Small-scale solar panels about the size of a door are poised to be plugged into more U.S. homes and apartments as homeowners and renters who want to harness the sun’s energy look for cheaper alternatives to rooftop installations.
To plug a solar panel into a wall socket with the intention of adding power to the electrical grid, you need an inverter. Solar panels generate DC, the grid is AC. It is possible to make an inverter that will synchronize to the grid, and if there’s on input waveform, it just won’t put out AC power. “Not grid-forming” is the term I’ve seen used for this.
If you go to harbor freight, buy a gas-powered generator, build a suicide cable and plug it into a socket in your house without throwing your main breaker, you could be energizing lines that a lineman somewhere thinks are not energized, which could injure or kill him.
Worse, by generating your own power you’re reducing the money you have to pay to the power company. That’s punishable by flaying in 14 states.
To plug a solar panel into a wall socket with the intention of adding power to the electrical grid, you need an inverter. Solar panels generate DC, the grid is AC. It is possible to make an inverter that will synchronize to the grid, and if there’s on input waveform, it just won’t put out AC power. “Not grid-forming” is the term I’ve seen used for this.
If you go to harbor freight, buy a gas-powered generator, build a suicide cable and plug it into a socket in your house without throwing your main breaker, you could be energizing lines that a lineman somewhere thinks are not energized, which could injure or kill him.
Worse, by generating your own power you’re reducing the money you have to pay to the power company. That’s punishable by flaying in 14 states.