States/Cities Attempting To Limit You Self Produced Power...

[Hedges]

That's why I think the Secure Power feature of Sunny Boys, and batteryless backup of some AIO, is quite valuable.
Battery systems come at quite a premium, also some risk. Secure Power costs an outlet, switch, length of wire.
The trick is manually moving loads to the outlet which is live, or disabling excessive loads so PV/inverter only has to support critical ones.

Better if such support of important loads like refrigerator was automated, but don't see it today. Such an inverter with transfer relay providing dead-man connection to grid and automatic transfer to PV-direct backup is all that would be needed, I think.

Having a house with absolutely no power, and fridge/freezer full of spoiled food isn't funny.

While it can't help for certain downed lines or blown transformers, this is why I say vast majority of problem could be solved with a $2 pager wired to interrupt A/C and heater thermostats. Anything that reduces grid capacity but hasn't brought it down can be accommodated by controlling loads. (Actually, pager, relay, GPS and custom software to perform time-randomized on/off durations might be the complete package. Single model deployed everywhere, and radio broadcast with regional location and percentage load curtailment controls it.)

 

[cs1234]

A small AC battery doesn't have to cost as much as it does to install, it's because houses aren't set up for it wiring wise and the code involving them is outrageous. Doesn't have to be very big to run a fridge, box fan or electric blanket.

Solar panels and AC outlets on the inverter is a nice feature, but it can't power squat if the sun isn't out coincidentally at the same time as the utility power. The battery back up could be charged with anything, the utility, a generator, your cars alternator, etc..

Allowing the utility to curtail high power consuming loads is something that is tried from time to time, but Americans are pretty resistant to the idea of allowing somebody to control their thermostat. A small utility powered AC battery could help with load reduction as well if we allowed it to be controlled by the utility, it would grid sync and with export control / zero export could reduce overall load on the grid by injecting power to cover some of the house load.

Even just a 2-5kwh of batteries with a small 1200-2000 watt inverter designed onto it that can grid sync would be a huge improvement, and shouldn't cost much more than $1000-2000 in bulk if designed properly. It just needs a dedicated 120vac circuit for attachment (if we want to be safe) and a device to read consumption to prevent export.

 

[Hedges]

Americans are pretty resistant to the idea of allowing somebody to control their thermostat.

Yeah but ... the utility gets to control your entire house. And the city. Just cut power.

That's why I think adding pager to thermostat should be optional. For anyone who doesn't agree, pager with 100A or 200A contactor is installed under the meter. During a power emergency, anyone with the optional thermostat cutout gets to keep power.

A small AC battery doesn't have to cost as much as it does to install, it's because houses aren't set up for it wiring wise and the code involving them is outrageous. Doesn't have to be very big to run a fridge, box fan or electric blanket.

...

Even just a 2-5kwh of batteries with a small 1200-2000 watt inverter designed onto it that can grid sync would be a huge improvement, and shouldn't cost much more than $1000-2000 in bulk if designed properly. It just needs a dedicated 120vac circuit for attachment (if we want to be safe) and a device to read consumption to prevent export.

That's called a UPS. You can buy it and plug it in.

Listed ESS are about $1000/kWh including installation (supposedly)
Grey market LiFePO4 cells are around $125/kWh

Don't know if $1000 price point can be hit with 1kW inverter, 2kWh battery. Wholesale maybe, retail harder unless there is a large market.

I think Ecoflow is $3600 for 3.6kW, 3.6kWh

Sync to grid only needed for peak shaving or grid support. Off-grid e.g. mobile inverter/charger should take care of backup purposes. Easier compliance when not grid interactive.

If grid support is desired, the utility can buy and install at grid scale. The cost and safety issues of distributing across homes makes it impractical. Only if the equipment is already there, and sufficient incentives are provided. But I doubt economically competitive with utility scale, except in the case of EV where homeowners have large battery capacity.

 

[cs1234]

Sync to grid only needed for peak shaving or grid support. Off-grid e.g. mobile inverter/charger should take care of backup purposes. Easier compliance when not grid interactive.

If grid support is desired, the utility can buy and install at grid scale. The cost and safety issues of distributing across homes makes it impractical. Only if the equipment is already there, and sufficient incentives are provided. But I doubt economically competitive with utility scale, except in the case of EV where homeowners have large battery capacity.

I thought we already came to the conclusion that the utility either doesn't want to, or can't, install the needed infrastructure at grid scale because of costs/profit or what have you.

