Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow • Hacker News Board

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#31

Post by hkt » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:23 AM UTC

xbmcuser wrote: post #24

slackfan wrote: post #2

This will lead to some new and exciting ways of starting a housefire.

The new sodium batteries are a lot safer than the lithium chemistries. And we already do have type of home batteries they are just called UPS systems. The real game changer will be when 3-5kwh plugin batteries fall below $150-200pkwh as at those prices batteries will make sense even for apartment owners/renters with no solar to use it to demand shift as time of day electricity prices get more common.

Why that number in particular? Are you thinking of payback period of something else?

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#32

Post by fortran77 » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:26 AM UTC

reenorap wrote: post #4

Why bother? Power companies will complain they are losing money and regulators will allow them to buy energy from residential solar panels basically for free (NEM 3.0). This is California. California has spent decades convincing people to convert to solar panels and EVs and now that many have switched, they doubled electricity prices and told us not to charge when it’s too hot. Now they want solar panel owners to pay…

When we got our solar system in CA, our electric bill went to zero. We calculated the payback to be 9 years. Eventually, they stopped buying back electricity and changed the way they metered and our bill was as high as ever. We save a bit because we're able to charge our electric car at times of peak PV output.

We left California last year for this and many other reasons. They just don't want anyone to be productive here.

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#33

Post by chris222 » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:27 AM UTC

Bluetti already has a product for this available in the EU. I have been posting eveywhere that they need to bring it to the US.

https://www.bluettipower.eu/products/balco-transfer-hub

Balcony solar without storage is actually pretty dumb when we already have integrated battery/inverter/solar mppt units available for a few hundred dollars.

All we need to do is have something like this hub inbetween to ensure grid isolation when an outage occurs.

For crticial loads you would just plug those directly into the all in one battery unit. Almost all of them these day also have a With a solution like Pila is developing you could even use your homes wiring to transfer power (~1kW) around multiple small battery units (attached to independent circuits) each with some different critical loads and solar attached to them.

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#34

Post by My_Name » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:27 AM UTC

"the battery pays back from around 2.5 years onwards"

So around 1000 charge/discharge cycles?

That is roughly the ability of a battery. By the time you break even, it's time to spend again.

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#35

Post by internetter » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:29 AM UTC

guidedlight wrote: post #19

I thought plug-in solar was coming 10+ years ago.

Millions of households have plug-in solar. The payoff is something like 1.5-5 years. Of course, this should be tens or hundreds of millions, but this isn’t vaporware

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#36

Post by NavinF » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:30 AM UTC

lukeify wrote: post #9

I can’t help feel without ampacity and voltage upgrades to most domestic home circuits this is like a fart in the wind.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49141066

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#37

Post by shusaku » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:30 AM UTC

As someone with a poor background in electrical engineering, this is really cool. It’s amazing that you guys can make something like this work.

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#38

Post by perpetuallunch » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:31 AM UTC

reenorap wrote: post #4

Why bother? Power companies will complain they are losing money and regulators will allow them to buy energy from residential solar panels basically for free (NEM 3.0). This is California. California has spent decades convincing people to convert to solar panels and EVs and now that many have switched, they doubled electricity prices and told us not to charge when it’s too hot. Now they want solar panel owners to pay…

Similarly here in Australia.

Electricity prices keep increasing, daily supply charge keeps increasing (this ones supposed to pay for the transmission network), while the solar feed-in tariff keeps decreasing.

With the added stupidity that, obviously the sun works during the day and so do you.

Now tax payers are forced to subsidies residential batteries as well as rooftop solar, which results in a wealth transfer from everyone else to home owners, and isn’t a policy that helps low income earners and / or renters.

It’s also government picking winners, which historically has never worked, rather than letting private enterprise pick winners, and potentially failing, in an open and free market.

Wild.

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#39

Post by yhcehb38r » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:34 AM UTC

UK-based reader here. Homeowner, with no solar or battery, but interested in getting some decent, independent advice, how would I go about it?

We are a two EV household, with oil central heating. Don’t mind paying for solid unbiased advice.

Re: Plug-in solar is coming. Plug-in batteries should follow

#40

Post by bsder » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 4:34 AM UTC

zugi wrote: post #29

mkozlows wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a scam. Connecting to the grid has enormous value, and keeping the grid up has real costs. A model where your generation pays you retail prices doesn't make sense. California's current net metering system, which is more reflective of the true benefits and costs of solar to the power system, has been incentivizing people to add storage to keep their solar rather than get paid big money to feed back midday low…

> Connecting to the grid has enormous value Yet in most locales it's illegal to disconnect from the grid. If disconnection were legal for those who want to be energy self-sufficient, then charging just to connect would be more defensible.

> Yet in most locales it's illegal to disconnect from the grid.

That's kind of ... required?

Otherwise you have a bunch of people who are off the grid until the sun doesn't shine for a week and they run their batteries down and then they all try to connect simultaneously and collapse your grid.

Most places I know of don't care if you never connect to the grid--you get your exemption and get on with life.

However, once you are connected to the grid even once, the grid operator has to size things for the worst case when everybody is connected to the grid and drawing power and work things out for stability when everybody disconnects and they have to back off generation. At that point, the grid operator is well within their rights to demand that you comply with cooperative regulations like making a request to connect/disconnect from the grid itself.