Solar Panel - Balkonkraftwerk (posted 2023.09.21, last updated 2023.09.21)
After my brother living in the same building already had a small Solar installation running since last year, it was time for me to get even ;)
Background
My brother had a 600W installation, using a HM-600 and 2x400W panels
Currently, in Germany a 600W installation is allowed to be installed without (much of) paperwork/bureaucracy, larger installations are more complicated due to their potential impact on the grid and the compensation for injected power.
Next year, the limit will be raised to 800W and the registration process will be even more simplified.
However, those "simple" 600W/800W installations will not be compensated for excess energy injected in the grid.
Given our suboptimal geo location, I decided to get a more powerful setup, which will be capped at peak sun, but should yield better output during lower sun times.
Panels: 4x Trinasolar Vertex S TSM-DE09R.08 (435W) (DatasheetArchive)
Additional stuff [WIP]
Registration
After my inverter was capped at 600W, I got a certificate from deine-energiesteckdose.de, which luckily got accepted from my local electricity company.
OpenDTU + OpenHAB
To get more raw data from the HM-1500, I built myself a OpenDTU box using the kit from blinkyparts (Archive)
To persist and further analyse the data, I setup an mqtt server and a OpenHAB installation.
Additionally, I could connect my brothers HM-600 as well to get some comparisons.
As expected I got nearly double the output during lower sun, and while I was capped at 600w during peak sun, I was able to get them for a longer duration than the smaller setup.
Power meter logging [WIP]
As our power meters were exchanged in the progress of registering the solar installations, we got newer digital models that offer a digital interface