What are the requirements for battery backups?

 

All systems which include a battery shall be electrically connected in a manner which ensures that any non-solar generated electricity used to charge the battery is not later metered as solar generated power. This can be done in one of two ways:

 1. The meter used to report production is electrically located before the battery charger and does not measure any power that is drawn from the battery bank.

 2. A net meter is connected to the system that runs in reverse when any non-solar power, including on-site generator power, is used to charge the battery bank.

This must be an integral part of the physical system design. An inverter which can be configured using software to preclude non-solar charging of the battery bank is not sufficient if that inverter is used as the source of reporting for renewable generation.