output of new system with solaredge

[laserlite]

I supplied the panels and everything and had a solar company install. Before I called them I thought I would try for answers here. The solaredge inverter shows that there isn't any watts being produced. Its been on for about 8-9 days and its been mostly overcast with occasionally sun. With the sun being so low I do have some shading issues with some pine trees. Only some of the sun gets directly through the branches. (I will be having them removed this spring or summer). I have 23 325 watt panels on a west facing roof and 7 325 watt panels on a different roof facing west all with optimizers. Do you think this is normal or should there be a little electricity being produced. I haven't gotten back the solaredge portage page where you can see individual panels, the solar company is setting it up and will send it when done. I saw on a previous post their system started showing when it was producing 4.31 watts. It hasn't really been that nice here in Massachusetts but at some point they should have produced a little at some point when the sun briefly came out shouldn't they?

[ButchDeal]

is there ZERO production or low production? if zero, it likely is a communication issue.

[laserlite]

The inverter is showing 0 watts produced.

[ButchDeal]

The inverter is showing 0 watts produced.

what does the inverter itself say? you can press the button below the LCD and cycle through different display screens on the inverter.
Is it turned off, at the DC disconnect, AC disconnect, or breakers tripped?

[solarix]

Solar systems are amazing in how they can even produce power under bad conditions. You should be seeing something. Sounds like a problem to me. Bad connection in the DC strings? What is the string voltage showing? should be around 350Vdc. One of the neat features of SolarEdge is that when it is off, the optimizers revert to outputing a mere 1 volt each - so the string voltage when off should measure 23V on one string and 7 volts on the other.
Could just be bad karma for not letting the installer handle the whole project...

[dennis461]

Perhaps it was installed wrong or not turned on, and you are in reality getting zero output.
Is this a "behind the meter" system. You should start troubleshooting (or installer should).

Does the inverter front display turn on when you push the little button?

[emartin00]

It sounds like the inverter wasn't activated properly. You have to tell the inverter to talk to all the optimizers, or they won't produce power. You can download the install manual from their website, and it will help.

[laserlite]

Everything seems to be switched on and running. The optimizer pairing shows 20 of 20 but there are 30 optimizers total. Is this because its overcast and not enough light to energize the remaining 10 or should they all show up?

[ButchDeal]

Everything seems to be switched on and running. The optimizer pairing shows 20 of 20 but there are 30 optimizers total. Is this because its overcast and not enough light to energize the remaining 10 or should they all show up?

if there are 30 then it should say 30 of 30. Overcast should still have them enough light to at least check in but if not it would be 20 of 30.
Do you have the monitoring site set up for it? https://monitoring.solaredge.com/solaredge-web/p/home

Is the inverter producing anything? with 20 optimizers it should be producing unless turned off. it could be in standby mode.
Do you have your permission to operate from the utility? is it a PPA by chance?

[laserlite]

No I don't have the monitoring site yet. I emailed the solar installer this morning to see when I could see it. The green production light is on next to the screen on the inverter. I have the permission to operate from National Grid and they switched the meter to bi-directional. No I own the system. So even with cloudiness conditions all 30 optimizers should show on the inverter screen?

[GRickard]

I would start with the SolarEdge Installation Guide. Go to chapter 5 (commissioning), step 2 (pairing the optimizers). Try to redo this step and if everything is wired correctly and the correct polarity, it should recognize all of the optimizers in about ten minutes and then start producing.

[ButchDeal]

the inverter remembers the optimizers configured for it so it should say x of 30 if you have 30 but you stated it has 20 of 20 which means that 10 of them are not configured. you should have the monitoring set up. The inverter should also state the actual production on the main screen
on the first screen on the LCD it should state Vac [V] Vdc [V] Pac [w] with corresponding values directly under those.
Then the third line would be P_OK: 20/30 <S_OK>
and fourth line should have status (on, standby, generating, etc)

http://solaredge.com/sites/default/files/se-single-and-three-phase-inverter-user-manual-na.pdf

[dennis461]

Can you post a picture of the display?
Low output looks like this...

[laserlite]

Here's the screen from the inverter and also a picture of the house with the sun and shading on the panels. It did snow an inch last night. Did the re-pairing of the optimizers and now it is 19 of 19 optimizers missing 11. By looking at the picture of the house do you think that is enough light for all the optimizers to show and produce a little electricity?

[ButchDeal]

so it looks like you have a production meter as well and it is claiming 0kw generation today.
from the roof photo it looks like you have very few modules not covered with snow (at least on the lower roof which we can see).
Are the modules on the upper roof also covered with snow?
The inverter only knows about 20 optimizers so if the other 10 are the ones currently uncovered they are not going to turn on.
What you want is to get it to discover all the optimizers on a clear day with all of the modules uncovered so they all can generate at least a little power to turn on their optimizers.