IRVINE SOCAL AC DISCONNECT CODE SOLAR INSTALLATION

[everydaychris]

HEY FAMILY! I never knew anything about the power of the sun until I actually needed to harness it.

I live in Irvine in a newer home. Apparently, the home has solar pre wire in the attic and there are also two outlets in the garage for solar.

My question is, can the solar installer do everything inside and avoid any conduit outside the home?

I have been trying to look everywhere for proof to show the installer that the city of Irvine does not need an AC solar disconnect on the outside as one of my neighbors explained to me.

He used OC SOLAR that said IRvine can do everything inside so it looks cleaner. However, other neighbors didn't know and they all have a large conduit running from the roof to their meter.

Any help would be awesome! Thank you!

 

[Maast]

The question you're really asking is about NEC code compliance. If your area is using the 2016 (I think, might be 2014) NEC or newer it requires a external solar DC disconnect switch that also initiates a rapid shutdown that a firefighter can readily identify and access. Basically you must have a box with a switch on the outside of the house thats clearly labeled.

Code compliant installs are a HUGE subject and are difficult to do by a DIYer unless they spend weeks/months reading the code and commentaries. Take a look at article 690 as a start.

Now as far as the conduit goes it's absolutely possible to have a install with no (or very little) exposed conduit: You hide all the wires inside the mounting racks and you just have a small piece of conduit going from the rack through the roof into the attic and then from the attic down through the garage into the crawlspace and up to the inverter. Any time you can see wire thats over 60V DC it has to be inside conduit.