Crossy

Yup, we've had a rather miserable on-off day too, still charged the batteries and export but just not so much as previously. Don't have our own AQI but the local online ones are bouncing off 60.7ug/m3????

Posts removed, let's try to keep a modicum of respect here.

"What would you like to do first, Kim?" asked Joe. "I want to get weighed," she said. They ambled over to the weight guesser. He guessed 120 pounds. She got on the scale; it read 117 and she won a prize. Next the couple went on the ferris wheel. When the ride was over, Joe again asked Kim what she would like to do. "I want to get weighed," she said. Back to the weight guesser they went. Since they had been there before, he guessed her correct weight, and Joe lost his dollar. The couple walked around the carnival and again he asked where to next. "I want to get weighed," she responded. By this time, Joe figured she was really weird and took her home early, dropping her off with a handshake. Her roommate, Laura, asked her about the blind date, "How'd it go?" Kim responded, "Oh, Waura, it was wousy."

Teacher: Because the taste buds for sweet are at the front of your tongue not the back of your throat

Yup, been there, got the T-shirt.

Same with the little birds you buy "to set free", the ruddy things fly back into the sellers' cages where they get fed and watered. Unlike the people who buy them they are not bird-brains

There are an increasing number of on/off-grid battery-less hybrids that will work as grid-tie until PEA come along with the no-reverse meter at which point you shell for battery storage and tell PEA where to shove it ???? If they had been available when we installed, I would very possibly have gone that way.

Do you have a link??

One would assume it uses rotating machines so ought to add to grid stability. But TiT ... We came within an ace of having a waste-to-energy plant built just down the road, local protests scuppered that one, for now!

Yup. And a number of my Aussie mates are more than mildly miffed about it. Many are moving to local storage which (currently) isn't controlled by The Man.

Grid-stability is a big issue for places with a massive installed base of domestic solar (Aus for example).

The problem for MEA/PEA is where to draw the DIY line. They can't let just any old Chinese junk to feed energy into the grid, plus they need to know that the island-protection works correctly and reliably. HMHO DIY to a decent standard using approved kit (subject to an inspection) should be permitted, but the licenced contractors would be up in arms as their income would be shafted. Both our inverters are approved and my install is "reasonable".

There is FiT available. BUT It's not exactly easy to get on to (and one member has been waiting >2 years for his FiT meter), and a DIY system won't fly, need to use an approved installer and approved kit. Doing so will easily multiply your payback time by 4 ???? That being the case go hybrid with ESS (batteries) and have the advantage of never having a power cut, ever.

OK, a quick look at the manual suggests that it doesn't have a current transformer (CT) that would allow you to automatically control the output to prevent exporting energy ???? This isn't really an issue unless you find out that your meter is clocking up when you are exporting. Time for a test as detailed above.

Well, as luck would have it the 25th and 27th produced exactly the same amount of energy, 40.9kWh, so we can do a direct comparison with no correction for the control needed ???? 8.56/8.27 = 1.035 so a 3.5% increase, not as big as we saw, but definitely a movement in the right direction ???? Let's continue this experiment.

I'm talking to Foshan Neexgent but looking at the horizontal brush version, I hope it will be more controllable and I'll be able to use it to clean our upstairs windows without breaking out the ladder (so I can justify with Madam). A bit expensive at the moment but Yannis is "checking for a better price". We shall see.

If you clean your panels today (or first thing in the morning) and check energy generated tomorrow, we can use our system as the reference source (5th and 7th March). It would be interesting to see if the numbers correlate. EDIT Actually, if you can let me have the daily total for the day before and the day after your last clean (and the dates) we can compare now using our system as reference.

Yeah ^^^, I would certainly ask about it being at ground level. Just to confuse, our office has "G" as the at-grade floor but the next one up is "2". Our condo in KL had the entrance at "3A" (4 being unlucky in Chinese), it also had ... 11, 12, 13, 13A, 15 ... and the less said about the lift in our place in Ankara, Turkey, the better ????

The Good-ole US of A did actually try, the bill failed but ...

@eddysaccwhich inverter do you have?

There have been a couple of rather vague reports of Thai digital meters charging for export, I've also seen it reported on other solar forums not just in Thailand. I suggest checking if the meter is counting up when you know you are exporting! Just turn everything off around lunch time when the sun as at peak output.

The results of our semi-scientific study. Background Myself and @JAS21 live about 20km apart as the crow flies, at this time of year there's no localised storm activity so we get broadly similar weather. Although our systems are of different capacities the panels are oriented in roughly the same direction and angle. We also tend to clean our panels on a sort of regular basis. The factor we used to determine if cleaning made a measurable difference was Total Daily Solar Generation which would be in kWh. What we did Testing took place over two 2-day periods. Period 1 - 27th and 28th February 2023 JAS cleaned his panels on the morning of the 28th, I did nothing (my system is the control or weather-reference). 27th JAS = 21.92kWh Crossy = 40.60kWh 28th JAS = 23.31kWh Crossy = 38.30kWh The reference output went down by about 4.25% If we apply that factor to JAS output on the 28th we get a corrected output of 24.71kWh. So, the effective change from cleaning is about +12.7% Period 2 - 4th and 5th March 2023 This time I cleaned my panels on the morning of the 5th and JAS did nothing (so his system is the reference) 4th JAS = 23.22kWh Crossy = 35.9kWh 5th JAS = 22.39kWh Crossy = 37.9kWh The reference output went down by 3.6% Applying that factor to my system output on the 5th gives a corrected output of 39.30kWh So, the effective change from cleaning is about +9.5% Conclusion It's not a particularly good test methodology and neither set of panels was particularly dirty (JAS panels were probably a bit dirtier than mine), but there does seem to be a correlation between cleaning them and a not insignificant increase in output. Of course, this does assume that I've done my sums correctly, which is why I've included our measurements if anyone wants to pull my maths apart ???? We will do the same test again when we clean again, actual schedule hasn't been decided as yet, probably about a month unless things look particularly grubby.

Yes. Very good point, we have had reports that digital meters have been charging for exported energy as well as import!