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Belgium, which outlawed plug-in solar devices over fears of having unregistered systems feeding into the grid, will lift its ban.
Why the fuck is that a fear?!?
Because back feeding the grid means the power company can’t shut the power down to work on a line. It requires coordinating everyone that might have something like this to unplug it. Rooftop installations add controllers to only supply when grid power is on, or to disconnect the house from the grid. Same thing when you add a generator inlet you’re supposed to also add a grid disconnect.
You're sure these kits in Germany dont have that check in place? If I know Germans, it does.
I live in Germany, and I can assure you no such check exists. I have one of these systems (although I don't plug mine into the grid, I store power in batteries and use it)
I'm not sure how the electricians protect themselves, I can only assume that they measure for voltage on the line after disconnecting from the grid, and then search for the culprits. Generally speaking any service providers inform residents well beforehand about outages, and there might be fines if you hold back work? I haven't looked into it, perhaps someone else has more info.
The system can only feed into your house line if there is an external 230V 50Hz power net working. The moment the net goes down there will be no power from your micro inverter to your house. It requires power to work and a stable 50 Hz similar to most bigger inverters.
If you combine a power station (battery) with the inverter, this battery might give you a 230V outlet with stable 50 Hz. But this is not the one you should plug back into your house (would require an unsafe cable).
Overall, lots of fear and wrong information in this thread about safety. There is a DIN norm for all of this and the current 800W limit exists to keep your power line from melting in the walls in the most extreme cases.
it’s for the safety of people working on the grid. solar panels in general have either to be isolated from the grid or disconnect if the grid is down. they are not allowed to spill into the grid if the grid has no power.
I dont understand. These people can just install more switches to solve this problem, right?
We were just dumb before and thought power was unidirectional. Now we have evolved into a decentralized grid. So we just need to add another switch to cut off power coming out of every room, building, etc. Right?
That seems like the obvious long-term, safest solution.
We have regulations here in Germany (EU wide even if I am not mistaken). The solar inverters used are required to shut off within I think 200ms of the 50hz grid power going down. The inverters sold here can't output anything without grid power being detected on the AC output.
Why is everyone in this thread making assumptions and spreading fear instead of actually looking up how it works?
And in addition to them backfeeding into the grid , they bypass all the fuses and GFCI protections your house might have and effectively require the use of a suicide cord. That part of a plug should never be providing power, only using it.
“The beauty of the solar balconies is they are flexible, cheap and plug straight into the domestic network via a converter,
How the fuck does that work??
they have a “micro inverter” you literally just plug them into a socket in your house.
that's so dangerous...
why? they put around 600w max. there are plenty of appliances in a home that put a higher load than that.
because they backfeed into the grid, and because that means you have live male plugs.
they are not live. before they feed the grid they need to synchronize to the grid’s phase
-they detect AC from the grid
-they sync the phase to it
-start feeding
That's so cool!
In Spain, living a the bottom of an apartment urbanization well, I get 2 hours of direct sunlight a day. Some people are luckier and get all the morning sun, while others get all the afternoon sun.
Installing panels may still be troublesome, since the urbanization has a requirement of "unified look"... so I'm afraid it would mean either everyone, or no one, installing a panel, and they better look all the same (had an issue with additional balcony railing, optional but single design allowed).
‘If 1.5m Germans have them there must be something in it’
Yep, an impressive marketing campaign.
Honestly, I'm not saying they are bad. Depends on location and angle.
But the tittle is total rubbish.
30% locally generated solar power is good.
Agreed.
As I say, it's just the idea of 1.5m can't be wrong that is wrong. More so coming from a newspaper that depends on the success of marketing for its revenue.
Approx 2% of a population can definitely be sold a crock of shit if the marketing is good. Just look at the numbers who voted Trump in the US or Reform in the UK.
Honestly, if solar Balconies produced 30% of the nations' electricity, then it would be very impressive.
But while Germany producing 54% clean energy is bloody impressive. Honestly, 30% is likely to be solar as a whole, not just balcony solar.
The number of locations where the low sun would be inline to balconies is limited. Due to urban conditions. Mainly only higher flats over the average city line and rural areas.
And while in those higher or rural flats. The low sun may shine the correct way 30% of the day (if the panels can tilt). For that to generate 30% of the flats use over a whole year. Would take a pretty big balcony. The best panels available commercially nowadays are <300w per m2. So most balconies would have 600 to 1200w max. The whole side of the flat would likely be 4x to 6x times that.
I'd guess it's still worth doing. (def the whole side of the building thing) Mainly because the panels are so freaking cheap atm. It's the cost of bats and volt/current/charge management that would be the greatest cost part. But for most users. 30% from balcony alone is not realistic.
I, in just about every case, give no attention to norm-based arguments. We as a species on a whole, proportionally, keep doing foolish shit all the time.
But it was after reading your comment that I noticed there was a time that many Germans were either proponents of or tolerating (not all of them absolutely; there were rebels) some extremely bad things. Some 85 years ago.
Did you just seriously bring up Hitler in a balcony solar panel discussion?
Just what are you try to imply here