Batteries for Solar Panels in 2024

 

Can you imagine not having to depend on large battery companies? With technological advances, that day could be closer than you think. With more efficient solar panels and more innovative energy consumption, our homes could soon be completely autonomous. To achieve this independence, it is crucial to know about Inverter Batteries, a product that can maximise the performance of your photovoltaic installation.

Seeing the advantages of installing photovoltaic self-consumption systems, many enthusiasts think about enhancing them with solar batteries. They quickly run into a problem, though, in that not all batteries work with every type of PV inverter. Therefore, when searching for solutions for your self-consumption system, it is crucial to compare various budgets and look into the possibilities of panels and batteries.

Selecting solar-compatible inverter batteries is crucial, whether you already have a self-consumption installation or are considering a new one. Solar kits provide the best compatibility between batteries and solar inverters if you're considering combining solar panels and batteries. But what do you need to know to choose the correct battery for your installation? Join us in this article to learn more.

What to Consider When Choosing Solar Batteries?

To select the photovoltaic equipment with batteries that best suits you, take into account these aspects:

Compatibility with Inverters

Compatibility is crucial: not all batteries work with every solar panel inverter. Selecting a specific inverter brand may restrict the choices of compatible battery brands. Always select solar-compatible inverter batteries that adjust to your system to avoid damage.

Emergency / Backup Function

Some batteries offer an emergency function or backup capacity, allowing your system to continue working in the event of a power outage. This feature is crucial for greater energy security.

Ongrid and Offgrid Batteries

There are solar batteries designed to work exclusively connected to the grid (on-grid) and others that can also do so disconnected from the grid (off-grid). It would be interesting if the batteries you select had the off-grid function, especially if you aspire to complete autonomy of your photovoltaic system.

Why Use Batteries In Photovoltaics?

Accumulators or batteries are simply devices that allow you to “store electricity”. The process is actually a little more complicated since solar inverter batteries store energy in the form of chemical energy, which is later converted back into electrical energy through electrochemical procedures.

Why Would You Need to Store Electricity?

“Widening” your self-consumption curve.

If you have photovoltaic panels on your roof or are considering installing them, their production curve will only partially match the household consumption curve. Batteries or accumulators, on the other hand, allow you to store these surpluses for later self-consumption.

To understand it better, look at this example image: This is a real case with the production and consumption of one of our installations WITHOUT batteries:

All installations must be sized so that the percentage of self-consumption is as high as possible. That is, you consume most of the energy generated by your photovoltaic installation. In this case, part of the consumption peaks fall on the hours of most extraordinary production—a success! And an installation that will pay for itself in a short period.

However, due to each user's consumption patterns, it is only sometimes possible to achieve something like this.

But even in the case of this client, who does, as we say, have a consumption curve that matches production very well, by installing solar-compatible inverter batteries, they could t solar excess output in green. In this way, he could cover consumption peaks during the morning and night that appear in red, outside the hours when the client self-consumes energy.

More Significant Savings and Less Exposure to Increases In Electricity Prices

A solar system with battery storage requires a more considerable initial investment, but there are significant long-term financial advantages. You can drastically cut your electricity expenses by relying less on the grid, particularly during times of high demand. Furthermore, battery storage provides more flexibility, enabling you to optimise energy use according to personal preferences and time-of-use rates.