Enphase Energy home solution in New Zealand

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#181229 7-Oct-2015 09:53

Received two interesting press releases today:

Enphase Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ: ENPH), a global energy technology company, today announced that Australia and New Zealand are the first markets worldwide to receive the Enphase Home Energy Solution, an integrated solution combining solar generation, energy control, and energy storage. The award-winning Enphase technology is an advanced energy solution that delivers a high return on investment and greater reliability to the system owner.

“The dynamics of the residential solar markets in Australia and New Zealand make it one of the most storage-ready regions in the world,” said Paul Nahi, president and CEO of Enphase. “Homeowners in Australia and New Zealand want total control of their home’s energy because of the combination of electricity rates, high solar penetration, and declining feed-in tariffs. The Enphase Home Energy Solution fits these needs with compelling economics and sets the stage for the evolving energy market.”

Seventy-eight percent of existing Enphase system owners in Australia and New Zealand have indicated a strong interest in receiving the Enphase Home Energy Solution. Enphase will roll out the components of the Enphase Home Energy Solution in these regions starting in December 2015, with the Enphase AC Battery to be available in Q2 2016. The key components of the Enphase Home Energy Solution include:

Generation
The fifth-generation Enphase S-Microinverter is a powerful, smart solar energy inverter that simplifies installation and delivers market-leading quality and reliability with a design that is inherently safer with greater energy yield. Designed to pair with high-powered modules, the S-Series Microinverter delivers a significant reduction in cost per watt and minimise homeowners’ and installers’ risk in an environment of changing grid standards.

Control
Envoy-S Metered, a bidirectional communications gateway, empowers homeowners to control the energy in their home and enables more cost-effective and reliable installations. The Envoy-S Metered offers consumption monitoring and is zero export compliant, making it ideally suited to solar PV systems in Queensland and New South Wales.

Envoy-S Metered also enables system owners to rightsize their energy storage system to maximise the value of the energy from the owner’s solar system. With more than 20 percent of Australian homes already having installed solar and feed-in tariffs rapidly declining, economically viable energy storage is an attractive proposition that will accelerate the adoption of home energy management and storage.

Storage
The Enphase AC Battery is a scalable, modular energy storage system that seamlessly integrates with the Enphase Home Energy Solution. It delivers high performance and superior reliability, allowing homeowners to achieve self-consumption or to simply store solar energy for use at times when grid-supplied energy rates are at their peak. For installers, the Enphase AC Battery provides lower upfront costs and higher lifetime value, especially for retrofits, where the economics are the best in the industry. From the perspective of utilities, the intelligent, networked Enphase AC Battery is a powerful vehicle for distributed storage models, since it incorporates Enphase’s signature fleet-level performance monitoring and remote upgrade capabilities.

Management
Enphase Enlighten is a cloud-based platform that connects the Enphase Home Energy Solution with smart devices for an intelligent home. System owners use Enphase Enlighten to monitor their home’s solar generation, battery storage and consumption from any web-enabled device. System owners may also connect their Enphase system with other smart home apps, including Google’s Nest.

Australian and New Zealand residents who are interested in purchasing the Enphase Home Energy Solution can register online at http://www.enphase.com/au/register.

The Enphase Home Energy Solution will be available to solar installers through Enphase’s authorised distributors, including AC Solar Warehouse, Australian Microinverters, One Stop Warehouse, RFI, Solar + Solutions and SunEdison, as well as Solar Partners NZ and YHI in New Zealand.

And the next one:

Enphase Energy, Inc (NASDAQ: ENPH), a global energy technology company, announced today that it plans to work with Genesis Energy, New Zealand’s largest electricity and gas retailer, to conduct a residential energy storage trial for the Enphase Storage System that includes the Enphase AC Battery, a scalable, modular energy storage system that seamlessly integrates with the Enphase Home Energy Solution.

The Enphase Home Energy Solution offers homeowners a plug-and-play Enphase AC Battery to store energy generated from their solar photovoltaic (PV) system. Through the installation of a smart-grid ready Enphase Envoy-S Metered gateway, users can monitor and manage their home energy consumption through web-enabled devices and rightsize their energy storage system to maximise the value of their energy from the owner’s solar system.

