INTRODUCTORY SPECIAL INTRODUCTORY ... - PHOTON Info

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In Practice bluntly: »We have this beautiful home and I don’t want to see any big, black, ugly things on the roof.« 92 Plus, the Elkus family couldn’t draw much inspiration from their neighbors. They don’t have any immediate neighbors with PV systems, and they don’t know of anyone else in town with one either. That may change pretty shortly – the city of Po- way approved over 100 PV permits in the first 10 months of 2009. Elkus says a big part of the final decision to go solar was the incentives. In 2009, the government removed the $2,000 cap on the federal tax credit Elkus could receive for his system, meaning Elkus could now receive the full 30 percent credit. Com- bined with a $1.88 per W state rebate for SDG&E customers, the system cost just half of its original price. Although it still cost over $60,000 after rebates (pre-rebate price $114,000), Elkus realized quickly that the payback time would be spectacular. But Elkus was interested in a PV system solely as a long-term investment, he never would have sought out quotes for such a large system. He spoke with several installers, most of whom suggested he downsize his system. But Elkus, who had reviewed his energy bills since putting in the trout pond, would not accept a bid for a system if it didn’t cover 100 percent of his peak load. In most cases, the installers would have been right. Usually, homeowners looking to install a PV system in SDG&E territory don’t want systems that produce more energy than the household can consume. Otherwise, it’s like giving free electricity to the utility company. Elkus’ main con- cern was his fish. With Poway’s climate, it’s likely that wildfires will force the utility to shut off the grid for safety’s sake every few years. And while this problem could theo- retically be solved with a generator, and a store of propane, PV was the safer bet. In the end, Elkus chose the option of a reli- able off-grid system, even in the worst-case scenario. His worst case scenario was four weeks with no grid power, and no access to fuel for a generator. During the most recent wildfires, Elkus says, »we lost power for a couple days.« »The issue became Elkus‘ installer, Clary Solar, used a Google Maps image to recreate his rooftop, and simulate where the panels would go. About this installation Investment Cost Initial cost $114,660.00 Less CA Rebate $1.88/W AC -$23,345.00 Federal ITC -$27,395.00 $63,920.00 Energy Bill Net kWh/day Change Total Bill Before installation (June - July) 167.6 Month 1 (July - August) 116.2 -30.7% $1,038.49 Month 2 (August - September) 106.6 -8.30% $582.82 Nominal Power Modules 14 kW DC 70 Sanyo Electric Co. Ltd. HIP-200BA19 12.4 kW AC Racking Inverters UniRac Enphase Energy M200-32-240-S02 Connected to Grid Estimated Annual Production Juli 2009 22,795 kWh/year Installer Warranty 10 years from date of installation on all workmanship and materials supplied by Clary Solar what was the right way to protect myself.« Then there was the shape of his roof. The ranch-style design, which Elkus com- missioned and helped build in another of his do-it-yourself projects 12 years ago, has several peaks and valleys. Its sur- faces points in all directions. Then came Patty’s stipulation that the PV system could not be visible from street level. The complexity confounded installers: how could they install a 14 kW system – three households’ worth of PV panels – on an uneven tile roof, and keep it unobtrusive. Elkus reports that his experience with most installers was disappointing. »Most of the people I talked to didn’t under- stand anything about these systems ex- cept ‘plug the red wire into the red hole,’« he says. »Most of the questions I had they had no clue what I was talking about, or how to answer them.« Puzzle solved Eventually Elkus found an installer that, in his opinion, took as much interest in solving the puzzle as he did. Clary So- November 2009 Clary Solar
lar, a small installer based in San Diego, took the job with gusto. Junaid Qazi, the project’s lead installer, says this was one of the most challeng- ing installations on which he has ever worked. The sales team at Clary eventually came back with a system design that satisfied all of Elkus’ demands. It consist- ed of seven groups of modules on different areas of the roof, all pointing in slightly different directions – some slightly to the east, and others to the west. The system uses microinverters, so string size is ir- relevant, and the panels can face in as many different directions as desired. The 3D model Clary sent Elkus used a Google Maps image of his rooftop to simulate the system and what it would look like from the street. The house looked no different than before, and won Patty’s approval. Or as Elkus puts it, »it passed the test.