No Solar Production with Power Outage

[SolarBob]

Playing golf today in CA and noticed my solar production was dead, no production.

My house was being powered by my 2 power wall batteries.

After about 1 1/2 hours solar started working again, charging the batteries, and powering the house.

When I got home I discovered we had a power outage of about 1 1/2 hours.

I had thought that the solar would keep producing, not go dead, power the house and continue charging the power walls if necessary.

So what happened here. What am I missing?

Also many of our lights, led, were on, microwave and oven timers flashing, and my iMac's had a circle with slash through them.

Something was not right, or I do not understand how this is supposed to work.

I filed a support issue with Tesla.

Can anyone help me here so I understand what to expect.

Thanks

 

[Laketime]

Your solar panels will stop production if the batteries are near full charge. Once the walls drop to a certain point the panels will go back into production to charge them back up. They can't produce more electricity than your walls and house can handle since the power has no place to go so the panels stop production.

 

[jjrandorin]

Playing golf today in CA and noticed my solar production was dead, no production.

My house was being powered by my 2 power wall batteries.

After about 1 1/2 hours solar started working again, charging the batteries, and powering the house.

When I got home I discovered we had a power outage of about 1 1/2 hours.

I had thought that the solar would keep producing, not go dead, power the house and continue charging the power walls if necessary.

So what happened here. What am I missing?

Also many of our lights, led, were on, microwave and oven timers flashing, and my iMac's had a circle with slash through them.

Something was not right, or I do not understand how this is supposed to work.

I filed a support issue with Tesla.

Can anyone help me here so I understand what to expect.

Thanks

As @Laketime said, its entirely likely that your powerwalls were full or close to full. Its also very normal for there to be a power blip when the powerwalls take over. It depends on whether the powerwalls were powering the house (they likely were not) at the time of the power outage or not.

Basically, without more information, from what you posted, nothing seems very much amiss.

 

[GRV0928]

95% and up of the powerwall the gateway will stop the solar inverter to produce power until it falls below 95%…

 

[EVRider-FL]

The other thing that can impact electronics during an outage: if the gateway needs to shuts down solar production because the Powerwalls are fully charged, the AC frequency in your home is increased from 60Hz to 65Hz. For example, this causes many UPS units to switch to battery mode.

 

[Steve2498]

need more info. Aside from a possible glitch during a switchover when power was out, were the PowerWalls powering the house during the outage? If so, and the the PowerWalls were close to 100%, as others have said, that is how things are suppose to work.

if however the PWs were not close to 100% and solar wasn’t producing and/or the PWs weren’t covering the house load, you have A problem.
when my system was first installed, when off grid my solar production was shut down regardless of the battery’s SOC. it Took over a month but Tesla got it fixed but never told me what they did.

 

[Vines]

Playing golf today in CA and noticed my solar production was dead, no production.

My house was being powered by my 2 power wall batteries.

After about 1 1/2 hours solar started working again, charging the batteries, and powering the house.

When I got home I discovered we had a power outage of about 1 1/2 hours.

I had thought that the solar would keep producing, not go dead, power the house and continue charging the power walls if necessary.

So what happened here. What am I missing?

Also many of our lights, led, were on, microwave and oven timers flashing, and my iMac's had a circle with slash through them.

Something was not right, or I do not understand how this is supposed to work.

I filed a support issue with Tesla.

Can anyone help me here so I understand what to expect.

Thanks

Another question is what is the size of your PV system, what inverters does it use and what is the age of it?

If your PV production is too large compared with your battery size that can also be an issue. With 2 Powerwalls, you need no more than about 10-12 kW of AC Inverter output. More than that, especially of an older vintage, might be too much power for your Powerwalls to charge from, and your other loads in the house may not large enough to make up the difference.

 

[SolarBob]

Thanks for the info. I was not at home. Checking the app remotely I noticed no solar production looking at the app graph. There was a big gap in the solar production app graph.

The PW's were fully charged when the outage happened.

The outage was 1.5 hours so I do not know how low the batteries were drained during the outage.

After power was restored, the solar app started showing solar production, and recharged the battery usage.

