A photovoltaic installation must be well configured to offer its full potential to the user, who has spent several thousand euros on it and hopes to pay it off as soon as possible. A proper choice of solar inverter is vital to achieve this.
Have you decided to install solar panels in your home or are you thinking about it very seriously? Well, then we recommend that you spend some time informing yourself about what things are important and what you should pay attention not to make a mistake to throw away an investment that is not exactly modest.
And it is that, however small the photovoltaic installation that you are going to install in your home, at least a couple of thousand euros is going to take. If you also use a full-size facility for a single-family home, the normal thing is that it does not go below 4000 euros. It is, therefore, vital to know some aspects to make sure that what the installation company recommends is what you really need.
5 mistakes to avoid
We have already given you the main keys that you must take into account to install solar panels at home, but this time we want to delve into the importance of getting the investor right.
1. An underpowered inverter
In case you don’t know, the solar inverter is responsible for transforming the direct current generated by the photovoltaic cells present in the solar panels.
This is necessary because practically all of the homes use alternating current to work, so that direct current must be transformed by the inverter before being added to the home network, stored in batteries or incorporated into the general electrical network.
Once this is known, a common mistake is to choose an inverter that does not have the capacity to take on all the energy that the solar panels produce. Summarizing, if you have installed a total of 4 kWp in your home, you need an inverter of at least 4000 W to harness all that energy.
If, on the other hand, you install a 3000 W inverter, you will be losing 1 kW of energy along the way. That means that at least two solar panels in your installation will be useless.
MOTOR COUNCIL.ES
If you think that in the future you are going to add more solar panels to the photovoltaic installation, choose a somewhat more powerful inverter that allows you to do so. Otherwise, you will have to exchange it for a new one.
2. An inverter that consumes too much
But, as with everything in this life, going too far is also counterproductive. We have already advised you not to stay just because of what may happen in the future, but do it with your head because if you install a solar inverter that is too powerful, you will be losing money in two ways:
- The bigger the inverter, the more it consumes. In fact, a 5000 W inverter in stand-by can use up the energy generated by a solar panel on a sunny winter day.
- The bigger the inverter, the more expensive it is. You will have paid more for a device that you do not really need or are taking advantage of.
3. An inverter not suitable for photovoltaic installation
This is important, because in the market we have quite a few types of inverters that serve different purposes. And not all of them are suitable for photovoltaic installations.
The main thing you need to know is that solar inverters must be pure sine wave, as they do not damage the components and allow optimum performance to be obtained. Others, such as square wave or modified wave inverters, will negatively affect production and even damage the devices to which they are connected.
4. A poor quality investor
This is directly related to such important aspects as the energy performance of the inverter. Not all are the same and, as happens with pellet stoves or even solar panels, the quality of the product makes the difference when it comes to making the investment profitable.
Quality inverters offer at least 98% maximum efficiency and a European (average) efficiency of 97%. You don’t have to settle for that and the most well-known brands meet these standards without problems. Otherwise, you will be wasting energy that you would otherwise be harnessing.
5. An inverter not suitable for your home
We end with the influence of the characteristics of your home or the place where the solar panels will be installed.
To understand this, we must know that there are several types of solar inverters:
- String or chain inverters: an inverter for the entire installation collects the energy produced by the panels connected in series.
- Microinverters: each solar panel has its own small inverter, which is responsible for passing the direct current to alternating current individually and independently.
- power optimizers: they are something similar to a combination of the previous two. The system has individual microinverters that subsequently send the energy to a central inverter. Unlike the rest, the optimizer acts on each photovoltaic panel, so it is more precise when locating the point of maximum power.
Why is this important? Because each of them is advantageous in different conditions.
String or chain inverters are recommended in houses with unobstructed roofs and that receive constant solar radiation, such as shadows generated by chimneys, other roofs or houses. Also, they are the cheapest.
Microinverters, such as those equipped with Plug & Play solar panels, it is recommended when installing panels with different orientations, houses with roofs of complicated shapes and objects that cast shadows on them. In this way, it is possible to maximize the production of solar energy.
Finally, power optimizers are ideal for make the most of the power of the installation and to reduce the negative effect of shadows on it. Of course, this increase in the efficiency of the system entails a higher cost.
Inverter type for off-grid installation or grid connection
We end this article on solar inverters by referring to another grouping of the types that are on the market, in this case depending on the type of installation that we have installed.
We are referring to investors destined to isolated systems or those used in systems connected to the electrical network general.
The first allow to extract the energy produced by the solar panels to store it in batteries. This must be delivered with adequate voltage to be consumed by household appliances and other devices in the home.
The second are those that transform direct current into alternating current to later be consumed in the home. Y, if there is a surplus, it will be fed into the general electricity grid. In that case, if the user so wishes, it will be purchased by the distribution company at a previously agreed price that will later be deducted from the invoice.