Quote:
Originally Posted by gtojohn
Pinball, I don't have a revenue meter yet. Electrical needs to be tidied up before final. Until then system is being tested and run with current smart meter. Since the grid tie won't island or feed back without grid power so safety isn't an issue. As you probably know the enphase require grid power for 5 minutes before the will produce power. With my base usage and small array, power going back won't be much of a revenue lost either. My main goal is to trim off the most expensive part of my electrical usage assuming my payback would be fastest.
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Keep in mind that non-bidirectional meters almost universally will count up no matter which way the power is flowing through them. My old meter did this when we were doing initial testing. The idea is that they will not count down in the case that the meter is wired in reverse. ..not that this is easy to do or anything. So if you are running a high powered appliance and are generating say 1500 watts and the appliance is using 1300 watts, you might still be paying for the remaining 200 watts. The only time that I could figure it would make sense to power up my system before final inspection and meter install would have been when running my electric clothes dryer. Oddly enough I didn't have a load to run before I got the meters installed and figured the 4kwh of a dryer load wouldn't make much difference anyway so I left the lever in the off position. Some smart meters might just zero the return wattage though. Dial gauges count up only.