Of course an equipment ground is an earth ground. The EGC is connected to earth is it not? The point of that code commentary is to emphasize that you cannot rely on a separate earth ground system to carry fault currents high enough to clear OCPDs when faults occur in grounded circuits.
Nowhere do any of the NEC code revisions or any of the folks you've referenced here say that it's ok to do what you claim to have done, which is to leave the PV structural system ungrounded. It is not allowed in the US.
Anyone with a broken module who was actually concerned about the safety hazards it could present would have by now simply removed it from service. Problem solved.
Instead you would appear to prefer to engage in insulting comments and esoteric discussion of US electrical code, which doesn't even apply in your location. Don't try to fit US electrical practice into practices used other countries, which have different methods to assure electrical safety.
If you want to leave your structure ungrounded in Thailand then you need to find justification for it in the regulatory system in force there, or just do whatever you can justify to yourself if there are no electrical code requirements. It seems to me that this latter case is where you are.
I'm done with this. By all means feel free to do whatever you want with your system. I wish you good luck with it.
An equipment ground is not an earth ground. An earth ground is just that--a connection to the earth, i.e. soil/clay/dirt/etc. An equipment ground is a connection between pieces of equipment. It is quite possible to have an earth ground without an equipment ground, and one can have an equipment ground without an earth ground. They are separate things.
For those who are unaware of this, an earth ground is really not a very good means of electrical fault protection. The entire point of a grounding system is to ensure enough current returns to the breaker to trip it and open the circuit so that the current stops. Earth is hardly as good a conductor as copper or aluminum. An equipment ground, which connects pieces of equipment with an actual wire, is far superior to an earth ground.
I am not seeking advice on US electrical practice. I am seeking information about actual electrical safety. Electrical practice and electrical safety are not directly related.
Many who think themselves patriotic may look down on the practices of other countries. I sometimes complain about Thai practices myself. However, you imply in your post here that "different methods" exist "to assure electrical safety." That said, perhaps people would keep an open mind regarding those methods. I want to hear actual facts, not merely codes. Codes are just policies--they are not laws of physics. It seems apparent that those policies have a large fan club here. I'm not here to pour cold water on that--I just am not interested in playing politics with the electrical principles. I simply want to know actual, real-life facts about how the electrical devices in my system may or may not function given a shattered panel.
I am telling you that my system is not grounded, and therefore poses less risk of one getting shocked via a parallel connection with ground. Instead of helping me understand the principles of my system, people instead want to force me to ground it, so that it then conforms to their ideas of how things should work (which then introduces said shock hazard that must be mitigated according to their SOP).
So be it. Perhaps I should have known I would not get much help here among people who are more interested in codes than in actual electrical principles.
There is a very good reason why I have chosen NOT to ground the system. I've not brought that reason into this thread, but have previously discussed it elsewhere here. That reason is
lightning. It is a known fact that grounding does not prevent lightning damage, nor damage to equipment in the event of a strike. The NEC codes appear to acknowledge this. People ground their equipment to reduce the hazard of themselves being harmed by the lightning--but let the equipment suffer its fate. I have found, through experience, that having the only ground for miles around is an excellent lightning rod, and will increase the odds of a lightning strike substantially. For this reason, I prefer isolation.
Many refuse to accept that there are indeed two major systems to protect oneself from electrical harm: grounding and isolation. The two do not mix. One cannot go partway with either of these, it's all or none. I believe that the grounding method is easier to implement successfully. The isolation method can be more technically challenging. But both have their pros and cons. None should be shamed for intelligently choosing one over the other to fit one's particular circumstances--yet the shame game is quite active here among those who think their chosen method superior in every case. It is not superior in every case. There are exceptions to every rule, and the electrical situation in Thailand and in other developing countries certainly provides for some exceptions.