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A comment on Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans building mini solar farms. Parent comment

Re:Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans bu... by password4321 on Friday March 27, 2026 @07:09PM (#47549572)
I am not very well versed on this topic but I believe the balcony solar products market one of their safety features as "anti-islanding protection". Personally I wonder what happens if multiple balcony solar systems are connected... can each still tell when the grid is down since the other power source is active?

https://www.digikey.com/en/articles/anti-islanding-and-smart...

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Re:Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans bu... by PunchyHamster on Friday March 27, 2026 @08:29PM (#47550207)
people put few kW worth of micro-inverters and it is fine so I imagine that is figured out problem...

question is whether the ones allowed for sale implement it well and are tested for it

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Re:Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans bu... by PaulDavisThe1st on Friday March 27, 2026 @09:10PM (#47550473)
my understanding is that micro-inverters send an "up and running" signal encoded over the DC wiring to the main inverter, and that this is used to detect micro-inverter failure. that is an entirely different problem than the one in the GP comment, i think.
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Re:Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans bu... by theoreticalmal on Saturday March 28, 2026 @05:09PM (#47558138)
“Rapid shutdown devices” do this. Microinverters have the same “grid is down, turn off” logic as a main inverter
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Re:Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans bu... by PaulDavisThe1st on Sunday March 29, 2026 @11:48AM (#47564180)
Again, entirely different to the point being raised.

You have 4 neighbors, all with grid-tied inverters, all of which will do rapid shutdown if the grid goes down.

The grid does go down ... but are there circumstances under which the presence of neighboring inverters will "hide" the grid being down from each inverter, and so they will keep delivering power back to the grid ?

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Re:Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans bu... by Panzer04 on Saturday March 28, 2026 @03:09AM (#47552314)
Unless there's so much generating capacity available that they can power the entire connected grid, no.

Consider 100 homes on a power line network and the breaker trips. They probably draw 50kW on average, more if it's hot or cold and AC is on. Unless there's enough power generation available to power that entire load, voltage will drop and any halfway reasonable hardware should give up.

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Re:Suddenly energy independence feels practical:Europeans bu... by helterskelter on Saturday March 28, 2026 @04:01AM (#47552531)
Hobestly solving these sorts of problems could be a huge business.
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