Germans Combat Climate Change From Their Balconies: Plug-and-play solar panels are popping up in yards and on balcony railings across Germany, driven by bargain prices and looser regulations. - eviltoast
  • barsoap@lemm.ee
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    3 months ago

    Lighting fixtures in adjacent rooms are supposed to be on different breakers, not sure whether that also applies to balconies, not a room as such is it… but I’m no electrician. While I did get an A in electrotechnics I don’t know the VDE norms by heart (nor would I touch the wiring in a breaker panel).

    OTOH it’s perfectly permissible to have outlets and lighting on the same breaker. That’s all to say I wouldn’t be surprised or shocked to find that a balcony light is on a general “living room” circuit.

    I don’t think it matters in practice which phase the inverter is on. If you run the meter backwards with one phase and forwards with another, it should be still. We’re not talking about an autonomous installation, after all, when the external network is down and there’s no frequency to sync to those inverters stop outputting.

    Which all makes me wonder: Why aren’t we mandating that all new installations come with network isolation and points where you can plug in panels, battery etc? The hardware isn’t that expensive and installing it is practically free when you’re doing the initial installation.