Some Solar problems ahead?

Not really, or at least, they don't have any say in that.

In the following hypothetical, (I'm assuming that ALL homes on a given isolated grid, also have solar assistance). It won't happen in real life, but this is just for the sake of this explanation.

If ONE home chooses to stop using ALL possible power during a peak demand interval, AND, no-one else does that, THEN, their system has the

*potential* (owing to light and battery power availability) to supply its full capability into the grid, and get paid for their bit. This is of course assuming the remaining homes have a net negative generation, that is, even accounting for THEIR own solar systems, they still use MORE than what they generate themselves. In other words, they still draw something from the grid.

If ALL solar homes had the same idea (power off everything and let their solar systems pump power into the grid), then, NO-ONE would pumping power into the grid - their controllers simply will NOT let it. There are safety limits built in that prevent over voltage from happening. This entirely debunks the "solar overloads the wiring" statement, as well as the amount of copper.

It depends. Although the "grid" operates as a large-scale entity, it does indeed have some localised effects. And it NEEDS this, because even though the "grid" operates with some self-regulation as far as voltage goes (power stations vary up and down according to demand, and voltage is a good indicator of what the load is. There are quite high variations on the local level, because one suburb may have no air-cons, and the next door suburb may have them all. And the larger scale grid feeds them both. To ensure YOUR grid voltage stays within "acceptable" limits, there are local transformers that change taps to offer some control for this.

In the hypothetical that solar systems feed "too much" power into the grid (they won't, but let's say they do anyway), the transformer will switch to account for that, so less comes from the larger scale grid, and the local solars can supply a chunk of power.

This will not magically "stress" the copper, because the copper isn't carrying any more current that it's capable of ANYWAY.

Firstly, there is no "other way". Due to normal losses in copper, YOUR solar system has MOST effect closest to you, and the LEAST effect furthest away from you. The change YOUR solar box has on the whole is rather local.

Again, only locally, AND if the box lets it. If the grid voltage is ALREADY high, YOUR system will NOT push bucketloads of power into the grid.

:-) Congratulations, you've just turned a positive into a negative. What you're saying is a GOOD thing, and does not require "fixing". It's also the cheapest and most effective way of addressing load.

Take the far southern end of Victoria for instance. They're at the end of a long copper line, ant the wrong end of the power generation side, so there are significant losses. They have increasing peaks loads due to air cons and huge TV sets. Increasing copper would help, but ultimately, no-one is going to pay millions so a tiny town can have air cons and TV sets. What they're doing now, is using wind power to supplement peak power. So that droop due to load goes away, because the wind generators are taking up the slack. This is a GOOD thing. Of course, they want to whine about the noise, and they have every right to do that. The easiest way to fix that is to get THEM and THEM ALONE to pay the millions or billions for the copper upgrades. As long as everyone else doesn't have to pay, I'm quite happy to let them have that.

That theory would fail, mainly because it's these huge peaks (aircons) that need LOTS of power generation over short periods. Generating this class of power is expensive, but in above example, it's still cheaper than copper. Again, this is for long haul copper, local systems will see no (worthwhile) gain in copper upgrades.

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Reply to
John Tserkezis
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I meant they don't do the washing or run the pool. With a 2KW system, he fridge and smaller stuff draws 1 or 2 amps.

6 amps will be fed in the grid.

I don't see the point of the assumption. There will always be a number of houses with PV producing more than they use, especially on days where no A/C is needed. The line loss will lift the voltage. Should the upper voltage limit be reached, some of the inverters will cut out first and the voltage will not rise above he limit. But, depending on the hysteresis of the sensing circuits, they will switch on again. An inverter that switches off turns into a sink what used to be a source and so not only takes away feeding current but also adds some load and so amplifyies the effect. Depending on a lot of factors and inverter design I could imagine some oscillation happening here. Modelling this situation is difficult and we will wait and see if it can happen. In any case, it's not good as a switched off inverted defeats the purpose of the PV system and oscillations, God knows...

Never knew that. Are those solid state switches?

I don't doubt that but I think in the article the assumption was that too many PVs are feeding. If you got more sources than sinks the net effect is source, with the above mentioned possible effects.

Well the downside is, if PVs switch off and assuming nothing else bad happens, the investment would still be a waste of money (taxpayers money too). The owners might not even notice, only wonder why the power bill doesn't go down!

What I meant was that sudden solar PV changes won't cause problems at the generator side yet, due to the small scale.

Reply to
TonyS

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Not true in AC system. In an AC power system, real power flow is determined by the load angle between the generator and the load. Voltage level differences determines reactive power flow. Quite possible to have a generator (invertor) supplying real power, but absorbing reactive power.

David

Reply to
David

"TonyS"

** John Tserkezis is a life long, total nut case.

Like the proverbial Zoo Gorilla, he annoys himself.

So, it is a totally superfluous to annoy him with facts or logic.

They are both forever beyond his comprehension.

FFS - wise up.

.... Phil

Reply to
Phil Allison

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Wth noting that the two towns cited in the article - Exmouth and Carnarvon - are both relatively small and distant from the main state grids. AFAIAA both would be reliant on relatively small local generating facilities, their grid may not be all that stiff.

Reply to
Bruce Varley

It's been a while, but the names ring a bell.

Either limited local generation, or long distance cables causing voltage lag will do it. I'm thinking it's more likely to be long distance cables.

Wind is out there to supplement peak power use, and that works well, if you ignore the constant whining and protesting to get the wind generators taken out, citing noise and eye-soreness as reasons.

Quite sensibly, they are all ignored. It's easy to leave the wind generators installed and ignore the whining and protesting It's hard to remove the wind generation, and ignore screams of blue bloody murder when they get to their quiet homes, turn on the lights and barely get a dim glow.

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Reply to
John Tserkezis

"Dimmer"

** Hey - Dimwit.

Go straight to hell you stinking troll.

... Phil

Reply to
Phil Allison

Or their complete disbelief when the wind generators are left in place, and the people turn on their lights, but the wind isn't blowing.

Sylvia.

Reply to
Sylvia Else

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