What’s the point of inverters in Solar PV systems at home if DC is used?

349 views

So solar panels produce DC current, no conversion actually happens when sunlight is generated as electricity.

The DC current is then converted to AC as it is efficient in the electrical grid for long distances. However it is also used at home and majority of devices (hardly at least) don’t use AC as it gets converted to a safer DC current. This is especially important for electronics and battery recharging. When conversion happens, majority of that energy is lost as heat which you would find in the charging brick. In addition, with smartphones and EVs, wouldn’t direct DC be more efficient and quicker to charge than converting it back to DC. [Proponents claim that it would be beneficial if buildings had a ‘AC-DC converter box’ near a switchboard.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hF_A4sp7nM8) (should mention that this is not a very credible source but others also claim similar stuff with DC)

So as I said before, why is AC forced as the current for homes instead of direct DC. Only current that needs to be exported to the grid would benefit from AC conversion. I couldn’t really see any answer to this with solar on mind. They will say AC is used for powering things while the other sites claim that AC burn devices if used.

In: 13

9 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Solar power (DC) is cheap. Grid power (AC) is expensive. Converting from AC to DC or from DC to AC wastes some amount of power.

**Do you choose to waste cheap solar power to produce AC, or do you choose to waste expensive grid power to produce DC?**

If you have AC appliances, you need to invert to AC to power them which wastes some cheap, solar power.

If you have DC appliances, you need to be able to produce and store enough DC power to operate them. That requires a lot of expensive batteries. Or, you need to convert grid power to DC. That wastes expensive grid power.

If you do have enough capacity to store enough power under average conditions, you will have an excess of power during great conditions, and you’ll need the inverter anyway, to export that excess to the grid.

You are viewing 1 out of 9 answers, click here to view all answers.