vanwyk.za

Thanks to everybody that responded to my thread on the Prepaid meter that could not load electricity as it was installed on the essential circuit side - and not the incoming side from Council / Escom. As per suggestions on this forum - I had the installer come back and moved one of the plugs in the kitchen to the Escom / Council / incoming side and connected the prepaid meter to that - it now works perfectly.

To all
Thanks for the comprehensive feedback...so two things:
I found that the prepaid meter is behind the inverter- which means it does not 'see' the escom / ciry council line - and therefore does not register the load of the money Had to switch the inverter 'off' - and link directly to council power so that the meter can 'see' the direct line from council Also - very embarrassing - we forgot to pay our municipal bill last month...and then council started deducting it off the prepaid electricity.. Learning experience all round...

The OP mentioned in the subject - Tshwane. 
Bear in mind we don't have a fixed fee for post paid 😀😀. 
The different price tiers are also different to CoJ. 

@vanwyk.za I like the fact that Jay also mentioned water has to be recycled every "2 weeks or so". Just to add on to this, if you can get your water tank cleaned every 3-6months regularly, that'll ensure it remains clean from deposits that sit just below the outflow valve meaning you may not necessarily then need to invest in a water filter for your system and you can drink directly from the water. I've had a 5000litre water tank since 2015 and run off a DAB 0.5hp pump to the whole house and it's been dream without issues, well save for the regular cleaning. All the best.

Let's add a bit of fat to this. Say you have 16 kWh a day to sell back @12c a unit as the last price I saw. This gives you less than R60pm. You cannot use the same prepaid meter and a bi-directional could cost R9000. Now I don't know if there are any admin fees. 
Based on the above and current income from your feed in takes about 12 yrs to break even. 
A lot better ways to spend the money. 🤔🤔🤔

This can definitely be done,
We've done this our side and have been happy with the results. For our 6-person household we went with a 0.75kW VSD pump. With inverter/Solar installations, it's common practice to get a variable-speed (VSD) pump rather than a conventional pump: while VSD's are pricier, conventional pumps produce a surge on start-up that can be several times the pump's rating (and hence could overload the inverter/battery if the load is otherwise heavy). Likewise, if set correctly, VSD's consume less power in operation since they adjust speed based on pressure demand. Peak consumption of our 0.75kW pump is 800W (this is when several taps are on at the same time). With a single (low-flow-head) shower or a single tap switched on, consumption is about 580W. For our use, total power consumption on an average day is around 1.5kWh - 1.8kWh when the pump serves the household for the full day. Water in a tank should be cycled every 2 weeks or so; so the pump needs to run even when municipal water is available to achieve this. In our case when municipal water is available, our pump is on a timeswitch that powers it on only during the day; hence at night we continue to use municipal water. This drops daily pump consumption to around 0.5kWh whilst still hitting the cycle-tank-water-every-2-weeks target.  
Full system details in my signature; but the 5kW Sunsynk Inverter + 5kWh Hubble battery we use has worked well so far during water outages (we're frugal with water when using the tank - which also reduces battery load during load shedding); I'd imagine your larger system would handle this perfectly.

You could always just ask them. Probably they will want drawings and a sign off from a suitably qualified person. There are companies that will carry out this process on your behalf. 
Can't help here. Did you do your own install? If you didn't, then ask the installer for assistance. Or ask on this forum, your inverter is one of the most commonly used in SA
A bidirectional meter would be required, and the billing would reflect what you consumed and what you fed back. You won't get paid as much for your feed in as you do for grid electricity. Some municipalities require that you be a net consumer - IE you may not sell back more than you buy. I don't know if Tshwane is one such.
See my answer to the previous question. They are going to have to properly track your purchases (when you take from the grid) and your feeding back in, then calculate who owes who how much. So I don't think pre-paid and reselling are going to go together. I currently have pre-paid in COJ, but I am not interested in selling back.

There is a big question mark against these schemes in SA. Even in Cape Town nobody seems to end up with the municipality paying them, and they are paying over the NERSA rate for electricity that is fed back in. Depending on the tariff your are on right now, you can probably reduce your bill, but is it going to be worth the total cost? I would do some investigation first.

From my perspective in COJ. If I wanted to start selling back to City Power
1) I have to go on to the reseller's tariff, with about R800 a month in fixed fees before they look at the movement on your meter
2) The net consumer requirement is in place, so I can't resell (get paid) for more units than I consume. 
3) The price I pay them for a unit of electricity is in rands and cents. The price they pay me is cents. So even if I sell back exactly as much as I use, I still owe them money
4) A bidirectional meter must be installed. Last I heard this is at my expense, and it is in the thousands of rands. This is the killer.

So do your homework and do some calculations.

I will add that I expect Eskom and municipalities to get increasingly aggressive regarding registration of PV. So I am getting my system registered. First prize for me would be to have a registered system - set for zero export - and retain my prepaid meter, but not all muncipalities allow that combination. 

Get your installer to put a dedicated plug point on the grid side for your meter's CIU.

Just checked the manual for Sunsynk. Might be going out on a limb here, might be wrong, but if I'm right, you should probably do this sooner rather than later.
 
1. In the menu, on the "System Mode" page, "System2" tab, tick the box "Limit to Load Only"
- That should cause your inverter to supply the ups backed-up load only, and stop the bleeding.
 
2.You should be able to top up your municipal power at that point until your municipal account is no longer in arrears. Money down the drain, sorry.
 
3. My concern here is - again - I strongly suspect that you are exporting power to the grid through a prepaid meter, which you really don't want to do. If you had the "Solar Export" box ticked on the Mode menu, then, un-tick it, don't use it at all until you get a bi-directional meter that can distinguish between power coming in vs power coming out. Because otherwise your exported power will be counted as purchased power. You'll be paying full price for each unit you send to the municipality as if you bought it from them, even if you're giving it away for free.
 
4. If you had the "Zero Export" mode ticked, then it is likely there is a problem with the installation of your CT coil because it should normally be limiting the inverter's power to the house only, but it appears you've been exporting instead. If this is the case, if you were in "Zero Export" mode while this happened, I'd suggest calling your installer back to check the fitment of the CT coil.
 
I hope this helps.
And I hope actually that I'm completely wrong and that it's something else.

There is another possibility. If on your ID you are in arrears for other munic debt they also deduct some of the power loaded. It can even be for another property.