A small "ups" as you described my dedicated circuit attached inverter/battery combo if able to do grid sync could "shave off" some of the loads that utilities are having to deal with that are overburdening them. If allowed to be controlled by the utility, they could "shave off" whatever the inverter size is right off that houses load without inconveniencing the customer whatsoever.

As far as compliance and regulation goes, those are often lobbied nonsense that can be changed by the utilities and politicians to go with this new idea if desired. There isn't anything inherently dangerous about a relatively small battery and inverter than can sync to the utility AC power and do zero export through some sort of CT type monitoring of the house main meter. It turns off if power is lost completely anyway, unless we want it to power a critical loads panel/circuit.. which if we do would require some additional house wiring considerations, but certainly isn't insurmountable. You could even just have a couple ac outlets on it for grid down conditions, one for charging (say from a generator / vehicle inverter) and one for output. Then people could just hook up some stuff to it with an extension cord.

 

[Hedges]

The grid can do anything, but that takes a large investment. They are hobbled by PUC which sometimes won't even authorize cost of tree trimming. And by their own greed, pocketing profit but not making investments.

Residential rooftop PV costs 3x what utility scale does. But if people with more money than sense voluntarily pay for it, that relieves utility from making some investments. Then all they have to do is change rules in the middle of the stream so it doesn't cut into their sales and profits.

Plug-in vs. hardwired is a major reduction in installation cost & hassle, but can overload wires in circuits with multiple outlets. If connected to a single load circuit like dryer or stove (providing another breaker protected outlet so appliance still connected) the wiring problem is solved, but still has 120% rule issues backfeeding middle of breaker panel. Seems like hardwired is the only completely safe way, and that drives cost too high for cost-effective benefit to utility. Maybe instead just hang an AC battery on power pole.

Like laws and sausages, nothing pretty will come from the present scheme of distributed authority and investment. Worse now, I think, than when one utility owned generation and distribution, and didn't have to worry about competition from its customers.

"Save yourself!", don't expect anything good from the system. Just decisions to throw the burden on the well to do, partially subsidize the poor, and ensure politicians and company executives looks like the pigs and farmers of Animal Farm talking about the lower animals.

 

[wattmatters]

There are always "no issues" until there are.

Very true.

I think the point being made however is that the proportion of VRE (= solar + wind) a grid can (but not necessarily will) reliably work with is proving to be far higher than many naysayers suggested.

That proportion will vary depending on the specifics of the grid it is integrated with but as an example, the state of South Australia, over a full year, is now at a tick under 70% of total demand being met by VRE. Note that this has been achieved with bugger all firming of VRE. There is no hydro capacity in SA, so the only VRE firming is batteries, which represented 0.7% of the state's grid demand. The rest of course is via gas power plants and imports from Victoria (mostly brown coal generation).

We were told 10 years ago that the grid would collapse beyond 30% VRE. South Australia passed the 30% mark in 2013 - a decade ago. The entire Australian NEM (National Electricity Market, which includes SA but not Western Australia), will hit 30% VRE this year.

Grid operators are of course concerned, that's what they are paid for. SA has some unique characteristics which may not be as applicable nation wide but nonetheless they are at the forefront when it comes to policies to integrate more rooftop solar PV onto the grid so it is worth watching what they do and how those policies play out.

To have short periods on some days where 100% of the state grid's power demand is met by rooftop PV alone is pretty astonishing and I can imagine how anxious the staff inside control rooms must be. The two way power flow capacity with neighbouring states is in the process of being upgraded with a large HV transmission line to NSW and that will also help significantly. What SA does not have is a large industrial dump load.

It's a heck of a real time experiment. The stresses in the short term are coming with Winter in the southern states (especially Victoria) but not to do with rooftop PV but rather gas supply shortfalls (despite being the largest exporter of gas in the world). This is the bit where political ideological insanity hurts us. Hence the desire to move people off residential gas consumption and use electrically drive heat pumps for water and space heating.

With grid operation there are two main forces:

1. Physics.
We mess with that at our peril.
Fortunately there are ways to incorporate quite high levels of VRE if done smartly. This is a matter of engineering and smart control of the levers. Smart people can work out the technical, engineering and financial costs involved in building and optimally operating such systems, but these are not the only factors in play. Climate and weather also factor into this.

2. Markets.
The market mechanism and the management environment used is often more the cause of grid issues than the physics and engineering. It can (significantly) distort what is both cost and physically optimal. When those who influence markets think they are more powerful than physics, then the physics will take over.

