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RESIDENTIAL GRID TIE SOLAR POWERED SYSTEMS

THE BASICS
Home
Grid tie (also known as grid-intertied or utility-interactive) systems are intended to operate in Solar energy
parallel with an electric utility. PV homes
Here is how they work. At night or during inclement weather all the electricity is Inverter
Ads by Google supplied by the mains. During the daylight hours, the system generates some
PV systems
power, offsetting the consumption of electricity from the utility and cutting
Solar Systems Off grid
electric bills. The balance of the kWh required by your loads is automatically
Solar Powered drawn from the input lines. If the PV panels are producing more electricity than Grid tied
Solar Home you are using, the system will feed the surplus of the energy back to the utility. Grid tie backup
It may even spin your electric meter backwards, further reducing your monthly PV panels
bill. PV cells
Such configuration is the most common, simplest and less expensive than other types of Cost
grid-interactive residential PV setups. Currently, an average net cost of an installed batteryless Pros and Cons
on-grid PV generators for homes is under $7 per watt. For homeowners a large portion of this cost Efficiency
may be offset by various credits and rebates. The main disadvantage of such systems is that Lights
normally they do not provide any back-up power during blackouts even if sun is shining and the
PV array is producing enough energy. For a backup you need to use a battery-based systems
with special inverters.

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PRINCIPLES OF OPERATION AND WIRING DIAGRAM

Below is a simplified schematic of a typical grid tie solar power system that illustrates its operation.
Several strings of solar panels are paralleled in the combiner that includes fuses or circuit breakers. It is desirable
although not required to have a separate overcurrent interrupter for each string.
One of the two DC busses from the
PV array are usually grounded. In
theory, either buss can be grounded-
you need to check your part's
manual. Most inverters come
configured for negative ground,
although some panels manufacturers
recommend positive ground for
higher efficiency. The combiner frame
or the PV arrays grounding conductor
should also bonded to an earth rod.
A manual DC disconnect switch is
required at the place where the
cables from the solar array enter the
house. In U.S. the DC systems in use
today can be up to 600V. Since it is
hard to find UL listed single-pole
breakers rated for 600VDC, installers
often use a breaker with mulitple

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Grid Tie Solar Power System http://solar.smps.us/grid-tied.html

poles connected in series. To reduce

the possibility of a fire and to protect
the system from a damage caused by
lightings it is desirable to have a
voltage-clamping device, such as a
metal oxide varistor (MOV) across the
DC buss.

Besides a manual disconnect switch

there should be a DC ground fault
interrupter (GFI) - a device that opens
the circuit when it detects a specified
leakage current to earth. Note that
DC grounding should be done only in
one place. If you ground a cable both before and after GFI, the GFI will go off.

The above solar power diagram shows a grounded wiring. NEC® also permits ungrounded configurations in
combination with transformerless inverters. Such setups should have disconnects and fuses in both positive and
negative DC lines. They should also display a proper warning.
A voltage from the PV array is converted to AC by a special utility interactive DC-AC inverter. Such a device operates as
a pulse-width modulated switch mode power supply (SMPS) with AC output. The SMPS inverter is connected directly
to the main service panel. Although it includes internal disconnect switch, the utility companies usually require an
additional manual AC disconnect. A grid tie inverter should meet certain power quality and synchronization
requirements, and provide anti-islanding protection. Note that it will be powering your home only when utility is
available. If the grid is down, the PV system has to immediately seize exporting power. The control circuit automatically
synchronizes inverter's output to the mains. In order to allow the current flow back into the power lines, its output
voltage has to be just slightly higher than the utility voltage. For more details see a grid tie inverter schematic.

To extract the maximum power out of the PV panels, they have to operate near peak power point of their volt-amp
curve. This requires variable loading depending on the illumination and ambient temperature. Grid tie inverters for solar
applications normally use maximum power tracking algorithm that helps to extract maximum power from the panels
(see: I-V characteristics of solar panels). Since sunlight intensity varies during the day, it is not simple to size your
system. You can use this calculator to find the required amount of the panels.

By the way, in practice, the solar inverters often have several built-in fused pairs of DC inputs that make an external
combiner unnecessary. They also usually include both internal DC interrupt switch and ground fault interrupter.

This wiring diagram provides an example of a 3-wire "split-phase" 120/240 VAC configuration typical for the wiring of
most new US homes. Many inverters however provide only 2-wire 120VAC output. With such models, for 120/240 VAC
you would need to buy two inverters that allow mutual synchronization and so-called "master-slave" mode. You will
need to stack them with paralleled inputs and series-connected outputs. The junction between these two inverters will
become the neutral. Also note that some models do not have a bulky 60Hz output transformer. They either provide
isolation in a high-frequency converter stage or don't have a transformer at all.

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