“Enphase is delighted to be working with Genesis Energy for our inaugural trial in New Zealand,” said Greg Wolfson, storage product line director at Enphase. “As an integrated energy retailer, Genesis Energy is well placed to build on its unique mix of skills and services to deliver solar options to the New Zealand market. This includes storage solutions, which Genesis Energy views as a progressive step towards offering their customers versatile energy solutions.”

Genesis Energy’s Chief Executive Albert Brantley said, “The trial is another step forward in implementing the company’s strategy of delivering simple and smart energy solutions and services.”

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#1401940 7-Oct-2015 18:02

Almost everyone already has an energy storage device in their house. The hot water cylinder. It has a far lower cost per kw/hr of storage than any currently available battery technology. And since water heating is 1/3 to 1/2 of power use of the average house. All that is needed is a smart element controller. That will monitor the output of the solar inverter. And the current at the meter. So it will run the element instead of exporting power.

Enasolar already make this device. They just need to make a version 2. That can support variable feed to the element. And can different cylinder thermostat settings depending on if the power is from solar or grid. And multi element support as well.

reg52nz

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#1427141 12-Nov-2015 19:58

Yes the hot water cylinder is a good storage device, we just have a simple timer on the switchboard, at the moment it turns on hot water at 11am and off at 4pm, which is plenty of time to heat our 180 liter hot water cylinder so long as any morning cloud has lifted by 11am which it mostly has. In fact mostly the hot water is reheated within a few hrs so excess is then going back to grid at this time of year anyway. The simple timer was a cheaper option than the fancy $500 diverter type switch. Sadly however no amount of advanced technology can compete with governments that promote essential services being controlled by monopolies. Its a form of legal theft really when you think about it.

Our biggest problem with our grid connected system is the lousy buy back rate that Genesis gives us (about one fifth of what we pay per KwHr) and also in our case to go solar we lost out ten cents per KwHr night rate. So regardless of hot water storage you would think that as decent batteries become more affordable they become more viable. So what does Genesis do to combat that? They get involved with Enphase ..... I assume that is so they can control the price of batteries and stop people reducing their power bills.

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#1427162 12-Nov-2015 20:48

Reg1952: I assume that is so they can control the price of batteries and stop people reducing their power bills.

You really are negative about things.

If they can reduce their demand for peak time purchasing or generation of power, then that reduces their costs which will in turn allow them to be more profitable.

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reg52nz

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#1427212 12-Nov-2015 21:30

Yes absolutely negative about governments that sell off state assets to promote legal theft of essential services to monopolies and VERY proud of such negativity. I was very positive about the $18,000 I spent on Solar and looking forward to investing in batteries in the near future, but disappointed to hear Genesis were going to have any control over that too.

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#1427259 12-Nov-2015 22:10

Looks interesting, but every time I run the numbers on solar generation (after including cost of capital and depreciation etc) I can't make them work. Solar water heating, however, (heating the water directly, not using PV) does seem to add up. If only I had a cylinder instead of continuous flow gas.

@Reg1952 - I'm not going to open up a debate about state asset sales, about which you clearly feel strongly. However, based on my calculations of solar PV, which I admit I haven't updated for 12 months or so, I suspect you would have been better off putting the $18,000 into Genesis shares rather than putting it into PV and trying to save and sell them power.

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#1427267 12-Nov-2015 22:29

JimmyH: Looks interesting, but every time I run the numbers on solar generation (after including cost of capital and depreciation etc) I can't make them work. Solar water heating, however, (heating the water directly, not using PV) does seem to add up. If only I had a cylinder instead of continuous flow gas.

@Reg1952 - I'm not going to open up a debate about state asset sales, about which you clearly feel strongly. However, based on my calculations of solar PV, which I admit I haven't updated for 12 months or so, I suspect you would have been better off putting the $18,000 into Genesis shares rather than putting it into PV and trying to save and sell them power.

