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Tesla solar panels during power outage
- Thread starter houser2021
- Start date
No, unless you have battery storage, your solar panels are dormant when there is no grid, period, end of sentence. Actually, the first time that happens to you (for example, if you have a PSPS or other power outage) you will be EXTREMELY frustrated, knowing that there "could be" power but you cant use it.
Also, that is by design, for protection of linemen/women working on lines. Unless you have storage, you dont have a way to create a microgrid, so, no power.
One more thing, thats not just "tesla" solar panels (since there are usually people who say "why did tesla do that?" its a "solar panels without storage no matter who installed them", thing.
Also, that is by design, for protection of linemen/women working on lines. Unless you have storage, you dont have a way to create a microgrid, so, no power.
One more thing, thats not just "tesla" solar panels (since there are usually people who say "why did tesla do that?" its a "solar panels without storage no matter who installed them", thing.
Just wondering,what did your sales person, installer tell you about your panels and power outages?
Before getting batteries, that is exactly what happened to me. I was made aware of that so I wasn't surprised when it did happen.
I knew it too, when I got my solar panels in 2015, but convinced myself I didnt need it. PSPS were not a thing then. In 2019 I had 3 power outages at my home, with one of them being just under 3 days.
Its one thing to know "I wont have power but we dont normally have power outages that long here", and another thing entirely to be without power for multiple days... especially when you have solar on your home, and its bright and sunny, or it was for me, anyway.
We have a generator and used that during the power outages and PSPS. But that got old after 5-6 a year with some being a few minutes to others being 12+ hours. And trying to be a good neighbor, we didn't run it at night.
I was reading up on this a little, and apparently some inverters can be run in a special mode to allow this. Its basically for off grid installations, and I can not remember what the mode was called or the inverter. If you were connected to the grid, you would need to turn off the main breaker manually, and then change modes in the inverter. I am also sure the interconnection agreement would forbid trying to do any of this. I was primarily looking into the idea to see if I ran a small generator, that the solar could then continue working providing additional power. I came to the conclusion its just not worth the time for the one or two times a year without power. Not too mention, an auto transfer switch and installation for the generator is not gonna be cheap.
Perhaps you are remembering that Enphase announced a microinverter, IQ8, capable of islanding, I.e. working off grid.
Enphase IQ8 microinverter to operate without the grid - AC Solar Warehouse
However, the product is not yet on the market, and it is unclear to me how it wouldn't feed power back to the grid without an automatic transfer switch, ala the Tesla gateway. As I read the press releases, two IQ8 microinverters would be sufficient to establish a local micro grid, as they are supposed to be able to run with IQ-6, and IQ-7 microinverters. Supposedly, it is due out Q4 2021;
https://www.renvu.com/Learn/When-will-the-Enphase-IQ8-be-released
All the best,
BG
Enphase IQ8 microinverter to operate without the grid - AC Solar Warehouse
However, the product is not yet on the market, and it is unclear to me how it wouldn't feed power back to the grid without an automatic transfer switch, ala the Tesla gateway. As I read the press releases, two IQ8 microinverters would be sufficient to establish a local micro grid, as they are supposed to be able to run with IQ-6, and IQ-7 microinverters. Supposedly, it is due out Q4 2021;
https://www.renvu.com/Learn/When-will-the-Enphase-IQ8-be-released
All the best,
BG
I think the one I saw was Delta H6 6000W. Personally I will wait a while until battery prices come down, and they perfect the tie in at the meter. That is if Tesla ever starts selling just batteries again.
iQ8 will only work in island mode with the Enpower MID (i.e. automatic transfer switch and autotransformer) but it can work without batteries.
MrTemple
Member
FTFY:
...unless you get an inverter that can do islanding, like the IQ8 that is releasing about now (aka in Two Weeks™
).
FTFY:
...unless you get an inverter that can do islanding, like the IQ8 that is releasing about now (aka in Two Weeks™
The "sentence does not continue" until that is a verified product that is being installed in peoples homes, and there are no issues from an AHJ in using that product. So, right now, its still "period, end of sentence. Perhaps the sentence continues "later", but thats "later" not "now".
skepticcyclist
Member
This is actually not true. The linemen are most likely protected as they shut down service to the section they are working on anyway.
The reason why solar stops producing is because there is no place for excess energy to go as output from the solar cannot match house consumption unless you have a system that can adjust output. There are some off grid inverters that do just that.
ucmndd
Well-Known Member
How would they "shut down service" in such a way that prevents lines from being energized by literally any service connection/transformer in the entire neighborhood?
"Most likely protected" is not an appropriate level of assurance when dealing with high voltage electrical distribution.
skepticcyclist
Member
IOW, the reason isn't because of lineman safety - This could easily be remedied at the house level to where no power goes to the grid while still being able to access solar production. The real reason is because the excess electricity produced has nowhere to go and grid tied inverters need communication with the grid to work.
But it is because of lineman safety. While you’re right that it could easily be remedied at the house level the fact is that current solar only installs don’t have that protection built in and running them as they are currently configured during a power outage would endanger linemen.
If you’re going to be talking about theoretical remedies, then this could easily be remedied by adding battery storage. I don’t think anyone is saying that it wouldn’t be theoretically possible for a solar only install to operate safely when the grid is down, just that would require additional hardware and configuration changes.
That said, in addition to worrying about what happens to the excess power, you need to worry about what happens when the sun goes behind a cloud and there isn’t enough power too. On a cloudy day the power will be going up and down and that’s not good for pretty much any electronics. Batteries also help in this situation.
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skepticcyclist
Member
ucmndd
Well-Known Member
The “communication” grid tied inverters have with the grid is exclusively to determine if the grid is up or not, for the safety reason that you assert doesn’t exist because linemen are “most likely protected” by the method you’ve seemingly invented whereby they can quickly and discretely “shut down service” to any arbitrary section of line that could otherwise be live from any single point of service.
Yes, you can’t run your solar without somewhere for excess energy to go, or an islanding inverter behind an ATS that can vary output based on demand. That can be true too. But saying it’s the ONLY reason and that the aforementioned safety issue doesn’t exist is just ridiculous.
skepticcyclist
Member
Perhaps I wasn't clear? Lineman safety isn't the reason for it being set up as such, it is the result (which can be mitigated) of it is set up as such.
And I never said nor implied ONLY. So your emphasis on a word I never even used is either a strawman or a misunderstanding of what I meant
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