Type of Electric Meter

wilsonbh
wilsonbh Solar Expert Posts: 57 ✭✭✭
in Advanced Solar Electric Technical Forum #1
Is there any way to determine if my electric meter runs in reverse. No issue really, just wondering....

ElectricMeter.jpg
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  • BB.
    BB. Super Moderators, Administrators Posts: 33,613 admin
    #2
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    I looked up the meter on the GE website and found it here (pdf scan of brochure here).

    The documentation does not mention what happens if it is back driven... The manual is from 1987 (I think)--so it probably was not a concern back then.

    If you are installing a solar RE system, the utility will probably change your meter (especially if you change rate plans). Just turn on your solar and see A) does the stator spin backwards and B) does the right most kWhr dial start counting down...

    Short of re-wiring the power to the meter backwards (illegal) or taking it apart (also illegal), I can't tell more...

    -Bill
    Near San Francisco California: 3.5kWatt Grid Tied Solar power system+small backup genset
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  • Solar Guppy
    Solar Guppy Solar Expert Posts: 1,989 ✭✭✭
    #3
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    It doesn't what your meter is, you HAVE to have the permission of the Electric company to have the inverter connected to their grid. When the electric company ( FPL ) approves the interconnect, they will install metering of their choice for measuring the enegry your sending back to the grid, you have zero say in this.
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  • Windsun
    Windsun Solar Expert Posts: 1,164 ✭✭
    #4
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    In theory, yes.

    But with the high permit fees and huge increase in paperwork over the past couple of years for grid tie systems, we are starting to see more and more "stealth" guerilla solar systems.
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  • n3qik
    n3qik Solar Expert Posts: 741 ✭✭
    #5
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    Found this on eBay:
    http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=300204464225&ssPageName=STRK:MEWA:IT&ih=020

    250 watts may not be much, but could turn my meter backwards on some days.
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  • Solar Guppy
    Solar Guppy Solar Expert Posts: 1,989 ✭✭✭
    #6
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    Florida currently hasn't had the high permit/fee issue. I paid 100 dollars for the permit and nothing for the electric company interconnect/inspection on the 5kW system I added last year. Heck, the Electric company keep showing up unannounced with little mini-tours showing off my residence as there is only a handfull of people that have gridtie around here and I built 2 of the systems!

    I'm fully permited, planned and inspected. I'm sure if the day ever came solar became something more than something a handful of people do, than yes, what has happened in WindSuns communtity could happen here, but for now it hasn't.

    The OP is looking into the Florida rebate program ... going guerilla is not an option.
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  • Telco
    Telco Solar Expert Posts: 201 ✭✭✭✭✭
    #7
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    Don't know if it was on this site or some other site, but read that some meters will increase regardless of what direction power is flowing. If you don't have the right kind of meter then you will be paying the power company to push power onto their grid at the same rate you would pay to take it off.
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  • System2
    System2 Posts: 6,290 admin
    #8
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    As a Utility worker I will Remind you of how dangerous this situation is. First off you have not informed the utility which breaking the law ( they will sue you and I will tell you why next). By feeding back thru the meter you feed thru the transformer on the pole thru it's windings resulting in feeeding the primary high voltage side. Now an unknowing utility will open the fuse to that transformer and they will then go to work on the de-energized transforemer and touch the top lead ( Whick you have energized at 7200 volt or higher depending on your utilities primary voltage feed) Then what happens next is gonna be not so friendly. Your gonna watch him get electrocuted , maybe he will live, probaly he won;t. Then what do you think his buddy is gonna say or do to you. Then the utility will probaly charge you with murder. Please I hope everyone will consider the poor Lineman when they do grid tie and please make sure to notify your utility. All he is trying to do is keep your power on.
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  • BB.
    BB. Super Moderators, Administrators Posts: 33,613 admin
    #9
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    Nick,

    I agree with you that it is illegal and not smart to install a listed Grid Tied inverter system to a home without notifying the utility (plus following local building/inspection requirements) and nobody should connect a home made generator to home wiring that can back drive utility lines because of the possibility of injury or death--A UL/NRTL listed inverter cannot back drive and energize a utility line. The "Anti-Islanding" feature of all listed inverters is a requirement specifically designed and tested to ensure that this cannot happen.

    On the other hand, cities have made the building department another profit center and are charging huge fees and ensuring that property taxes are increased based on the value of the system installed. For states (like California) which have tried to make solar RE a political cause--they are, with one hand subsidizing new installations (no property taxes, rebates, some cities dropping fees and permit costs) and on the other, increasing paperwork, regulation, requiring on-line logging, etc.

    All of this to offset 0.5%-1.0% of the utility's total grid load...

    What is it... I am up to 4 hands now? :roll:

    In the end, it would have been much more cost effective if I could send $10 per watt to the utility and have them install/maintain an installation in "my name" (same/similar billing options, etc.) and it would probably buy 2-3x more solar "power" at a major installation vs the costs of my little retail system.