« Before Elkus made his decision, Clary sent him four proposals describing energy savings. They laid out payback sce- narios for a 70-panel system with and without the chiller, and with or without SDG&E’s new option for smart-meter- ing, which would allow varying rates depending on the utility company’s peak hours. The most appealing solu- tion involved a smart meter. According to Clary’s estimate, Elkus’ internal rate of return over 25 years would be 34.5%. At that rate, the system would be paid off in 6.3 years. Once Elkus had chosen his system, Clary knew the roofing side of the project would be tricky, but he figured the electrical engineering aspects would be routine. The next few steps should have been simple: an city inspector would review the plan, they would spend a week or two building, and then the city and the utility would conduct final inspections. They submitted their plans in mid-January. Inspections in Poway tend to take just a couple of weeks, usually, so Clary proceeded to order materials. Bureaucratic mayhem The city’s initial response to the ap- plication arrived shortly. The inspector said the project plan was not in compliance with UL requirements, since Clary was using Sanyo modules with Enphase microinverters. The note read: »modules require fuse protection for listing verifica- tion by NRTL... Where is this fuse protection provided?« Junaid Qazi, an installer at Clary who was working with Enphase microinverters for the first time, contacted the Enphase for clarification. The city of Poway, as it turned out, was using a subcontractor at EsGil Corpora- tion, a San Diego-based building safety consultancy that reviews plans in numer- ous San Diego County municipalities. When Enphase heard that a municipal- ity in the San Diego area might be turn- ing down proposals for systems with their technology, they got involved immediate- ly. »(EsGil) reviews plans for a lot of cities,« says Jeff Laughy, an applications engineer at Enphase involved in the debacle. »San Diego and the surrounding area is too big of a market to not be allowed to install your equipment,« says Laughy. Still, the city wasn’t satisfied with a response from the manufacturer alone. They needed something more official. »That was an ordeal,« says Laughy, who knows the section of UL code, 690-51, be heart. Next, Enphase contacted John Wiles, a code expert at Sandia National think it was forged.’« The city wanted to speak with someone in person who could verify the plan’s compliance with Nation- al Electric Code. The inspector was calling into ques- tion UL testing standards, specifically the organization’s use of CSA International, another testing agency, to help review products for listing, says Qazi. »They were questioning UL’s way of doing it.« During the five months that Elkus and Clary spent negotiating with the City of Poway and EsGil, says Qazi, the process repeated itself several times. The first inspector »had this set of objections, and we worked through each one of them, and we got him the documents he needed,« says Qazi. The rejection letter cited NEC code 690-51, and called for overcurrent protection to be added to each module, since En- phase inverters lack fuses. Retrofitting the system to meet this code would require the installer to cut the cable for each module – 70 of them in all – and inserting a fuse. »Those looked like reasonable objections at the beginning,« says Qazi, »but once you go to the waivers and you look at all the ad- dendums that UL had issued specifically, it was really clear that they did not require it.« As the debate escalated, the conversa- tion moved into increasingly higher levels of the bureaucracy. The SDG&E smart meter: Elkus says the smart meter which adjusts electricity rates based on peak and off-peak hours has helped save money on his bills. »But every time that a new person would get involved the whole story would start again.« Items they have already dis- November 2009 93 Melissa Bosworth / photon-pictures.com » Labs, and Tim Zgonena, Princi- pal Engineer in Distributed En- ergy Resources Equipment and Systems with Underwriter’s Laboratories, for back up. Both agencies sent responses to the city attesting to the safety of Enphase inverters when used with Sanyo modules. »They wouldn’t take that document as well,« says Qazi. »In fact they said ‘this document would be fine, we just
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A LONG, STRANGE TRIP SOUTHERN EXPOS
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4 Under the Sun National Renewable
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6 Photo of the month The garden of
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12 Readers‘ letters So why are so
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