit/waver to opt out. I have solar. they didn't make it easy. I still have billing fights over them trying to rip me off. Is it easy now? yes, the problem is the evil corp - who have been caught defrauding people without solar too.
Why should it be required?
Roofs need covers. They should be solar covers. They certainly shouldn't be toxic waste from the oil industry simply because it's cheap... and doesn't last. You put on ethical roofing and it's likely approaching solar prices.
Solar panels on roofs is a poor use of limited resources and an unnecessary hazard for installers. In addition to itself being a fire hazard paneling impedes firefighter access and significantly increases the cost of roof repair and replacement.
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- Money is not god. Except for most people in the USA apparently. mammon is the true religion. What is cheapest is not always the best or right thing or even should be allowed. It's illegal to sell / buy things that are too cheap. you just don't think about it; products that are deadly is not really a concern you think about because they are banned. Your junk food may kill you and make you miserable and fat; but it's slow and subtle - but it doesn't randomly kill you quickly like cheaper food would. poin
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What is wrong about it? Do you disagree utility scale solar has a better capacity factor and costs 2x less than rooftop?
Money is not god. Except for most people in the USA apparently. mammon is the true religion. What is cheapest is not always the best or right thing or even should be allowed. It's illegal to sell / buy things that are too cheap. you just don't think about it; products that are deadly is not really a concern you think about because they are banned. Your junk food may kill you and make you miserable and fat; but it's slow and subtle - but it doesn't randomly kill you quickly like cheaper food would. point is, cheap is goes too far. selfish short sighted idiots make up the USA as the world is seeing represented...
- I've seen gov fights play out for YEARS over fire code regulations. complaints about how new houses will cost more money from the big building corps-- who are impacted least. People literally DIE and it's a drawn out long battle for common sense... which eventually won out (surprisingly, because this was in the USA. Yes ,we need to shame the stupid Americans and the minority of decent Americans just have to suffer being with stupid or do something about it. Like all the people saying Muslims need to do something about their crazy factions.) LEAD in gas has benefits and cost savings... only took like 80 years to stop that - in the end the money savings from the ban were higher. Again, money shouldn't be the sole deciding factor (which it was just took generations of damage to find long term costs.) People don't realize building costs are up because of increased disasters due to global warming; it'll continue to rise. Insurance rates prove impact already.
Instead of answering the question you go off on tangents about food, religion and leaded gas. If you have a non-cost reason for disagreement why not just state them?
- utility differs. a small farmer utility is not the same as a super massive scale system. people never include full costs: the GRID. high power lines over long distances. transformers etc. Lower demand and you have tons of savings.
- Utility scale has benefits; but not all of that is real. there is a lot of graft and waste in consumer solar and added overhead which gets reduced at scale... but a housing development which is how most houses are built (or not built to create crisis and drive profit; admittedly by industry leaders) they have scale, experts, and their overhead is spread out like a "utility" is.
All the same infrastructure is required because the sun is not always shining and yet people expect all of their toaster ovens to work 24x7 regardless even in total darkness and amongst weeks of rain.
- we don't have limited solar resources. you can't build a house against the building code which greatly increases cost. You could have a real shithole for almost nothing.
More of the same deflections. If you have something objective to say about solar please just say it.
Solar panels on roofs is a poor use of limited resources and an unnecessary hazard for installers. In addition to itself being a fire hazard paneling impedes firefighter access and significantly increases the cost of roof repair and replacement.
- Firefighter safety doesn't really matter to people. I've seen that play out decades ago. Electricity in houses is a REAL THREAT for firefighters. Gas service is a massive TERROR to firefighters. Poor building codes are a top threat in most the USA, still. people don't care. To say we can't do solar because firefighters is idiotic or dishonest.
Yea well those same firefighters that "doesn'
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I'm too busy. this was a break from a busy day. you do some thinking on the matter. you need to; you bring up that shit about no power when the sun is down, it's a sign you are not worth my time. which is actually valuable and i choose to waste it on here as a break. we have more than enough roof space going to waste to power everything; sure we could easily exceed our needs in the USA simply by using as much farmland as we waste growing ethanol fuel doing solar instead and it would cost less than the we