Inclosure came and trampled on the grave / Of labour’s rights and left the poor a slave … And birds and trees and flowers without a name / All sighed when lawless law’s enclosure came.” – John Clare, the poet of the environmental crisis – 200 years ago
Safety tips and Local Power’s thoughts post Cyclone Alfred
Well we thought running out of toilet paper was the hot topic in an extreme event, but it seems deciding to turn your Solar PV system off or leave it on has taken the prize.
Local Power shared thoughts and helpful tips on the topic here: Local Power Blog and here: Local Power Facebook
Now that it seems the apprehension of Cyclone Alfred is passing, it’s a timely reminder of what characteristics to observe with your Solar PV System moving forward.
Here are our top 6 most important points:
Whether you chose to turn your system off or leave it on, it’s never safe to interact with your solar panel array. To be clear, it doesn’t matter if your inverter was manually turned off or is off now because of a power outage, when there is sunlight, your solar panel array can still produce dangerous levels of DC voltage.
If you have turned your system off, you’ll then be deciding when to turn it back on and if it is safe to do so. As with any electrical appliance, you’ll first visually look over your PV system where possible to see if anything is damaged. It’s also important not to turn switches that are wet or stand in bare feet while it is wet. When you turn the PV system on, the inverter will go through a start up process, checking parameters such as grid voltage, solar output and safety protocols amongst other parameters.
This can take 5 minutes. Once it completes it’s start up, check that the inverter is powered on and that no fault lights are displayed. While inverter designs vary, a green light generally indicates normal operation, whereas a red or amber light signals a fault that requires professional inspection by a solar electrician.
If you have chosen to leave your PV system on, observe over the next few days the lights on the inverter are green as noted in point 2 above to ensure there are no faults being detected by the inverter.
If a solar panel has sustained an impact, it can shatter but still produce power and inverters may not detect this. Shattered panels visually look a little different compared to others on the roof and although still producing energy, should be replaced or isolated by a solar electrician.
If your solar monitoring app shows your system as offline, it does not necessarily mean it is off. Many modern systems are connected to the internet via Wi-Fi or other methods, and an offline status could simply indicate an internet connection issue. To confirm that your solar inverter is operating, always check the physical inverter itself.
If you’ve been enjoying monitoring your Solar PV system on your device app, always check that your app is the latest version available. New functions are constantly being introduced, which sometimes will only work on the latest versions. Particularly when it comes to having to update your wifi passwords on the solar inverter.
There has been widespread power outages on the Energex network and these are visible on the Energex outage finder here: https://www.energex.com.au/outages/outage-finder/emergency-outages-text-view/
Those of our customers that have a Solaredge or LG battery backup system, but haven’t lost power may have set their battery into backup mode, which preserves the battery capacity if there was a power outage. As the threat of a power outage reduces it will be important to remember to change this mode back to “maximise self consumption”. If you are in a power outage, you’ll likely be preserving your battery usage and look forward this weeks partly sunny weather forecast to top up your batteries.
Those of our customers that have a Fronius BYD battery backup system, may have been using the 24hour block out feature to preserve your battery capacity. This will become less important as the threat of a power outage reduces.
Those who have had the Fronius PV Point feature installed, should be reminded that this power outlet is only live when there is a power outage and usually indicated with a red light on the PV point.
If any of the above information has raised an interest in finding out how to become more in control of your electricity self sufficiency, please contact Local Power and we would be very happy to design a solution.
On the positive side, if you were contemplating cleaning your panels, leave it for another few years.
We hope the above information is helpful and the Local Power team is always here to support you if you have any questions or concerns.
Stay safe and take care,
from the Local Power team