 

[miahallen]

Where I live... Not being connected to the grade is actually surprisingly common... It's an old lake community that started in the '80s in Kansas

Of course maybe 15 years ago they incorporated as a city

There's maybe four or 500 residents year-round and it balloons to 1200 in the summer

I'm currently building my house and I made it quite clear that I was putting a 10,000 Watt solar array in and that I would not be connecting to the grid

The city has no problem with it they also have no ordinances against it

The big thing that comes into play, at least in Kansas, is that if the property you own is connected to the grid you can't disconnect it from the grid

Meaning if the infrastructure is already there you have to use it

Luckily the property I have has never in any point in history had power on grid

I suppose it also helps that I'm a planning and zoning commissioner for the city

But the utility company will disconnect you if you stop paying, right?

 

[wattmatters]

But the utility company will disconnect you if you stop paying, right?

I guess the risk is ending up with a credit score issue which can affect other things you might need to do in life.

 

[NPhil]

Very true.

I think the point being made however is that the proportion of VRE (= solar + wind) a grid can (but not necessarily will) reliably work with is proving to be far higher than many naysayers suggested...

No such point has been made. It is not making a point to falsify a straw man fallacy, without having addressed the substance with even ordinary evidence, when the assumption (that we can just add things to a complex system without need for considering at length the long term stability) is extraordinary. What we know from the history of power production and other complex things, is that making more or less random changes to complex systems is more likely to harm stability than improve it.

 

[NPhil]

Hi, neighbor.

I was using Sun workstations at the same time, didn't have any significant issue with the power. Maybe because this was CAD, not a system requiring 100% uptime.

The use of the grid has grown and changed. Once, it might have powered factories and provided rural electrification. Telephones were powered by battery. Machinery has momentum that coasts through glitches. Power distribution has contactors that make/break repeatedly in event of a short, possibly blowing off the squirrel, branch or whatever and restoring power.

Was your Sun upset by a very brief outage, or a sustained one? Everything requires resiliency, not just the grid but also your computer. We put equipment being qualified through various surge, brownout, dropout tests. Even prior to your experience, computers were designed to handle that situation. Some would put CPU state into RAM when given a power fail interrupt, and batteries kept memory alive, at least for a while. UPS, generators, etc. support various installations depending on the uptime needed.

Yes, power could/should be made more reliable, but the more critical loads need to be protected locally. I think a big part of the equation is load control and load shedding. This applies to off-grid systems as well as the utility grid. The grid simply can't always supply all loads under all conditions. Could approach that, but at higher cost for everyone. Back in the '90's, a fire up north took out one transmission line, and over 3 days the grid gradually collapsed from Vancouver to Ensenada. I think if large loads like A/C were taken offline (despite the excessively hot weather), then other loads like refrigeration, fans, pumps could have been supported, and grid would not have collapsed. Pagers connected to thermostat wires would be a trivial solution giving the grid automated control to achieve stability.

In fact, that was the time when Unix was barely moving away from the thinking that operators must never remove power without going through a normal shutdown, lest the file system be corrupted. And, although my example was intended to present my workstation as a metaphor of a canary in the coal mine, in fact it was inconvenient, because the state of my work was routinely scattered across multiple windows, which all vanished with every power failure. And I'm not talking about what _should_ be, I'm talking about the assumptions which are, because, as rife as the attitude is in high tech, I do not assume that contributing to the collapse of large systems, especially by telling the operators how to do their job, is OK, if I can point a finger at something the user could have done to ameliorate the consequences, but did not.

 

[NPhil]

The grid can do anything, but that takes a large investment. They are hobbled by PUC which sometimes won't even authorize cost of tree trimming. And by their own greed, pocketing profit but not making investments.

Residential rooftop PV costs 3x what utility scale does. But if people with more money than sense voluntarily pay for it, that relieves utility from making some investments. Then all they have to do is change rules in the middle of the stream so it doesn't cut into their sales and profits.

Plug-in vs. hardwired is a major reduction in installation cost & hassle, but can overload wires in circuits with multiple outlets. If connected to a single load circuit like dryer or stove (providing another breaker protected outlet so appliance still connected) the wiring problem is solved, but still has 120% rule issues backfeeding middle of breaker panel. Seems like hardwired is the only completely safe way, and that drives cost too high for cost-effective benefit to utility. Maybe instead just hang an AC battery on power pole.

Like laws and sausages, nothing pretty will come from the present scheme of distributed authority and investment. Worse now, I think, than when one utility owned generation and distribution, and didn't have to worry about competition from its customers.

"Save yourself!", don't expect anything good from the system. Just decisions to throw the burden on the well to do, partially subsidize the poor, and ensure politicians and company executives looks like the pigs and farmers of Animal Farm talking about the lower animals.

