A grid tie inverter changes DC to AC and safely sends your renewable energy back to the utility company.
In this type of system using a solar grid tie inverter the utility grid acts as an infinitely large battery bank storing your generated power for use by someone else down the line.
The following illustration shows how the typical solar electrical system is configured to send power to the grid: A Grid-tie system consists of a solar array and the grid tie inverter.
The main service entrance to the building and the Net kWh Meter are already installed on existing buildings if utility power is present A user-friendly inverter includes all components necessary to make a grid connect system installation simple and code compliant. Grid Tie Inverters, or so called Power Inverters convert D.C. power to A.C. power.
It is necessary to run all of your AC appliances. A Common stand alone grid tie inverter operates at 12/24/48/120 volts DC and create 120 or 240 volts AC. Many power inverters come with a built in battery charger.
The rate of power of an inverter indicates the wattage it can supply continuously. Your inverter should be sized to 125% of the AC loads that will run simultaneously. The extra 25% capacity will protect your inverter from being over-loaded. It provide you with the ability to expand your system later.
The 3 most common types of inverters are square wave, modified sine-wave and pure sine-wave. The output wave form depends on the electronic conversion used to create the AC power. Modified sine-wave power inverters are capable of running household appliances such as televisions, VCR’s, power tools, microwave ovens, washing machine, freezers and computers.
Pure sine-wave inverters produce power that is comparable to utility power (local power company). Using pure sine-wave will increase AC motor efficiency and life. The additional cost of a pure sine-wave power inverter pays for itself in high-end applications such as radio transmitters, telecommunications and remote telephone systems, where the loads are sensitive to wave form variations. We carry power inverters, chargers, inverter/chargers manufactured by Trace now Xantrex, Sunny Boy, Fronius, Invertek, Beacon, Genius, Iota and Exeltech.
We have always found that another backup is always nice. In the past few years we have seen the most improvement in this product, very reliable. It is important to understand that a grid tie inverter can be used in conjunction with a battery backup system too, or hooked directly to the grid if you desire.