    I am starting to get the feeling that the whole Solar Grid Tied "danger" is what I used to hear from the phone company four decades ago where we were going to kill phone workers and destroy the network when we bought our own phones/answering machines/computer modems on their phone lines...

    There is a point where, if too many people install Solar RE Grid Tied inverters, that actually back driving the grid from multiple subdivisions could cause problems with safety equipment and load balancing (and even shut down the grid because the utilities are not setup to accept power from the grid when solar RE generation exceeds total grid load for an area)--we are probably a long way from this happening at this point.

    So, I can understand the requirement to register with the utility so that they can manage their networks if the point where home generation exceeds loads ever happens.

    -Bill
    Near San Francisco California: 3.5kWatt Grid Tied Solar power system+small backup genset
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  • Solar Guppy
    Solar Guppy Solar Expert Posts: 1,989 ✭✭✭
    #10
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    Nick,

    A GridTie UL1741 listed inverter cannot backfeed without a voltage present on the mains, it is a built in safety feature. Your concerns are valid for someone hooling up a generator, but not a gridtie inverter.

    SG
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  • Noodles
    Noodles Solar Expert Posts: 30 ✭✭
    #11
    Re: Type of Electric Meter
    Telco wrote: »
    Don't know if it was on this site or some other site, but read that some meters will increase regardless of what direction power is flowing. If you don't have the right kind of meter then you will be paying the power company to push power onto their grid at the same rate you would pay to take it off.

    You may be thinking of my old post in the grid-tie section of the forum:

    http://forum.solar-electric.com/showthread.php?t=1757

    That is exactly what was happening at my house, but the folks from my local power co installed a new meter for me. Luckily, I discovered this within a few months of my wind-gen installation and it was corrected.

    Mike
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  • niel
    niel Solar Expert Posts: 10,300 ✭✭✭✭
    #12
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    nick2000gmc,
    i think you may need an education beyond the little you know or have been told. in fact you almost sound as if you are trying to single-handedly discourage grid-tied solar because of safety issues to you. what hogwash because in a real concern it would most likely not be the lineman who would get hurt, but rather injurious to the individual making such a connection or his property.
    bb brings up some points as to why some forego the red tape (go guerilla) and just connect, but he stepped upon this lightly as most of the time it is the utility that is fearful for its safety and i'm talking only financial because they don't like competition within their monopoly. they do see other generating sources as a threat to their financial security and needlessly put up roadblocks to these small systems. these systems through design pose no danger to you unlike the circumstances those same people (your bosses) may expose you to. i know how they have cut manpower back in most places as to pose a real danger to service and the utility workers themselves because of their overzealousness to save a buck at all costs. now in fairness i don't know if the utilities in canada are guilty of this, but here in the us they are. they just make agreements that under certain circumstances that they get loaned to other utilities and is why during things in florida that i hear the news report that so many of our lineman have to go there to help. that help is a misleading statement as they are being paid to go there and one might view them more as utility mercenaries.
    do understand that nobody here has advocated an illegal hookup, but when that happens it is not usually from ignorance this hookup occurs from. it is more a case of being bullied or taken advantage of from utilities and or inspectors as safety is a concern to anybody that makes such a connection too. that generator hooked to a utility main from an individual may be the exception to the stupidity thing as this could endanger the lineman, but it will without a doubt do something to the generator with possibly the lives and property of those involved in the generator's connection once power is restored as the grid would backfeed to the generator and win. those generators don't have safety items built into them either like grid-tie inverters do, but i'm not hearing concerns from you on the generators and only on the limited abilities of solar to feed the grid. this does make me think some fear card is being thrown in here by you somehow. if i'm wrong then i apologize, but then it affirms your need on educating yourself on this matter.
    edit to add:
    in all fairness i do agree that disconnects must be in place, but for those inverters meeting ul1741 it is automatic and i feel you are singling out solar unfairly with the you'll hurt me fear card. though your job is dangerous and that you could get hurt by a bad connection from solar or generators connected to the grid, i still contend that the person making that connection could be in just as much danger or more and i do not advocate doing this. i am dissapointed in you that you had elected to just answer by swearing rather than debate or answer to my posting saying how it is i am wrong. i must've hit it on the head somewhere to get a reaction like that from you and know that reactions like that will not be tolerated here.
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  • wilsonbh
    wilsonbh Solar Expert Posts: 57 ✭✭✭
    #13
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    I totally agree with you Niel! I think the real answer here is the Utility doesn't want "Grid-Tie" systems poping up all over the place. So they regulate them to death, or near death.

    I'm hoping to install a system, but am not 100% sure I can pull it off despite having the money to do it because of regulatory constraints.

    I view these things sorta like the situation depicted in the movie, "Who Killed the Electric Car."

    Billy
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  • Solar Guppy
    Solar Guppy Solar Expert Posts: 1,989 ✭✭✭
    #14
    Re: Type of Electric Meter

    wilsonbh,

    what constraints are you having with your proposed Florida system?
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