This is somewhat my view, although I might prefer to call it reasonable preparedness, hoping to avoid my choice to make some small move toward absence from the grid becoming part of a "movement", and that movement becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Life is complicated, I guess.

 

[wattmatters]

No such point has been made.

I provided an example of a grid which has done just that and not failed. Not sure how that is a strawman argument?

 

[NPhil]

I provided an example of a grid which has done just that and not failed. Not sure how that is a strawman argument?

It's a straw man because no claim has been made that it absolutely cannot run, for a while.

 

[wattmatters]

It's a straw man because no claim has been made that it absolutely cannot run, for a while.

I wasn't referring to any claims made or not made in this thread. It was a common refrain used by the fossil energy lobby for years here, "Adding VRE = unreliable grid". Mostly FUD fuelled by Murdoch mouthpieces. The bigger grid failures here have had two main causes:
i. severe weather events made worse by climate change taking out transmission infrastructure
ii. failures with coal power plants

 

[OffGridForGood]

While it can't help for certain downed lines or blown transformers, this is why I say vast majority of problem could be solved with a $2 pager wired to interrupt A/C and heater thermostats. Anything that reduces grid capacity but hasn't brought it down can be accommodated by controlling loads. (Actually, pager, relay, GPS and custom software to perform time-randomized on/off durations might be the complete package. Single model deployed everywhere, and radio broadcast with regional location and percentage load curtailment controls it.)

Good point, if they were concerned about making the system capable of load sheading to prevent brownouts-or total black-outs, we would be hearing these types of discussions to enable controls. Instead the talk is all about taxing PV panels, and the instability of the grid - EV's threat to a fragile grid seems to be a common one.
My Province has introduced another approach - provide incentives to charge an EV over-night, a new 'ultra-low' 2.4 cent/kWh rate is pretty hard to ignore, 11Pm to 7Am and will encourage many homeowners to shift other loads to this low demand period of the day. Clearly there are far too few EV's at the moment to have that much impact, and I am pretty certain even without the 'ultra-low-rate' EV's were mostly being charged overnight to be ready for the morning commute.
It seems a strage mix of policies to get a rebate from purchasing solar on the fed tax, but then be sent a PV state-tax for this same solar now that it is on your roof.

 

[OffGridForGood]

One in three homes have grid-tied solar PV. It's still growing strongly each year but I think 60-70% will be about the upper limit as not all homes have suitable rooftops, rentals etc where it may not be suitable, economic etc. Plus apartments etc.

_ Thank-your for the correction Wattmatters!
I was hoping you would chime in with the Australia perspective.
On one of Andy's early videos (off grid garage) I believe he comments on his home has three phase, but one phase is set for critical loads, to enable the utility to quickly shead loads (when required) while maintaining some power supply to each home to run things like fridges and freezers (medical devices come to mind), I wondered if you can comment. Is this a 'thing' in Australia? - we don't have an easy way to go to residential three-phase in N.America but I am mostly interested in the idea of a residential service that has built in load shedding capabilities as a concept. Then apply Hedges ideas of remote control to enable the utility to shed loads when needed, while still providing essential service to critical residential loads.

 

[Quattrohead]

Big brother wants to shove himself down your throat more and more so that you have to rely on them.
My city has just notified us all that we have to change to new trash system where there is no more recycling, reduced pickup schedule and they are forcing every home to pay for trash whether they use it or not. Oh and the price is going up 40%.

 

[Nobodybusiness]

Big brother wants to shove himself down your throat more and more so that you have to rely on them.
My city has just notified us all that we have to change to new trash system where there is no more recycling, reduced pickup schedule and they are forcing every home to pay for trash whether they use it or not. Oh and the price is going up 40%.

If you live in an incorporated city trash pickup should be included in your taxes.

A lot of cities are doing away with recycling because of the cost. They can’t recover the cost of doing it.

The last city we lived in stopped doing recycling.

Where we live now ( In the sticks) Republic Services does our Trash pickup weekly and recycling every 2 weeks.

$68 a month..

 

[NPhil]

I wasn't referring to any claims made or not made in this thread. It was a common refrain used by the fossil energy lobby for years here, "Adding VRE = unreliable grid". Mostly FUD fuelled by Murdoch mouthpieces. The bigger grid failures here have had two main causes:
i. severe weather events made worse by climate change taking out transmission infrastructure
ii. failures with coal power plants

Also ad hominem fallacy is not supporting evidence. It isn't reasonably in question that large complex systems can fail catastrophically, in ways which range from difficult to practically impossible to repair in a timely fashion, it's history.

 

[NPhil]

Maybe this will add perspective: