...
The objective is to supply power to the house for critical systems in the event of a power outage. We have 2.4 kW of lithium battery power and multiple inverters. Ideally, we would like to group our batteries and connect the inverter directly to the panel and select what circuits we need to power.
We will be supplying only 120VAC to only 1 phase.
Inverter Connect Directly to Appliance
...
We moved around some circuits in the panel to ensure all critical circuits are on the same phase. This is not important if you will power both phases. If you do have critical circuits on one panel it will be easier since you don't have to supply power to both phases. This however does require you to rework your fuse panel.
Here we have moved circuits that would be useful in the event of a power outage to our L2 phase. This includes heat, hot water, tv, internet and coffee!
Connecting to the Panel
To connect our inverter to the panel, we simply connected our inverter to a receptacle which was running on the desired phase (L2 in our case). Ideally, this receptacle should not be on a circuit containing a GFCI or arc fault breaker . It will still work but if the GFCI/Arc Fault trips, you won't be able to reset the circuit.
Connection Steps
and should not have any loads between the inverter and the panel.
Please consider the following situation:
Connection Steps
- Turn off the main power circuit on panel!
- Turn off all circuits
- Ensure all 240v breakers are OFF. Any 240v breakers that feed sub panels can be kept on. Ensure 240v breakers on sub panels are OFF.
- Connect
- turn off the input cuircuit on panel! (main power)
- turn off all circuits
- ensure all 240v breakers are OFF (we can not turn these on)
- connect inverter to receptacle on desired phase. (Ideally a circuit not protected by a GFCI or arc fault breaker)
- power Power on inverter
- turn Turn on critical circuits on panel.
...
To connect our inverter to both phases we will need to connect to two different receptacles on different phases. We will need to ensure all 240v breakers are turned off.
Connection Steps
- turn Turn off the input cuircuit main power circuit on panel! (main power)
- Turn turn off all circuits
- ensure Ensure all 240v breakers are OFF (we can not turn these on). Any 240v breakers that feed sub panels can be kept on. Ensure 240v breakers on sub panels are OFF.
- Connect connect inverter to receptacle on each phase. (Ideally a circuit not protected by a GFCI or arc fault breaker)
- power Power on inverter
- turn Turn on critical circuits on panel.
...