I am curious what is coming up next that makes John Shaw excited about the solar marketplace.
This is my second round of interviews with John Shaw of Bella Energy in Louisville Colorado. John talks about micro-inverters in much more detail in this video.
SolarDave: What is Hot In The Solar Marketplace Now?
(automatic transcript – might be a bit off, I will correct later)
John Shaw: As I alluded to it
the last segment about a micro-inverters, AC Panels
is pretty exciting to me.
Yep one of
the benefits of that
is that, first and foremost, we obviously
know that that particular micro inverter works
with that panel that because it’s pre mounted on it
and secondly, and even Enphase
claims that operations the installation crews can save money
by installing micro-inverters versus central inverters
and there are some places
where we save from we
can get away with using less of
master electrician time and so some
of the higher values in overhead or
costs is reduced but at the installers
have some more time on the job
I’ve read some
stuff on Enphase’s site says you
save fifteen percent in installation costs, I think
that that they
truly did see that number somewhere, but I as I suspect they have
range but in a use the high number.
I tend to want to error
on the side of caution or be
conservative in you I might use the per
six percent number or something like that
we’re not being fifty percent say things we
might see some savings but
the fact is the AC panels we
don’t have to separately mount the micro inverter
the rail, right now were putting
in rail were putting in a microinverter
on the rail and they were putting
the panel.
That’s correct, currently with the AC module
in the inverter is going to
be on the back of the panel
either I don’t know if it will
be connected to the frame of the
panel or a fixed to the backing sheet
of the panel or affixed to the panel like a J. box or a
junction box is normally where the leads come out of.
I don’t know which.
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Dave, You’re firing up my desire for micro-inverters. Of course, we’re already under contract with REC Solar for a system with a central inverter — but it’s not going up until June 2010.
Wonder if it’s not too late to switch our system to a micro-inverter system. Again, REC tells me a micro-inverter system is still a lot more costly than a central inverter system. Of course, as I’ve noted before, if my central inverter konks at 12 years and has to be replaced then, and my micro-inverters last 20 years, you’ve got to add that cost in when comparing central to micro-inverters.
With SMA going into micro-inverters, I have a feeling central inverters are going to out-moded within five or so years. What do you think? And/or what does John think?
The last time I spoke with Cary Hayes from REC Solar he indicated that they are not proven technology yet, so I am guessing they are not install them at this point. Perhaps Cary has changed his mind. I will see if Cary will chime in to see what they are thinking now.
The mains problems of micro inverters are (in my opinion):
-Less efficiency than a central inverter
-More chance for failure (normal failure multiplied by the numbers of panels)
-Harder maintenance in case of failure
So i think it is lots of possible future problems for a little initial cost avantage.