FYI, the outage was not soft for my Power Walls. My computers, Direct TV, LED lights, and appliance clocks had to be reset.

The outage also messed up my VELOP router wireless setup.

At installation time when Tesla checked the system, the outage they generated was seamless to the house so I am not sure what actually happened.



Thanks to all for responding.

 

[ucmndd]

The PW's were fully charged when the outage happened.

Then everything is working as designed as far as the solar goes. If the batteries are full, solar is shut off.

As for the brief outage during transition - it does seem to "depend". Sometimes my outages result in barely a flicker, other times it's a good 10-15 seconds or so before the PWs get the message and start powering the house. I suspect this has to do with what mode they're in when the outage happens and what your home loads look like... charging vs discharging vs standby - but that's just speculation on my part.

 

[Laketime]

Thanks for the info. I was not at home. Checking the app remotely I noticed no solar production looking at the app graph. There was a big gap in the solar production app graph.

The PW's were fully charged when the outage happened.

The outage was 1.5 hours so I do not know how low the batteries were drained during the outage.

After power was restored, the solar app started showing solar production, and recharged the battery usage.

FYI, the outage was not soft for my Power Walls. My computers, Direct TV, LED lights, and appliance clocks had to be reset.

The outage also messed up my VELOP router wireless setup.

At installation time when Tesla checked the system, the outage they generated was seamless to the house so I am not sure what actually happened.



Thanks to all for responding.

Sounds like they are working in line with the scenario I mentioned earlier. Changeover is only seamless if you are already running on the walls or the grid is up (you changed to self powered mode while grid is still running). If the grid goes down and you were not running off the walls it will take a second or so to change over.

 

[jboy210]

...

FYI, the outage was not soft for my Power Walls. My computers, Direct TV, LED lights, and appliance clocks had to be reset.

I have no idea how fast the Powerwall picked up in this outage, but it is sometimes not quick enough for computers and other sensitive electronics. Some people use a small UPS to ensure their electronics stay powered during this quick transition.

With that said I have never had a clock in an appliance die (flash 0:00) during an outage and switch to the Powerwalls. You might create your own outage by shutting off grid power and ensuring the Powerwalls are working properly.

 

[jjrandorin]

I have no idea how fast the Powerwall picked up in this outage, but it is sometimes not quick enough for computers and other sensitive electronics. Some people use a small UPS to ensure their electronics stay powered during this quick transition.

With that said I have never had a clock in an appliance die (flash 0:00) during an outage and switch to the Powerwalls. You might create your own outage by shutting off grid power and ensuring the Powerwalls are working properly.

It really "depends", like @ucmndd mentioned.

I only did a little bit of testing, but the conclusion I reached was:

If powerwall state either = "standby" or " being filled from PV" when a power outage happens, you can experience a power "blip" where it takes some amount of time for the powerwalls start powering the house.

If powerwall state = Discharging, you almost never notice the power outage.

Additionally, it depends on whether the power outage is "clean" (similar to you throwing the main breaker in your home), or if there is a period of time where the power is fluctuating from the utility before it drops (happens sometimes in a "live" non simulated power outage). The systems have to conform to some standard or other where they have to "ride through" some power fluctuations.

Power fluctuations happen in a real power outage sometimes ( power spikes, etc) and the powerwall wont immediately pick up and cover that, unless and until the power actually "drops".

So, whether its a "blip you never noticed" or "I had to reset my clocks" or "power transfer took 10 seconds!" is all "it depends", at least that is what it seems to me.

 

[LadyLion]

I went on the Tesla app yestrday 8/27 My system does not show power production since early July
Has nayone else experienced this Is ther a Tesla emergency phone # ? The listedcust service # only answers
during weekday hours

Ladylion

 

[jjrandorin]

I went on the Tesla app yestrday 8/27 My system does not show power production since early July
Has nayone else experienced this Is ther a Tesla emergency phone # ? The listedcust service # only answers
during weekday hours

Ladylion

The number I have is 877-961-7652. No idea of the working hours for this phone number though.

 

[LadyLion]

The number I have is 877-961-7652. No idea of the working hours for this phone number though.

Thx