few chosen happy clients

This solar system is recommended for Residential or Small businesses. Ideally, an off-grid system is not connected to the electricity grid and requires battery storage. Off-grid solar solutions are supposed to be designed correctly (can be affected by budget) in order to generate enough power throughout the year and have the necessary battery capacity to meet the client’s electrical energy requirements or demand.

Generally, off-grid solar installation sizing or specifications are based on your daily wattage usage and peak Watt-hour requirement. Daily watt-hour usage can normally be calculated from your utility bill over a time-period but may require more accurate usage pattern monitoring with energy metering data loggers.

  Off-Grid Components

Below are the components of an Off-grid system

1. Solar      Panels
2. DC-AC      grid-tied solar inverter
3. Solar      cables
4. Mounts
5. Charge Controller
6. Battery Bank
7. A Connected Load

Optional off-grid components

1. A      backup Generator or a Backup Source of power
2. A      Transfer Switch
3. AC      Load Center (Existing DB Can be used)
4. A      DC Load Center

Grid tied systems consist of only 2 key components – solar panels and a dedicated grid tied inverter. All the electric power generated by the solar panels feeds through a mains synchronized inverter directly into your distribution board and offsets the power you would normally consume from Eskom. It will of course only do this when the sun shines! If the panels produce more power than what is being consumed at the time, the balance will flow back into the network and it will actually reverse the electricity meter (not all types of meters can do this though). Since no batteries are used, no independent energy can be stored for later use. This means that energy required at night will still be obtained from the network.

1. Solar Panels

2. DC-AC grid-tied solar inverter

3. Solar cables

4. Mounts

• Energy provided by the Sun – saving money.

• No expensive batteries required.

• Sunlight is directly converted into electricity to use.

• At current electricity costs, system payback is between 4 to 6 years.

• Cost of energy yield fixed for at least 25 years.

• The only home improvement that will save you money on a daily basis!

• No maintenance required.

Main disadvantages of Grid Tied Solar PV Systems include:

With no batteries, there is no independent energy storage.

During load shedding or a power outage, the system switched off also.

Current legal issues in South Africa can limit the full benefits in certain applications like being paid for power supplied to the grid by the utility.

This system is very similar to an off grid stand alone system but has the ability to interact with the public power grid network. Eskom power could be used as a backup source of power when required.

Such a system will automatically switch to Eskom power when no Sun has been available for a period of time or when electricity demand exceeds the ability of the system.

Grid tied systems could be combined with grid interactive systems to create a hybrid system that will still make power available when the grid network is down. Essentially a UPS inverter and battery bank is added to the basic grid tied system.