Fully electric home, Crazy or Brilliant?

[zhackwyatt]

If you have solar/energy storage, you can still have power during a grid collapse. Maybe it's slower, but I can L1 charge or even L2 charge (if sun is shining and you being in AZ, it's almost always shining).

As others have mentioned, a massive disaster also means no gas because of lines and gas pumps don't work with no power neither (jokes on anti-EV folks who think gas is safe). Not to mention, you have to be around a few hundred pissed off people waiting in the same lines in this post-covid crazy filled world waiting for gas is not a good place to be.

You can truck gas in and pump directly from them.

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[zhackwyatt]

?
I have a small to medium sized solar system and can run my house and still feed most of the power generated back into the grid during the day. Charging my EV at 48A will be no problem unless there's snow covering my panels, which can be remedied.

Unless you have batteries, most inverters will shut down if the grid loses power. I think you have to have special disconnect hardware installed otherwise.

 

[zhackwyatt]

If you have solar/energy storage, you can still have power during a grid collapse. Maybe it's slower, but I can L1 charge or even L2 charge (if sun is shining and you being in AZ, it's almost always shining).

As others have mentioned, a massive disaster also means no gas because of lines and gas pumps don't work with no power neither (jokes on anti-EV folks who think gas is safe). Not to mention, you have to be around a few hundred pissed off people waiting in the same lines in this post-covid crazy filled world waiting for gas is not a good place to be.

True, although storage is expensive and would only help at your house.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

Unless you have batteries, most inverters will shut down if the grid loses power. I think you have to have special disconnect hardware installed otherwise.

My inverter will do a break-before-make rapid disconnect if the grid goes down. After that rapid switchover, the system will keep the critical loads panel powered (most of the house, but not all). If I have sunlight, it'll continue to power the house on solar. If there's no sunlight, the battery will be the power source.

(In fact, it's slightly less complicated because the critical loads panel is on the non-grid side of the inverter, so the critical loads are always being managed by the inverter. All that really has to happen is a shut-down of the grid-side of the panel.)

 

[zhackwyatt]

My inverter will do a break-before-make rapid disconnect if the grid goes down. After that rapid switchover, the system will keep the critical loads panel powered (most of the house, but not all). If I have sunlight, it'll continue to power the house on solar. If there's no sunlight, the battery will be the power source.

(In fact, it's slightly less complicated because the critical loads panel is on the non-grid side of the inverter, so the critical loads are always being managed by the inverter. All that really has to happen is a shut-down of the grid-side of the panel.)

I could be wrong but I don't think that's common unless you have batteries and of course batteries are less common too due to their expense.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

I could be wrong but I don't think that's common unless you have batteries and of course batteries are less common too due to their expense.

I don't know anything about how common it is with existing installs, but it's not a difficult setup and several inverter manufacturers offer a system that will allow a grid-tie critical loads setup with or without batteries. I think you are correct in that it is a newer option (maybe last decade?).

It's obviously significantly less useful to have a critical loads panel without a battery backup since that won't work without sunlight.

 

[MMXX500]

If you live in Cali going all electric in the 'home' is very beneficial. There are generous EV rebates in CA. I live in a city that has great electric rates with our own utility so no PG&E crap. The city has rebates for EV chargers, most electric appliances and non gas HVAC units. The city is pushing all electric homes to reduce any reliance on PG&E. PG&E is looking to raise rates nearly 20% this year. They are a hot mess.

Meanwhile right next door in Rocklin we get no city incentives, no PGE incentives. We are stuck with PGE and to make things worse they partnered with Pioneer so now we get another electric delivery charge added by them - Placer county hates EV owners! On the positive side we do get fantastic water so at least there's no water spots.

 

[skiingj]

Meanwhile right next door in Rocklin we get no city incentives, no PGE incentives. We are stuck with PGE and to make things worse they partnered with Pioneer so now we get another electric delivery charge added by them - Placer county hates EV owners! On the positive side we do get fantastic water so at least there's no water spots.

Yes Rocklin is very nice. We used to live there.

 

[Superfly-Vic]

well here in Miami they are trying to pass a law to Limit the amount of credit Solar can generate so FPL doesn’t have to pay so much for energy sent back to the grid

 

[yngwenli]

I could be wrong but I don't think that's common unless you have batteries and of course batteries are less common too due to their expense.

I think a few other inverters have some intelligence to island, but yeah, it's not too common. I have batteries and really saw the cost as getting insurance from power companies constantly raising rates (one of the highest in nation), ToU cost shifting and power outage/fire/freak weather possibilities.

I suppose the cost is between say a GT or a premium after all the tax credits are said and done (maybe $7k-$15k depending on number of batteries from 26% fed credit and possible state credit). Boils down to where someone wants to just spend their $$ really.

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