Grid power down, Powerwall + stepped in, Panel production Zero

[Astur]

As stated for a New Powerwall + installation with 15 Q-Cell 400 panels.

It was 1:00PM local, Powerwall + charged at 100%, house running on power from the panels (still waiting for net metering activation and meter swap). Received notice from Tesla App that grid power had been lost, battery was discharging to run the house and the App showing the connection line from grid to meter with a red "X".

Everything fine up to here. HOWEVER I did notice from the App that although sun with no overcast the panels were NOT producing any power and the house was just running 100% on Powerall + power.

Is this normal? Although I'm presuming that since grid power was lost and there was no reference voltage to the Inverter/Gateway, the feed from the panels was shut off.

Is this a fair assumption? Is there a way to circumvent his?

 

[jjrandorin]

It was 1:00PM local, Powerwall + charged at 100%,

Everything fine up to here. HOWEVER I did notice from the App that although sun with no overcast the panels were NOT producing any power and the house was just running 100% on Powerall + power.

Is this normal?

Yes, this is normal. The power has to have someplace to go, and if grid is down, and powerwall is 100%, there is no where for it to go so the gateway shifts the frequency until the powerwall is drained some.

Is there a way to circumvent his?

The solar will kick back on (or it should, anyway) when the powerwall is drained "some amount". How much, seems to be a bit random / depend on some other installation parameters I am unaware of. In my own case, if my powerwalls are lower than about 93-94%, my solar will be on. The simplest way to keep the PV producing is to drain the powerwall some by increasing house load.

There isnt any way I am aware of to keep the powerwall at 100% and also have the solar producing.

 

[Astur]

THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!

 

[Astur]

Just one more question... isn't that always the case?

I live in Puerto Rico, which you may know that we are frequently subject Tropical Storms and Hurricanes. The last BIG ONE, Maria, with her 200+MPH winds and rain wrecked havoc on the electrical infrastructure to the the tune that I was without power for 35 days!

Anyway, my question is that when an extended grid outage occurs, the Powerwall + runs out and the sun finally comes out, will the battery charge from my panels even though there is no grid reference?

If yes, then will the Tesla System (Powerwall, Inverter, Gateway) go into some kind of "Islanding Mode" to keep power from going out to the grid and thus protect line workers?

Sorry for all the questions and doubts but I'm new to all of this and you seem quite knowledgeable.

 

[Redhill_qik]

Just one more question... isn't that always the case?

I live in Puerto Rico, which you may know that we are frequently subject Tropical Storms and Hurricanes. The last BIG ONE, Maria, with her 200+MPH winds and rain wrecked havoc on the electrical infrastructure to the the tune that I was without power for 35 days!

Anyway, my question is that when an extended grid outage occurs, the Powerwall + runs out and the sun finally comes out, will the battery charge from my panels even though there is no grid reference?

If yes, then will the Tesla System (Powerwall, Inverter, Gateway) go into some kind of "Islanding Mode" to keep power from going out to the grid and thus protect line workers?

Sorry for all the questions and doubts but I'm new to all of this and you seem quite knowledgeable.

The purpose of the Gateway is handling the "Islanding Mode" and separate the house from the grid both to protect the line repair workers and because it would be impossible for the Powerwall and Solar to work as the grid would be an infinite load.

If your Powerwall walls go to zero in the app, the Powerwall will actually have 5% buffer, they will go into standby and periodically check to see if the PV can generate any power. Once the PV can produce again the cycle starts over.

 

[yblaser]

In addition to what @Redhill_qik posted it's important to understand that sometimes this doesn't work as seamlessly as it is supposed to for a variety of different reasons.

Sometimes you may have to shed loads by turning off breakers to the house and sometimes you might have to jump start the system with a small external battery. Given you have the potential for extended outages you may want to understand and prepare for this potential issue.

See for example:

Help: Powerwall Cold/Jump started without grid power [resolved]

Hi There, Wonder if there is a way to cold/jump start the powerwall off grid? My System 12KW, Tesla Gataway2, Powerwall+, Powerwall Here is brief explanation what happened. We lost power on 1/10 at 2am, Powerwall kicked in, not as seamlessly as expected but it worked. We had power all day on...

teslamotorsclub.com

 

[jjrandorin]

I was without power for 35 days!

Wow....

Being without power for about 3 days made me decide to splurg on powerwalls to go with my solar... I cant imagine what 35 days without power would be like.

 

[aesculus]

Wow....

Being without power for about 3 days made me decide to splurg on powerwalls to go with my solar... I cant imagine what 35 days without power would be like.

11.6666666666666... times as bad.