Hobbyist Renewable Energy?

vossman77 writes "I was looking into renewable energy from a hobbyist perspective, maybe generating a few watts of solar or wind power, just to reduce my electric bill. But upon further review, I found out that I need a special grid-tied AC inverter that shuts off when the grid turns off (for worker safety reasons) and makes the current in-phase with the grid. These two additional features, over the cheap inverters sold at department store, make the cost upwards of $2000, but support more watts than I need. While this is fine for large-scale projects, it is out of range for a small scale hobbyist. A Google search came with some home-brew hacks at best. So, are there any Slashdotters out there doing small-scale renewable energy projects with grid-tied systems? What are other options for the hobbyist to play around with renewable energy, other than charging a cell phone?"

Comments

go 12 volt

[Jailbrekr]

You can try converting parts of your house to 12 or 24 volt, which would negate the need for expensive inverters and whatnot. All you'd need is a simple charging circuit for a battery (could be as simple as a diode) and then feed the 12/24 volt lights straight off it.

Not cheap

[Lord_Frederick]

If going green was cheap, fossil fuels would die out on their own without incentives and subsidies.

Burning a house down is the least of his concerns

[Ellis D. Tripp]

I would also think long and hard about criminal liability for the death or injury to utility workers who get killed because his system was backfeeding the power grid.

Those transformers on the poles work just as well when operated backwards, stepping the 120V output from your inverter up to the 7-13 kV distribution level. Unless your inverter has enough "smarts" to isolate itself from the grid in the absence of utility power, your system will attempt to power up your part of the utility network, resulting in a severely overloaded inverter (with resultant blown fuses/smoke/fire) at the best, or a serious hazard to lineworkers at the worst.

People HAVE been sued when lineworkers are killed/injured by improperly installed generators or PV systems that resulted in backfeed. Prosecution for criminally negligent homicide is also a possibility, especially if the prosecution can prove that you KNEW of the need for automatic isolation, but failed to provide it in order to save a buck.

In short, use properly designed equipment, installed according to manufacturer's instructions (and get the proper permits/inspections as required), or stick with a completely isolated low voltage DC system.

Re:Renewable fuel

[element-o.p.]

That's kind of what the "hobbyist" label implies :)

For a lot of hobbyists, the plan goes something like this:

1. 1) I'd like to learn something new, like how to generate electricity from renewable sources.
2. 2) Where can I apply this technology in a useful, but small-scale, experimental, non-critical way?
3. 3) Search for a problem that can be solved by this solution.
4. 4) ?
5. 5) profit!!! (sorry, couldn't resist)

One teeny problem...

[Anonymous Coward]

How many city electric workers are going to agree to touch your electricity when they see some homebrew box rigged up to your breaker? I'm guessing that whatever you attach to your city's power grid has to be approved and licensed, and has to meet local electric code requirements. That probably kills most homebrew solutions.

Don't do it

[jmorris42]

> Because, let's be clear here: we're talking about generating lethal
> amounts of power and driving it into wiring that goes into other
> people's houses and into systems that other people are maintaining.

This is the key part. I'm as Libertarian as they come but a power grid implies a need for some sort of standards and real enforcement of same. Forget the legal implications for a minute, do YOU want to kill your lineman? Then don't conduct unannounced experiments on the production power network. Ya got three choices here:

1. Man up and buy the commerical, TESTED AND CERTIFIED product for that key interconnection point.

2. Build a test grid, do your R&D and produce a TESTED AND CERTIFIED product of your own.

3. Restrict your alternative power experiments to those that do not require an interconnect to the grid.