Reality check: When the power grid goes down, all grid-tie solar systems will go down with it

Sunday, June 17, 2012
By Paul Martin

by Mike Adams
NaturalNews.com
Saturday, June 16, 2012

A lot of people believe they are becoming “power independent” by installing grid-tie solar systems, but what many don’t realize is that virtually all such systems are designed to actively go offline when the power grid goes offline.

A “grid-tie” solar system is one that ties into the power grid, pulling electricity from the grid when needed, then pushing excess electricity back into the grid when the local customer isn’t using the full capacity being generated by PV panels (photovoltaic). As long as the grid stays up, it’s a clever solution because it reduces or even eliminates the customer’s electric bills while generating “clean” energy.

Because of the very fact that these systems are tied into the power grid, however, they all have a safety feature that disconnects them from the grid when the grid goes down. In other words, if the power grid goes offline, your entire grid-tie solar array becomes instantly useless and you can’t power a laptop computer even if you have $100,000 worth of solar panels sitting on your roof. In a grid-tie system, they all are instantly shut off.

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