Has anyone else had issues with the Enphase company and its battery back up system? I had one installed earlier this year. It would appear that the company does not respond to customers/installers when it comes to problems incurred. For instance, the storage CT measurement has a reading error in my system and Enphase has repeatedly failed to get back to the installation company to correct the error. While away from home for a couple of months I only managed to ‘save a couple of trees’ despite the fact that only the fridge and freezer were on for all that time. Usually it is 5-6 plus, so naturally would have expected quite a few more.
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Sorry I do not use any type of battery or solar panel energy system yet.
But I do suggest you write to Enphase detailing the problem/s you are having. Include the relevant portions of the Australian Consumer Law (ACL) in regards to fitness for purpose, and timely repair or replacement of faulty goods even if only minor faults. Give them a reasonable time to respond eg 2 weeks or perhaps 28 days. Send the letter by registered post so you have proof of mail delivery.
If they fail to respond appropriately to your request then you can get the item repaired and bill them for the cost, this is a right in the circumstances of failure to repair in a reasonable time under the ACL, or you can take the issue to your State/Territory Administrative Tribunal.
Choice provides a Help service to their members, and if you are a member you might wish to use their service.
In a previous topic I listed a number of resources and links that may be of use to you. There is a publication in the links from the ACCC regarding your ACL rights as well that you could use as your ACL references. The topic link follows:
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Only 1 Enphase battery? I guess you are aware that they can only deliver 260VA continuous, so that if fridge and freezer are on at the same time, you’ll probably still be drawing power from the grid. However, dropping from 5-6 to one “saved trees” seems quite a drop.
Can you enlighten us as to how using a battery saves trees? I don’t think they have started chopping them down to burn in furnaces just yet, even though there is talk of that (calling it green power) by the government!
As an aside: for grid-connected systems batteries actually increase* the CO2 emissions in our mostly fossil fuel powered grid.
*Enphase batteries are say 95% efficient overall, so that you use 1.05X the green power charging the battery that you would otherwise have exported to the grid, which has to be made up by burning extra coal or gas, less the fraction of however much wind and solar generation was going into the grid at the time.
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@grahroll What a detailed response. Thank you.
As for contacting Enphase, initially I did - and they acknowledged the reading was incorrect, advising me to contact the installers. Did so. The installers cannot, as yet, get Enphase to contact them i.e. no responses to repeated requests. We will follow up with your advice.
@gordon Not being technical, Gordon, I meant one system - there are four batteries. I was told this was more than sufficient for a one person household.
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4 Enphase batteries are certainly enough to power a fridge, an LED TV and a few lights in any household overnight, but not enough for an electric jug.
As for the failure to get any action, @grahroll 's advice should get things happening.
Be sure to keep the Forum advised of your progress, as it will be useful guidance for others.
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Thanks for the extra info Gordon. For May and June, I was overseas with only the fridge and freezer on power. I always switch all appliances off at the wall anyway, as well as the off peak switch in the power box. So while away, my ‘trees saved’ went from 5-6 to 1. Between the 14 solar panels, the batteries and the off-peak off, the ‘trees saved’ should have put me well in credit, not in the position of paying a bill.
Enphase were contacted, again, and I received an e/m advising me that more was at fault in the system. But, I assume that because I was in contact with Choice, they are now in contact with the installers. Hopefully the faults will be rectified. Will they compensate for the lost savings? It can be assumed ‘NO’.
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Some companies will pay for lost FiT credits if their equipment/installation is shown to be at fault.
Given the very small loads you had whilst away, I suspect the overnight usage would have been in the order of 1kWh (for typical reasonably efficient fridges and freezer), and a similar usage during the day for an unheated house in May-June. That would be about 1/4 your battery capacity, which means that not only was the battery contributing little or nothing to your energy usage, but also that perhaps the PV system wasn’t doing a lot either (or you weren’t being paid for exports, despite your system exporting). However, without knowing how many kWh = a saved tree, and seeing details of system output and grid imports etc, I can’t say for sure.
Your PV system + battery should have been covering your entire electric energy usage while you were away, even in cloudy weather.
This is a good demonstration of why full system monitoring is so useful!
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