Its a close comparison. If you are rating it against money in a term investment it makes sense. If you are tacking it onto a mortgage then its borderline but was still paying its way.

Have to make so many assumptions on what interest rates, and power prices are going to do that it is easy to make a scenario that goes either way for if its profitable or not. The thing is, if I add a battery to it, then I get a degree of energy independence which in the past would have been great, but since vector have sorted out the craptastic old united networks power network is less of an issue since bi-weekly powercuts in winter are not happening now.

Richard rich.ms

linw

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#1427268 12-Nov-2015 22:34

Regarding the battery, I see it is rated at 1.2kWh. What the hell can you do with 1.2kWh? It wouldn't even boil the jug let alone run a couple of heaters on a winter's night. And I bet it is very expensive so paralleling several would bankrupt most people.

It is all very well thinking you are beating the bad guys by generating your own "free" power but some simple arithmetic ruins the picture for most people.

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reg52nz

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#1427269 12-Nov-2015 22:35

The viability of it all varies a lot on ones individual circumstances. For example a couple both out working all day when it makes a lot less sense unless they can store what they generate for use when they get home. A retired couple (our situation) that are home most of the day that can adjust their usage to suit when they generate it makes more sense, especially if you don't have battery storage. In winter when it is cold, but the sun is shining it's great to sit inside with the heat pump on :-) In theory the grid is the best storage unit of the lot, but like I was saying earlier, when they buy it at 5 cents and sell it back to you at 25 they reduce the viability a lot when coupled with NO night rate. . Their explanation as to why no night rate for people with solar is that the technology is not there to support it. What they mean is they charge me to remove the one way smart meter that gave me all sorts of daily usage on my genesis app and replace it with a two way metre that is supposedly not smart as it cant give me the data on app. But the electrical inspector guy actually tells me that the new metre is VERY VERY smart, it is capable of 16 channels. But somehow Genesis thinks it is a real dumb metre and cant even figure out how to give me back my old night rate. See where I am going again........ The monopolies are controlling us and reducing viability of solar for their own profit.

reg52nz

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#1427274 12-Nov-2015 22:44

linw: Regarding the battery, I see it is rated at 1.2kWh. What the hell can you do with 1.2kWh? It wouldn't even boil the jug let alone run a couple of heaters on a winter's night. And I bet it is very expensive so paralleling several would bankrupt most people.

It is all very well thinking you are beating the bad guys by generating your own "free" power but some simple arithmetic ruins the picture for most people.

You don't just have ONE of those 1.2 KwHr batteries you get a whole bank of them. Half a dozen of them would run my heat pump no trouble at all.

mattwnz

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#1427293 12-Nov-2015 23:20

Reg1952: Yes the hot water cylinder is a good storage device, we just have a simple timer on the switchboard, at the moment it turns on hot water at 11am and off at 4pm, which is plenty of time to heat our 180 liter hot water cylinder so long as any morning cloud has lifted by 11am which it mostly has. In fact mostly the hot water is reheated within a few hrs so excess is then going back to grid at this time of year anyway. The simple timer was a cheaper option than the fancy $500 diverter type switch. Sadly however no amount of advanced technology can compete with governments that promote essential services being controlled by monopolies. Its a form of legal theft really when you think about it.

Our biggest problem with our grid connected system is the lousy buy back rate that Genesis gives us (about one fifth of what we pay per KwHr) and also in our case to go solar we lost out ten cents per KwHr night rate. So regardless of hot water storage you would think that as decent batteries become more affordable they become more viable. So what does Genesis do to combat that? They get involved with Enphase ..... I assume that is so they can control the price of batteries and stop people reducing their power bills.

I have been doing a bit of research on energy company buy back, and Genesis seems to pay the lowest. So I would suggest giving them the boot. They seem to pay about 5 c, while some others seem to pay about 8 cents, which is quite a big percentage difference. It looks like Vector are bringing in the Tesla home batteries. I just hope they are going to sell them at similar pricing to the US ones, after exchange rate and tax differences.

linw

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#1427396 13-Nov-2015 09:57

Reg1952:
linw: Regarding the battery, I see it is rated at 1.2kWh. What the hell can you do with 1.2kWh? It wouldn't even boil the jug let alone run a couple of heaters on a winter's night. And I bet it is very expensive so paralleling several would bankrupt most people.

