A commercial solar PV system will usually consist of a battery bank, inverter, an array of solar panels and a grid connection. The grid connection is normally a three-phase supply and the operation normally utilises all three phases. It is possible to install a single-phase inverter on one of the three phases, but it is not advised as the system is not able to feed solar power to the other phases, which is not the most optimal setup. The way inverters handle the distribution of solar power varies, but the systems we install supplement your main electricity supply by feeding clean solar power to the loads (essential & non-essential), during normal operation, and will provide power to your essential loads during grid outages. The systems work really well as they allow you to generate bigger "savings" on your utility bill because your solar power can flow to the larger energy consumers (geysers, pumps and heavy machinery) even though they are not connected to the output of the inverter.

 

The operation may require that these larger energy consumers are kept on during a grid outage and therefore be connected to the output of the inverter. These systems are capable of achieving this by paralleling inverters (single-phase or three-phase inverters) and battery banks, if required. There are also time of use (TOU) settings on our inverters. These allow us to control battery usage and further increase the renewable energy fraction of your system by storing excess renewable energy during the day and using it at night when the sun is not shining (depending on the operation).  

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Depending on the tariff structure you can also look at installing a pure battery energy storage system (BESS) to conduct energy arbitrage. This requires you have a time of use (TOU) tariff structure and the correct energy usage profile to make this feasible. 

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Lastly, you can consider installing a pure grid-tied solution, which does not include a battery bank. These systems are generally cheaper and provide a better payback period on the system. The issue is that the system will drop out during loadshedding and only return once the grid is back, not providing protection during loadshedding only savings on your utility bill during normal operation.