Looks cool. Sounds cool. There are some barriers.
The technology couldn’t be easier to use — simply hang one or two panels over a railing and plug them into an outlet. The devices provide up to 800 watts, enough to charge a laptop or power a small fridge. They’re popular in Germany, where everyone from renters to climate activists to gadget enthusiasts hail them as a cheap and easy way to generate electricity. Germans had registered more than 780,000 of the devices with the country’s utility regulator as of December. They’ve installed millions more without telling the government.
Here in the U.S., though, there is no market for balcony solar. Ward, a Republican state representative in Utah who learned about the tech last year, wants that to change. The way he sees it, this is an obvious solution to surging power demand. “You look over there and say, ‘Well, that’s working,’” he told Grist. “So what is it that stops us from having it here?”
His colleagues agree. Last month, the Legislature unanimously passed a bill he sponsored to boost the tech, and Republican Governor Spencer Cox signed it. H.B. 340 exempts portable solar devices from state regulations that require owners of rooftop solar arrays and other power-generating systems to sign an interconnection agreement with their local utility. These deals, and other “soft costs” like permits, can nearly double the price of going solar.
Utah’s law marks the nation’s first significant step to remove barriers to balcony solar — but bigger obstacles remain. Regulations and standards governing electrical devices haven’t kept pace with development of the technology, and it lacks essential approvals required for adoption — including compliance with the National Electrical Code and a product safety standard from Underwriters Laboratories. Nothing about the bill Ward wrote changes that: Utahans still can’t install balcony solar because none of the systems have been nationally certified.
These challenges will take time and effort to overcome, but they’re not insurmountable, advocates of the technology said. Even now, a team of entrepreneurs and research scientists, backed by federal funding, are creating these standards. Their work mirrors what happened in Germany nearly a decade ago, when clean energy advocates and companies began lobbying the country’s electrical certification body to amend safety regulations to legalize balcony solar.
In 2017, Verband der Elektrotechnik, or VDE, a German certification body that issues product and safety standards for electrical products, released the first guideline that allowed for balcony solar systems. While such systems existed before VDE took this step, the benchmark it established allowed manufacturers to sell them widely, creating a booming industry.
“Relentless individuals” were key to making that happen, said Christian Ofenheusle, the founder of EmpowerSource, a Berlin-based company that promotes balcony solar. Members of a German solar industry association spent years advocating for the technology and worked with VDE to carve a path toward standardizing balcony solar systems. The initial standard was followed by revised versions in 2018 and 2019 that further outlined technical requirements.
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My first question is: Are there electrical fire concerns?
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Grist again:
Without proper standards, a balcony solar system could pose several hazards.
One concern is a phenomenon called breaker masking. Within a home, a single circuit can provide power to several outlets. Each circuit is equipped with a circuit breaker, a safety device within the electrical panel that shuts off power if that circuit is overloaded, which happens when too many appliances try to draw too much electricity at the same time. That prevents overheating or a fire. When a balcony solar device sends power into a circuit while other appliances are drawing power from the circuit, the breaker can’t detect that added power supply. If the circuit becomes overloaded — imagine turning on your TV while a space heater is running and you’re charging your laptop, all in the same room — the circuit breaker might fail to activate.
This was a concern in Germany, so it developed standards that limit balcony solar units to just 800 watts, about half the amount used by a hairdryer. That threshold is considered low enough that even in the country’s oldest homes, the wiring can withstand the heating that occurs in even the worst of worst-case scenarios, said Sebastian Müller, chair of the German Balcony Solar Association, a consumer education and advocacy group. As a result, Ofenheusle said there haven’t been any cases of breaker masking causing harm. In fact, with millions of the devices installed nationwide, Germany has yet to see any safety issues beyond a few cases where someone tampered with the devices to add a car battery or other unsuitable hardware, he said.
The US is finally getting a version of EcoFlow’s DIY balcony solar system that I reviewed in Europe last year. EcoFlow says its Stream Series will be the first plug-in solar products to go on sale domestically, allowing anyone in a house or apartment rental to easily lower their energy bill, while also providing a modicum of backup power if the grid goes down.
Unfortunately, they’re only going on sale in Utah, which recently approved balcony solar systems that plug directly into 120V wall outlets — no messy (and costly) interconnection agreement required with your utility company. EcoFlow tells me that there’s no need to wait for a federal certification standard under The National Electrical Code or a tailored product safety standard from Underwriters Laboratories as some have interpreted. Balcony solar systems have already seen widespread adoption throughout Europe where millions have been safely installed.
The plug-and-play Stream series relies upon a microinverter to make solar energy grid-ready for insertion back into the home. Some of that energy can also be diverted to EcoFlow’s batteries for use in an emergency, or for delayed release back into the home to help offset the higher prices utility companies charge when electricity demand peaks each day.
EcoFlow’s Stream Ultra combines a built-in grid-tied microinverter with a reasonably large 1.92kWh capacity LFP battery. It can be installed inside or outside since it’s self-heated to remain operational in temperatures as low as -20 degrees Celsius (-4 degrees Fahrenheit), with IP65-rated resistance to dust and rain. Storage can be expanded to 11.52kWh by adding on additional battery-only Ultra units. You can also buy the Stream Microinverter separately if you already own a compatible EcoFlow power station.