Pushing a "legal" Mini Solar System to its LIMIT!

Old Design Issues - Limited to 600 watts, excess power goes to the grid without compensation. - No energy storage system (ESS) to store excess solar power. New Design Improvements - Installed solar panels on the roof for better efficiency. - Added energy meters to monitor power flow. - Created a 48V battery pack using four 12V LiFePO4 batteries. - Used Victron MultiPlus II for energy storage and management. - Configured the system to use the battery pack as a 600W power source. Performance Metrics - Reduced grid power consumption to around 50 watts. - Battery pack charges with excess solar power. Future Improvements - Need more solar panels for better utilization of the battery pack. - Approval from local grid provider is required. Positive Points (Sorted by Importance) 1. Modularity: The system is easily extendable and customizable. 2. Energy Storage: The new design includes a battery pack to store excess solar power. 3. Monitoring: Added energy meters for real-time monitoring of power flow. 4. Safety Measures: Included circuit breakers and surge protection devices. 5. Software Configuration: Allows fine-tuning of power usage and storage. Negative Points (Sorted by Importance) 1. Cost-Effectiveness: The system is not yet cost-effective due to underutilization of the battery pack. 2. Complexity: The system requires a good understanding of electrical systems and may not be suitable for complete beginners. 3. Approval Required: The system needs approval from the local grid provider. 4. Installation Challenges: Difficulty in installing solar panels on the roof.

The easiest way to actually get your solar panels on the roof, is to simply slide them on your ladder (with shorter side resting on your biceps as you climb up) and another person already up on the roof will grab the opossite side, you won't damage them that way and it is pretty safe. Personally, I've gotten thousands of PV modules on the roofs that way.

Here in the Netherlands we have a thing called "saldering", where anything that you push back to the grid will be deducted from your monthly bill, but that's going to be abolished in the next few years, so I was looking into a system like this as well, and you did exactly what I was planning to do, so thanks for saving me some time figuring everything out!

Everybody wants to have a house like Scott with all the latest tech installed.

Very nice installation! A 45° tile roof is very tough for panel installation. (Former rooftop installer)

All those breakers and shunts and zigby adapters and yadda yadda is really going to add up. cost wise. I did 20kw of solar for around $12k US, $15k if you count mistakes made along the way, and some unfortunate equipment failures. I have two small "microgrid" systems like in the video, and about 10kw worth of micro and string inverters that backfeeds the grid. I did it all myself and then had it inspected. I am lucky in several ways, I had land available to mount most panels on the ground. I also have one grid connection that goes to four households, so I have an absolutely huge base load compared to my usage. I send about 8-10% power back to the grid, the rest gets used up or stored in batteries. If I were in a high cost of electricity, it would pay for itself much faster, but 2 years in and it'll be paid off in ~3 more years. One drawback is it was kind of a hobby, I started with the microinverters... I added a 5kw string inverter, then two hybrid inverters and batteries. But now everything just works, and it isn't much of a hobby. Adding on to what I currently have will have drastically reduced ROI, as whatever I add will largely go back to the grid and they only pay 1/3 of what they charge me. I need to improve the temperatures that my hybrid inverters see.... everything is outdoors but dry. They experienced temperatures this summer that this area has never seen before. Not sure how to best go about this.

I'm so envious of how modular your distribution box is. Here in North America, industrial electrical systems tend to use more of the DIN rail mounted stuff, whereas at home we typically have a large, steel panel with rigid buses and a fixed number of slots for circuit breakers to plug into the buses. After adding new circuits, I'm running out of space, which means I can either install a larger panel with more slots, or add a second panel fed off of the first one. I don't know if our electrical code allows us to install DIN rail breakers, but it's a more practical setup in my opinion.

I really like your videos. I a electrician in the US and I love seeing how you guys do your electrical systems for your house and solar system

Good video, just from a safety side, you should probably have DC isolators coming from the batteries, something like the blue sea bs6006 is pretty good, also an AC disconnect nearby to the inverter would also be good, a simple MCB can facilitate this if you want to go simple

I'm jealous of your electrical panel. Here in the US ours are so last century.

Cool. Would be interesting to have an overview about the costs.

My previous job was installing PV systems nearly 20 years ago. As I can see your roof is the "areated type" so, probably you have some roof tiles that have a little "bulk" with a net to have airflow under the tiles. We used them as cable passages so you don't have to modify tiles. And we always have blocked the tiles underneath the panels with some PE foam to prevent them from moving (once the panels are installed is quite difficult to reposition the tiles). Hope this helps.

If you install the right assistant,you can run the PV inverter on the output and use it off grid too. There is documentation for "AC coupling" an inverter on the victron site

Hi, thanks for this overview of your upcoming solar system! No complaint meant, but I can't resist to ask: "What limit did this push...?" From the title, I would have expected something about how to get a maximum of energy while still abiding to the legal limits. Btw, it's announced that the limit will be raised to 800W output from the inverter next year. When building a system now, one could already have this target in mind. And since the solar modules seem to be some of your less costly devices, some overpaneling would be expected. Tilting modules could use more of the daylight than fixed ones, of course that would be quite complex, mechanically, and if this is too much hassle, one might consider to let them face into different directions to have a more even energy production during the day. Which, of course, only makes sense, as a way of maximizing immediate usage of the engergy, to reduce battery costs... I also had the impression, that you have bifacial modules. So mounting them in a way that allows significant light to hit the backsides would be another option. Maybe even reflectors... Of course you will be aware of all of this (and other things) much more than I am. Looking forward to the coming upgrades and follow-ups...

Excellent! I'm about to launch into this in my apartment in Barcelona. I do have to say that in the US, it's against electrical code to run data cables in the same conduit/tray as high power DC or AC. You might want to get a smaller cable tray to run the data cables only.

Great to see your new adventures in the Solar world :) It would be interesting to have more details on the Victron ESS configuration with micro-inverters. I did not go this way, I built a 'Custom ESS' using a Hoymiles micro-inverter connected to a battery, a battery charger, and a Raspberry for the brain of the system.

Very impressive setup! However, I noticed you don't appear to be using a battery management system (BMS) for the four LiFePO4 batteries. Are you not worried they might become unbalanced over time, leading to one or more of them getting overcharged / overdischarged? Edit: I see they are self managed, since each contains 3 or 4 such batteries wired in series, so that should protect them, however they can still get unbalanced, which means the battery will just disconnect in such scenarios :/

In the UK at least (of course your mileage will vary) you mustn't put mains voltage in the same conduit as low (data) voltage. I was also slightly concerned about your comment of just plugging solar into your mains, it's critically important to have an automatic isolator, so that if the mains fails, you are not supplying the grid with power and potentially endangering someone working on power lines they think are powered down.

Brilliant work, dude! Really well done!!! 😃 I just installed solar panels at home this week! 10 550w panels and inverter. (Well, I didn't, the company I hired did it. 😬) No batteries, the energy goes to the grid, but the electricity company installed a 2 way measuring... thingy... I don't know the name in English. 😬 So, the little clock runs both ways and it generates credits that we can use up to 50 months after. You know? I think about putting another 5 panels and batteries... But it was a heck of expensive already, so I'm going to have to wait. 😂 Anyway, stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊

Hello, I worked in the ventilation installation, with aluminum ducts, all our supports were either insulated from the ducts or made of aluminum to prevent electrolysis from eating away the aluminum. (according to my boss at the time)