Marius Fourie

Hi Bobster. They inspecting is totally impractical. The ACT specifies that the said inspector must be a Pr.Eng. The list you mention is in the document that I am encouraging you to read. By the way, I am a Pr.Eng and I have been in the SSEG industry for more than 10 years. They need hundreds of Pr.Eng(s). This is going to end in two ways: There will be huge class action law-suite. Unfortunately, more likely end is; one the their UN-QUALIFIED inspectors will kill himself, or cause huge damage or fire to a house or himself. Then they will come to their senses.

Hi Bobster, Read SSEG Compliance Test Report R8 MF v1.pdf, The ACT and NERSA is very specific about who checks what. See note 5. Then by e.g.: Anti-islanding must be certified by an international UL certified lab. This is all specified by law, not by local distributers (read Eskom and Municipalities).

If this is true, I have to ask why? They test for: Earthing Checking for anti-islanding. Timing how long the inverter takes to reconnect on restoration of grid supply. If an electrician and a Pr.Eng signs it off, and the inverter is NRS-097-2-1 compliant, then: Electrician checks earthing, before issuing a CoC. Para 5.2 of NRS-097-2-1 (5.2 Safety disconnect unit) specifies anti-islanding, so a NRS-097-2-1 certificate warrants that anti islanding works. It is a global certificate issued for global consumption by a globally certified lab. A delay in reconnection does not guarantee synchronization. Those old enough will remember how we synchronized generators before automated devices existed. Every Pr.Eng old enough has done it many times. So, the municipality tests is a repeat of test done for the CoC and the commissioning report. It is a total waste of time and resources.

The file SSEG Registration Requirement by Distributers v1.1.pdfis my summary of why we have to register after doing some research. The best signoff document I have seen that is an official Eskom document with an Unique Identifier (i.e.: Under configuration management) isSSEG Compliance Test Report R8 MF v1.pdf, it is in Release 8, so must be fairly mature. I have a few questions: City Power is a public entity and they have to proof that their decisions are rational. What is the criteria and motivation for upfront approval? What is the criteria? The act requires an electrician and a Pr.Eng or Pr.Tech to sign off the system so: Why does City Power sign it off? What is their criteria, over and above the Electrician and Pr.Eng criteria. In my estimate, City Power will need quite a few hundred of personnel (Pr.Eng's) to inspect a Pr.Eng's work. How many do they already have for this role. City Power is the only entity in the country across all engineering disciplines, who believe that the additional signoff by City Power is needed. Why? Is there any co-ordination between Nersa's Distributers (Eskom and Municipalities) or is every one going to be different? Note that I explain a few topics related to SSEG registration on my Youtube channel. There are many more questions to get answers for.

A very belated answer. BUT. The standard do not state that. Para 7.12 has many sub paragraphs and none of them state what the guys above says. I hate it if someone pretends to quote a paragraph and he obviously has not even read it. (YellowTapemeasure, where in 7.12 ???) I have just done an intensive study of 10142 specifically with this in mind. The deciding factor is that panels are double isolated devices, which means there are sufficient separation and makes that a useless exercise.

I prefer 60% DoD (40% state of charge = SoC) if you want long life. Else 25% SoC for typical 5 year. If you want to reserve power for load shedding, I do 60% SoC for load shifting and keep 40% (i.e.: Down to 20% SoC (its occasional) for load shedding.)

Hi All. I made this video. Pierre, I take exception to your insinuation that I am punting Victron. Let me state for the record that I am in no way affiliated with Victron and I hardly know the local Victron guys. I only met one and I don't like him. I simply use it and I believe it is an excellent product. The point is not if the King can find out what the state of charge is by asking the BMS, it is what it can do with the information, and the answer is nothing. You need to watch the video a few times more, because you missed the point completely. Let's be clear, the Axpert cannot blend power linear between PV and Grid. It does not convert the grid to DC, convert the PV to a suitable DC level, add the two and invert the sum of the DC power to AC. That is expensive circuitry, and that is why the Axpert is so cheap, it simply switches via a relay. The point of the grid tied inverter is to blend the grid and PV power before it is fed to the Axpert. The disadvantage is that the PV switches off under islanding conditions. Note that Voltronics, do not claim the Axpert to be a Hybrid Inverter. It's Hybrid inverters are the Infini series. They blend the power from the PV and grid. If you don't get the difference in the Victron and Axpert functionality offered, its sad. There are so much that the Victron offers the user if you understand it. And yes, King will catch up but by that time Victron has gone much further ahead.