Record solar yields in Europe: The summers of recent years have been extremely profitable for PV system operators. While nature suffered under the unrelenting heat of the sun, millions of PV systems were busy producing green power. And this is how PV system operator Vincent Illian is becoming increasingly independent from electric utility companies – right in the heart of Germany.

The world of energy is changing: PV systems are becoming increasingly common on roofs in cities as well as industrial and rural areas and are thus driving the energy transition forward. More and more companies are using PV systems to gain independence from electric utility companies and rising costs. Companies are making an active contribution to climate protection by using their own electricity from the roof. Any company that still has space on its roof or premises should not miss this opportunity.

More than 70 percent of all PV systems connected to the grid now have a battery-storage system. Why? Because more and more cost-effective batteries ensure that solar power is also available after sundown. Anywhere in the world. Even in your home?

Combined with intelligently managed battery-storage systems, photovoltaics provides a reliable supply of electricity around the clock exactly where it is needed. At the same time, it is helping support grids. With the costs of solar energy and batteries decreasing, nothing stands in the way of their increased expansion.

It’s been a year since the residents of the Efficiency House Plus homes in Hügelshart, Germany, moved in. They have already experienced one hot summer and their first winter. So how have these innovative, low-energy homes featuring their own PV systems, battery-storage systems and heat pumps fared during this time?

With the Sunny Boy Storage 3.6/5.0/6.0 range, you can have backup power for your home when there is a blackout. In this blog, we will discuss how to use the Secure Power Supply function included in your Sunny Boy Storage and alternatively how you can have automated backup of your household with the optional Automatic Backup Unit.

With the Sunny Boy Storage range of battery inverters, you can add battery storage to either a single phase or a three-phase PV system. Households in Australia are billed for their energy using net metering across all three phases of the grid. That means, the net energy purchased across all three-phases is what is billed, and it does not matter how energy is distributed across the phases.

It’s not always obvious how to choose the size of the battery (kWh) or the rating of the battery inverter (kW). These choices, along with your specific household energy usage, have a large influence on the cost and benefit of a new battery storage system. In this blog, we will show you examples from SunnyDesignWeb.com that illustrate the effect of different battery and inverter combinations for a typical household.

Batteries are taking on an increasingly important role in decentralized energy systems and constitute the heart of off-grid systems. They can also be increasingly found in on-grid systems, where they can cut energy purchase costs by means of increased self-consumption or peak load shaving. Battery monitoring plays a key role here. After all, PV system operators want to know whether their systems are actually working as intended, because downtime costs money and causes hassle. That is why SMA is offering a comprehensive upgrade for battery analysis via ennexOS.

Approximately 1,000 people live in the village of Gutu in Nepal, about 800 kilometers away from the capital city of Kathmandu. There is no public electricity supply. Until recently, everybody shifted for himself: open fires to cook on and smoke in the house, a huge stock of candles or the hum of the diesel generator at the local metal processing company were a part of everyday life. Find out why the village inhabitants have been able to leave all this behind them.