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> But the biggest long-term risk may be the unexpected tripping of solar resources during grid disturbances, This is entirely the electricity grids own doing. They told everyone who wanted solar that they must use inverters that are super safe and self disconnect if anything unexpected happens. The regulations were written super tight, with frequency limits, harmonic limits, reactive power limits, rate of change of f…
> But the biggest long-term risk may be the unexpected tripping of solar resources during grid disturbances, This is entirely the electricity grids own doing. They told everyone who wanted solar that they must use inverters that are super safe and self disconnect if anything unexpected happens. The regulations were written super tight, with frequency limits, harmonic limits, reactive power limits, rate of change of f…
Why is solar thermal so rare?
In most locales it’s now more cost effective to heat your water with photovoltaic panels & an electric water heater.
Why is solar thermal so rare?
Why is solar thermal so rare?
Why is solar thermal so rare?
Because photovoltaic got so good & cheap, with no moving parts. In most locales it’s now more cost effective to heat your water with photovoltaic panels & an electric water heater.
> But the biggest long-term risk may be the unexpected tripping of solar resources during grid disturbances, This is entirely the electricity grids own doing. They told everyone who wanted solar that they must use inverters that are super safe and self disconnect if anything unexpected happens. The regulations were written super tight, with frequency limits, harmonic limits, reactive power limits, rate of change of f…
Last year, I had the opportunity to talk to some PG&E-associated contractors [0] who were replacing the distribution transformer serving me. I asked them whether they trusted the anti-islanding protection in everyone’s inverters and whether they would like me to turn off my main breaker. They laughed and said that they couldn’t care less. They were going to intentionally short the secondary circuit if they were doing…
Because a typical solar inverter can't handle transient loads. It just spits out whatever power is coming in from the panels. It can't shed if too much is coming in and it can't magically create power to fix a shortfall. The power has gotta go or come from somewhere.
If you have a battery you can soak the transient load and disconnect from the grid and operate as an island but without the grid to act as a buffer for the load the inverter is useless on its own.