Building a Grid-Tied Solar Electric System
? Silicon PhotoVoltaics
Solar Panels 200watts to 300watts each
•power tolerance +10%? -5%
•UL and IEEE tested and certified
•safety class II for system voltage up to 500 V (projected)
•power warranty up to 30 years (80%), 12 years (90%)*
•product guarantee 5 years*
•high yields even at high module temperatures
•ecological advantage ? extremely l
ow consumption on material
•delivered ready for connection with cable and Multi-Contact plug-in connectors
Notices and warning labels are a requirement and must be affixed on the meter, the disconnect and on the side of the building near the meter. The purpose is to warn electrical workers and emergency personnel, most notably firefighters, that disconnecting the meter will not shut off all power within the residence. How safe are these systems?
•All interconnection and safety equipment must be tested by a Nationally Recognized Testing Laboratory for continuous interactive operation with an electric distribution system in compliance with IEEE 1547 (Standard for Interconnecting Distributed Resources with Electric Power Systems), IEEE 1547.1 (Standard Conformance Test Procedures for Equipment Interconnecting Distributed Resources with Electric Power Systems), and UL 1741 (Inverters, Converters, and Controllers for use in Independent Power Systems). In addition, all systems must be manufactured and installed in compliance with the National Electric Code (NEC). Do all power companies participate in the Generation Partners program? Participation in the program is entirely at the discretion of the power company. Currently, there are 71 participating power companies across the Valley. Go to the Participating Power Companies page for more information. If your local power company isn?t currently a participant in the program, let them know you are interested in installing renewable generation at your home or business.
•Additional information regarding federal and state incentives is available at the DSIRE website at www.dsireusa.org.
•$1000 TVA Incentive
•Financing for solar installations may be available. Each customer must submit an interconnection application to their local power company. Individual local power companies may alter or revise the proposed Interconnection Procedures and Interconnection Agreement guidelines drafted by TVA, in order to better specify the local guidelines or process. Contact your local power company for more information. In the event of a power outage, will I be able to supply power to my home? In order to be a participant in TVA Generation Partners, the system must be connected to and generate power to the grid. Each installation must have a grid-tied inverter that synchronizes the power generated with the utility grid, and also prevents electricity or generation from flowing to the grid during an outage. The condition where an inverter continues to electrify the grid during an outage is called islanding. For the safety of line workers, inverters must stop sending generation to the grid when there is a grid failure. This is a serious concern for utilities because they do not want any utility lines to be energized while they are trying to fix the cause of the power outage. It is recommended and suggested in the Interconnection and Parallel Operation Agreement (supporting documentation for the Participation Agreement) that the participant must install a manual, lockable, visible load break disconnect switch between the generation facility and the distribution system. The participant must also ensure that the manual disconnect is readily accessible to the power company. As a result,Generation Partners participants will not be able to supply power to their homes during the event of an outage due to safety concerns. Sunny Boy grid-tie inverters from SMA makes it easy for the majority of us that are connected to the utility grid to use the clean energy from the sun. Founded in Germany in 1981 as an engineering/control systems company, SMA started producing the Sunny Boy line of inverters in 1996. These inverters allow you to install a photovoltaic system without having to worry about purchasing an expensive heavy battery bank. The DC power that is produced by the solar array is inverted to AC by the Sunny Boy inverter after which it is either used by your AC appliances or sold back to the utility grid to lower your monthly utility bill. The Sunny Boy units are called "string" inverters because they are designed to be wired to a single series string of 12-24 solar modules. This makes the solar array wiring very easy since you don?t have to worry about paralleling multiple strings of solar modules together in a combiner box. However, the high DC voltage that this series string of solar modules produces needs to be handled very carefully because it can be lethal! To minimize the potential shock hazard of this system's high DC voltage leave each string open at one panel, After the DC wire is connected to a fused connection at the inverter or thru a junction box the strings can be connected for a complete circuit
SMA inverters are available in sizes from 2000 to 500,000 watts, making them ideal for a wide range of applications from small residential to very large 3 phase industrial systems. All SMA inverters come standard with built in LCD digital monitors that display instantaneous power output, energy delivered during the current day, and the total energy produced since installation. Ambient temperature range: -13?F- +114?F. All models have a 10-year standard warranty and are certified to the new UL-1741/IEEE 1547 standards.
