Hi All. Like many others, wrapping my head around what’s better is confusing as! At the moment we use about 20Kw per day however this is likely to slightly increase with winter upon us. I have a couple of quotes at the moment…
Quote 1:
$4,700
6.6kW system
20 x 330w Suntech Power HyPro Mono Half-Cell (STP330S-A60H/Wfhm)
Fronius Primo 5.0-1 - 5000W inverter
Quote 2:
$3,990
6.6kW system
20 x 330w Risen 330 Mono Tier 1 (RSM120-6-325M-340M)
Growatt 5kW 1ph Wi-Fi inverter
TIA
Hi Tia
The systems are plenty big enough to produce excess of 20kWh a day, depending on where you are located?
The Risen and SunTech panels are comparable. I think it’s worth the extra for the Fronius vs Growatt. The quotes are quite cheap, please just make sure you are using a reputable installer.
Hope that helps
Marty
Thanks for your help Marty.
I am Canberra based.
I did some more digging and obtained some more quotes which seem to be from more reputable companies. However they have now introduced into the picture the Solar Edge inverter. With this comes the optimisers on the panels. In terms of my roof space. I have 2 sections of roof north facing, 1 east and 1 west. West facing roof cops a fair bit of shade (was shaded around 2:30pm today) east and majority of north don’t cop much if any shade. Am I best to place all panels north facing, or some on the east facing roof? Would the extra $$ be worth it for the Solar Edge inverter? With panels being half cell would this be enough to compensate for any shading that might be an issue and as such can stick to a Fronius/SMA inverter.
Thanks again
Hi @BJDCC
Solar gets confusing doesn’t it! If you are getting shade on the west roof by 2.30pm then it’s pretty much useless, because the west gets the afternoon sun. So, if you are only considering North and East, which it sounds like, and there is no shade on North or East, do you need optimisers?
If you can fit them, then it’s best on the North of course, but if you can’t fit as many as you want on the north, the East is ok. The East will generate about 20-25% less electricity that the North (depending on a bunch of factors, but roughly). But that is why it’s good to oversize the inverter, because that helps to outweigh lower generation.
Not really. If the panels are shaded, they won’t generate power. Modern, high end panels do do better in low light conditions, and with on/off shading, but if a panel isn’t getting sun, it won’t produce power still.
I’m not in a position to give specific feedback as it’s sounds like quite a complex installation. But shade or no shade, SolarEdge is a great inverter. Make sure you find a really good solar company, they will be able to guide you. You can’t really go wrong with Fronius, SMA or SolarEdge. It’s usually worth spending a bit more up front to get a quality system that you are happy with for 30 years. I went cheap on a vacuum cleaner recently and I regret it, but I bet I wouldn’t have regretted getting the good one.
I hope that helps somewhat.
Cheers
Marty