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Solar Inverter

A solar inverter is necessary for your home to take advantage of solar power.

One essential part of any photovoltaic installation, whether it is grid tied or off grid, is a solar inverter. Inverters like these (Kaco 02Xi Series) are intended for grid-tie use, and must be able to perform two-way conversion. To understand what an inverter is and why they are necessary it is important to look at how our power is generated, delivered to our homes, and used.

Power grids are run on alternating current (AC) this is done because using AC, power can be transmitted large distances with very low power loss. This enables us to put our power generation sites hundreds of miles away from the location they are intended to service in some cases. Solar panels on the other hand, produce direct current (DC) this is a more stable and easily produced form of electricity, which can be stored chemically in batteries and easily converted back to electricity for use.

These two forms of power each have their strong points, ease of transmission for AC and ease of storage for DC, but the appliances in your home are designed to run on AC power. This means if you install solar panels, you need to be able to convert the DC power they produce into AC power for your appliances to use. When you have a grid-tie system it must be able to convert the power you send back into the grid into AC, and monitor when the power should be diverted to the grid rather than to your home. This is what makes a grid-tie inverter more complex than an off grid converter.

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