Making the most of solar

ard123en

Hi folks moved this from another section

We are about to take the plunge and buy solar looking at a 4.5 kw system for £5750 with monitor down to panel level. Had quotes from £4500 to 8k so somewhere in the middle with more monitoring and options for Tesla's battery later

I'm wondering if anyone charges leisure batteries during the sun shine to run lights at night. Tried a proof of today charged a battery pack up and been running my lounge lamps via inverter for the last 2 hours.

ajbell

How are you feeding the power back in?.

ard123en

Just on an inverter with a 13 amp plug to the lamps

ajbell

Oh I see, I thought you were some how feeding it back in via the fuse box.

ard123en

Found out that you can get plug and play grig tie inverters for a few 100 will be using one of these

Martyn1981

ard123en wrote: »

Found out that you can get plug and play grig tie inverters for a few 100 will be using one of these

Hiya, can I just check, do you mean the battery to an inverter to a lamp, all on it's own circuit, completely separate to the house's wiring? Or do you mean a plug and play inverter plugged into a domestic socket?

In the UK, it isn't legal to plug in an inverter, it has to be hard wired to the consumer unit on a dedicated circuit with no other items/sockets.

If you look, for example, on E-bay, you may find inverters that are not certfied for use in the UK if connected to the mains.

NineDeuce

Slightly off the main topic, but I would just go for the cheaper option. £1,250 for monitoring is not worth it. My opinion of course....

ard123en

Martyn1981 wrote: »

Hiya, can I just check, do you mean the battery to an inverter to a lamp, all on it's own circuit, completely separate to the house's wiring? Or do you mean a plug and play inverter plugged into a domestic socket?

In the UK, it isn't legal to plug in an inverter, it has to be hard wired to the consumer unit on a dedicated circuit with no other items/sockets.

If you look, for example, on E-bay, you may find inverters that are not certfied for use in the UK if connected to the mains.

I had the batteries on a separate inverter direct to the lamp but had seen grid inverters on Chinese sites that plug into a socket lots of American videos on YouTube

Martyn1981

ard123en wrote: »

I had the batteries on a separate inverter direct to the lamp but had seen grid inverters on Chinese sites that plug into a socket lots of American videos on YouTube

Hiya. Thanks for confirming.

If you plug an inverter into a socket in the UK (even if they are licensed for some EU countries), you will breach DNO regs, and invalidate your home insurance.

Had a recent 'discussion' with someone elsewhere claiming these where completely fine, he disagreed with the UK legislation I quoted, so I contacted my DNO who said no, no, no, quoted back the legislation, explained that these systems could result in export during a powercut/maintenance issue, and pointed out that the householder would be liable for any injuries to their staff, and the (as mentioned) loss of house insurance .... regardless of the cause, since the policy would have been breached. Ouch!

ard123en

Thank if I bought a second hand sunny boy can I cable it in alongside my solar edge to feed back a DIY power wall ?

Martyn1981

ard123en wrote: »

Thank if I bought a second hand sunny boy can I cable it in alongside my solar edge to feed back a DIY power wall ?

I don't know. I'm more a worrier about people getting hurt, than a technical guy.

But even if the power is coming from a battery, I suspect that too will have to feed into the CU, and as recently discovered, storage also needs DNO approval due to export limits and safety during power cuts.

BTW, here's the bit on inverters in the UK, see section 2.3.

Guide to the installation of PV systems

Please note that the text is in dark blue and there are 2 ticks next to it. Definition from page 7:-

Bold text in blue against a shaded box with two ticks indicates mandatory and/or broadly recognised requirements (‘must’).
Text in blue with one tick indicates recommended practice (‘should’).