It is all very well thinking you are beating the bad guys by generating your own "free" power but some simple arithmetic ruins the picture for most people.

You don't just have ONE of those 1.2 KwHr batteries you get a whole bank of them. Half a dozen of them would run my heat pump no trouble at all.

You seem to have missed this bit "so paralleling several would bankrupt most people".

We agree that multiple packs are needed but at what cost? This surely pushes the amortization period even further out?

reg52nz

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#1427513 13-Nov-2015 12:42

linw:
Reg1952:
linw: Regarding the battery, I see it is rated at 1.2kWh. What the hell can you do with 1.2kWh? It wouldn't even boil the jug let alone run a couple of heaters on a winter's night. And I bet it is very expensive so paralleling several would bankrupt most people.

It is all very well thinking you are beating the bad guys by generating your own "free" power but some simple arithmetic ruins the picture for most people.

You don't just have ONE of those 1.2 KwHr batteries you get a whole bank of them. Half a dozen of them would run my heat pump no trouble at all.

You seem to have missed this bit "so paralleling several would bankrupt most people".

We agree that multiple packs are needed but at what cost? This surely pushes the amortization period even further out?

I did not really miss that bit, I just figured I had already said more than enough about the potential cost ..... and the related political aspects. Have you any idea of the actual cost of them? Until we know that, its premature to say they will bankrupt most people.

As I see it the actual capacity of each battery is not so relevant. You choose from one big Telsa DC type or modular Enphase AC type. In theory modular allows you to add storage as you can afford it.

My whole point is that the cost will be controlled to some extent by the power companies, eg Genesis in the case of Enphase and as someone else pointed out Vector are already involved with Telsa. So long as we have a government that promotes profit of power companies over the good of consumers of essential services and allows such companies to have obvious conflicts of interest as controlling battery prices as well as the price of power then the viability of individuals storing is always going to be reduced.

Huchiz

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#1427653 13-Nov-2015 16:21

A Tesla Powerwall battery is 7KWh, 3.3KW peak power, and cost ONLY 3000 USD in the US.

An Enaphase AC battery (with built-in inverter?) is 1.2KWh, that's only 1/6th the capacity. How much does that cost in NZ?

Like always, I won't be surprised.

mattwnz

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#1427692 13-Nov-2015 17:23

Huchiz: A Tesla Powerwall battery is 7KWh, 3.3KW peak power, and cost ONLY 3000 USD in the US.

An Enaphase AC battery (with built-in inverter?) is 1.2KWh, that's only 1/6th the capacity. How much does that cost in NZ?

Like always, I won't be surprised.

The question is how much are the Tesla ones going to be when they land in NZ. Vector looks like they are the only seller of them when they come in. so may not be too much comeptition. They do look to be a game changer, as batteries have always been the weak area of solar setups, and I presume the tesla ones will only improve with new models.

Huchiz

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#1427694 13-Nov-2015 17:34

mattwnz:
Huchiz: A Tesla Powerwall battery is 7KWh, 3.3KW peak power, and cost ONLY 3000 USD in the US.

An Enaphase AC battery (with built-in inverter?) is 1.2KWh, that's only 1/6th the capacity. How much does that cost in NZ?

Like always, I won't be surprised.

The question is how much are the Tesla ones going to be when they land in NZ. Vector looks like they are the only seller of them when they come in. so may not be too much comeptition. They do look to be a game changer, as batteries have always been the weak area of solar setups, and I presume the tesla ones will only improve with new models.

Yes. And I believe we can refer to the new car pricing to the Tesla battery pricing in NZ.

Also it is interesting to mention that I have asked Nissan NZ how much the replacement battery for LEAF would cost, they never answered my question. :D We all know that is surprising low in the US as well.

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