{"id":30441,"date":"2019-05-29T14:09:37","date_gmt":"2019-05-29T03:39:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/?p=30441"},"modified":"2019-05-29T14:09:37","modified_gmt":"2019-05-29T03:39:37","slug":"pvel-solar-inverter-scorecard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.solarquotes.com.au\/blog\/pvel-solar-inverter-scorecard\/","title":{"rendered":"Delta and Huawei Commercial Inverters Beat Fronius & SMA In PVEL Testing"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"PVEL

And you thought the election was a shock result…<\/p><\/div>\n

I have good news.\u00a0 PVEL<\/a> —\u00a0 a standards testing company — has released a solar inverter scorecard<\/a>.\u00a0 It describes how a dozen different tests were performed on a variety of inverters and which were the top performers<\/p>\n

The bad news is the inverter scorecard is focused on North America and none of the top performing inverter models are available in Australia.\u00a0 Even if you got your hands on one you wouldn’t be able to use it here, as North American current is different because electrons spin counter-clockwise in the northern hemisphere.1<\/a><\/sup>\u00a0 Also, some of the inverters that did well are too large for normal residential use.<\/p>\n

Another problem with the scorecard is it only shows which solar inverters were top performers and not which did badly or whether or not an inverter that wasn’t a top performer was even given a particular test.<\/p>\n

Despite these drawbacks I’ll describe the tests performed and which inverters did well.\u00a0 After all, if a company produces solar inverters that perform well in North America they are likely to make ones that work well Down Under.\u00a0 The brands that received the most top performer ratings were Delta<\/a> and Huawei<\/a> and they are both available here.<\/p>\n

Who The Hell Is PVEL?<\/h2>\n

PVEL stands for PV Evolution Labs.\u00a0 It’s probably not evolution like this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Because that’s just a cartoon.\u00a0 It’s not even biological evolution like this:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Which is scary if you happen to know it shows bacteria evolving resistance<\/a> to increasing concentrations of antibiotics.<\/p>\n

Instead it’s about the evolution of solar technology thanks to human-guided change.<\/p>\n

PVEL tests solar panels, inverters, and other solar power hardware to find out what works well, what doesn’t work well, and what meets standards.\u00a0 It was part of DVNGL<\/a>, which is a huge Norwegian standards organization.\u00a0 I wrote about their solar panel scorecards in 2016<\/a>, 2017<\/a>, and 2018<\/a>.\u00a0 But now PVEL has been spun off and made an independent solar testing organization.\u00a0 This could be because DVNGL is heavily involved in the oil and gas industry and they wanted to avoid a potential conflict of interest between those working to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and those who want to watch the world burn.2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

Issues With Inverters<\/h2>\n

Inverters are the most likely to fail part of solar power systems.\u00a0 This is because:<\/p>\n