Batteries to Grid Tied?

[Tom Hoffer]

Hello Group
My neighbor has a "WINDMAX HY- 3000/48V" that was battery connected at his residence.
The turbine never really functioned right and recently the installer removed everything except the turbine and tower.
He would like to now grid connect the turbine. Any suggestions on appropriate inverters or special issues he might run into would be helpful.

Thanks
Tom Hoffer

[Ralph Day]

If the turbine never really worked what would be the purpose of hooking to the grid? Thousands of dollars for inverter, dump loading, permits and permissions...and it didn't work before? IMHO just enjoy the twirly lawn ornament aspect that is left from the wind experiment and save your (their) money.

You can check threads here about grid tie-ing wind turbines, it's not pretty.

Ralph

[Rob Beckers]

Hi Tom,

You can grid-tie it with a Power-One Aurora inverter, smallest they make is 3kW. However, as Ralph noted your neighbor might be throwing good money after bad. In addition to the inverter you need a rectifier, and mechanism to switch a dump load on in case the voltage reaches a set limit. It can all be done, question is if it's worth it.

-RoB-

[Tom Hoffer]

Thanks for the replies. I sent the neighbor some system design drawings from the Solacity web site and suggested he do a little more research.

Thanks Tom

[Chris Olson]

Hello Group
My neighbor has a "WINDMAX HY- 3000/48V" that was battery connected at his residence.
The turbine never really functioned right and recently the installer removed everything except the turbine and tower.
He would like to now grid connect the turbine. Any suggestions on appropriate inverters or special issues he might run into would be helpful.
Tom Hoffer

Hi Tom,

Who was the installer - Energy Concepts in Hudson?

Assuming you got the problems worked out with the wind turbine, the cheapest way to grid tie a turbine designed for battery charging is with an Outback or Xantrex inverter and a small battery bank. Just use the "sell engine" in the inverter to sell power to the utility.

However, Xcel Energy is going to require all the usual stuff - lockable outdoor disconnect by the meter accessible by utility personnel 24 hours a day, net metering agreement with the $47 monthly "net metering charge", etc.. By the time that your neighbor gives them the first 300 kWh every month for free just to cover the $47 "net metering charge" that they got, I don't see where it pans out unless you're running a Jacobs sized turbine and generating about 55 kWh a day. And even then you'll find you got screwed with your eyes open at the end of the month when the bill comes.

When you consider the fact that Xcel's grid infrastructure (and all their subsidiaries and Co-ops included) is crap, if a cumulus cloud even appears on the Minnesota/North Dakota border the power goes out and you have to revert to your dump load or shut the turbine down, and the fact they they refuse to pay you for your power you generate and feed back to the grid, but they charge you dearly for the "privilege" of grid tying your system - I wouldn't do it.

If you're going to install an RE system I'd put in the battery bank, inverter and enough capacity in both wind and solar to meet your expected loads, with a standby generator for backup. Then call the utility and tell them to come get the meter, pole and transformer and all the wires off your property. You'll find they'll come pull the meter but they'll leave the pole and transformer there until you get in the blade tractor, knock the pole down and push it and transformer into the ditch - then they'll come get it. BTDT. I have no kind words for any utility company, and the less you have to do with them, the better your life becomes.
--
Chris

[John Szegda]

Hello Chris,

I thought Massachusetts was bad. At least in this state, they do not allow the Utility Companies to get away with that type of taxing. How can they justify charging the public $47.00 month. Chris, I have an old 1KW Turbine with a Outback 3648 Inverter I'm giving to My neighbor, but the Controller is a chinese piece of junk. What type controller would you recommend.

John

[Chris Olson]

Hello Chris,
I thought Massachusetts was bad. At least in this state, they do not allow the Utility Companies to get away with that type of taxing. How can they justify charging the public $47.00 month.


The $47 a month is in the fine print too and they call it a "net metering charge". The thing is, Federal Law requires utilities to allow consumers to grid tie their systems and pay "average retail" price for the power. But it don't prevent utilities from making a grid tied system not economically feasible by tacking on a bunch of extra fees. The bottom line is that they do not want people grid tying their RE systems because they're in the business of selling power, not buying it.


Chris, I have an old 1KW Turbine with a Outback 3648 Inverter I'm giving to My neighbor, but the Controller is a chinese piece of junk. What type controller would you recommend.
John

I like the Morningstar RD-1 Relay Driver for auxiliary load control.
http://www.morningstarcorp.com/en/relay-driver

The RD-1 is pretty easy to program with a laptop computer and serial cable and it can control anything you can turn on or off with relays. For aux load control I use it, for instance, to turn on water heater elements powered by the inverters, which in turn loads the DC side of the system and controls over-voltage situations. The little device has four control channels with low-to-high, high-to-low, min/max on/off timers up to 18 hours on each channel, as well as fully programmable low or high voltage trip points for each channel.

Hugh Piggott told me about the little thing quite some time ago so I tried one. It works great.
--
Chris