So the big thing with the balcony solar to me is it can be plugged into a standard outlet and it would work without sending electricity downstream to the system somehow. So it seemed to be smart like that. Let me know if I have a misunderstanding here. So I always felt like having batteries would be useful enough without solar as you could (at least in my area) take the hourly electric rate and charge it during non peak times and have it be used during peak hours. This in addition to getting through power outages. So im kinda wondering if there are balcony battery options that would allow for this. Plug it into an outlet and setup when not to charge and when to provide power. Anyone know if this is a thing?
Balcony solar does send excess power back to the grid. If you have a really old electricity meter it might count backwards when that happens and you might be legally required to get it replaced before installing the panels (depending on local laws).
A battery that sends power directly to your entire household but never back to the larger grid would require integration with your electricity meter (not just plugging it into a random outlet) because you can’t measure the electricity usage in your home from a random outlet and know when to discharge.
Ah ok because the balcony solar articles seem to indicate they have something in them to prevent that.
Have you considered the energy loss. Depending on your battery you might end up with like 75% of the energy you paid for.
Because both storing energy in a battery and taking that energy out is not 100% efficient.
good point. I do use one for my router and I was thinking it would be nice to have the whole house going for smaller outages and that might make up for it. Also I feel like I could sneak it in easier at my condo. EDITED - Just looked it up and the high is 4x higher than the low and its a short span when it is real high and much longer overnight cheap. I think it might be worth it.
If their peak-usage rates are even 33% higher than normal, they would at least break even like so. Something like a Powerwall is still more useful as a back-up in-case of outages.
Otherwise, its anyone’s guess whether it would ever save OP enough money to pay for itself. The useful life of the batteries may be reached well before that point.
I think ecoflow has options to charge from the grid and discharge later. It’s called time of use rates. I know it’s on their regular power stations and the smart electrical panel but not 100% certain it’s on their balcony solar line called ‘stream’. They also have manual and automatic settings to charge up from the grid before large storms, that you might be able to hack to accomplish your goal
This looked so close and maybe it will work as it has to have net metering. I will look into it. Looks like if it does not support net metering than it requires something more.
Just to be clear, you need to live in a place that allows balcony solar or direct plug into wall systems. If you’re in Germany or most of Europe, you’re probably fine, but only Utah in the USA has approved these systems.
Thanks. I actually know but its just something I am geeking on. Even if it was allowed in the state the association for most folks would likely be a bigger hurdle unless the law specifically said it had to be allowed. The ecoflow page has scratched my itch though. It was basically what I was looking for.
They sell larger batteries for camping (and power outages etc.). I didn’t think it’ll do the specific charging your looking for but, that all sounds doable with some extra hardware to regulate the charging.
Yeah the thing is the balcony solar seems to have this thing where it provides power to your home but prevents it from sending power to the grid. I figured well it would be great to have a battery do like that. Mainly because I could have it on the balcony without having to get the association to allow it. Might be able to do the same with the solar panels if I don’t hang them but that would decrease what they get from the sun even more.
I am not aware of a cheap stand-alone unit that does this, but the typical solar hybrid systems can be used without solar and configured like that.
Uninterruptible power supply is what you want. It basically trickle charges a large battery and swaps to the battery when you lose power. They can last for a few hours depending on the size of the battery and the load on the circuit.
yeah but I want something that will work with the whole house the way the balcony solar seems to. UPC’s only seem to power whats pugged into them.
They have whole house uninterruptible power supplies.
that you can buy and plug into an outlet and be good to go? that seems to be how the balcony solar works.
That doesn’t seem safe to me since you’re basically pumping power back into the mains but no, I think most of the home battery backups systems have a switch that sits between the main and your house to control the flow of power in the event of a power outage.
Yeah it sounds like the panels have something like that. The main thing is it does not have to be wired in with an electrician.
