The "Canary Guy" 's 2 cents....
If you are on a residential grid, you have options:
1-) of going traditional with batteries and off grid, huge initial investment, some long term maintenance and you get to say FU to the electric company, and power shortages.
2-) of going hybrid with batteries and connected to the grid, same initial huge investment (or not), same long term maintenance and you can not say FU to the electric company. But you can get compensated for you excedence that you dump into the grid, and you are reducing the power companies need to generate as much because they get your left overs on the cheap. They always pay you less for what you dump, than they chatrge you for what you consume.
3-) of going hybrid without batteries and then must be connected to the grid, lowest possible initial investment, as the batteries are what cost the most normally of the installation. You dump you excess produced during the day, and pull from the grid at night and on cloudy days.
My advice, if you are unsure, try no. 3 as it's the lowest cost to start, go a year like that while you investigate batteries... eventually, you want batteries so you can really make an impact both in terms of your bills monthly and the reduction of power the local grid need generate to satiate demand. IE: you help yourself, and at the same time make an impact and help others.
We went with no. 2. The biggest drawback is that when the grid goes down, technically we get cut off and cannot even consume from our batteries... the "story" being that if we are dumping into the grid while it goes down, we may potentially harm workers that go to repair the grid. Riiiiiight. Cause they don't know how to cut power when they work, or be correctly grounded snd with the proper equipment to not get fried.
There is an easy work around if your local power company tries this on you... it involves cutting the circuit breaker in the box at the edge of your property, where the grid connection is... you simply pull that fuse, and you can consume normally while the grid is down from your solar installation without risk of harm to anyone but yourself. Physically you could get fried if you do not know what you are doing, and fiscally there will be fines for doing so no doubt.
Of you do decide to go off grid and say FU to the power company, invest in a really good generator for when you need to work on the system, when it malfunctions or when it's too cloudy for days on end to generate a lick of power. Wind mills are a good back up, normally when it's cloudy the wind kicks up.... but not all residential zones are cool with wind mills on a residential property.
Good luck! Post pics!
Here is ours, a little system by US A standards....
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...we went with Goodwe, the Chinese branch of General Electric.
3.6kW in 8 panels, inverter and a 5.4kW battery. Hybrid/connected to grid.
Our electric bill went from 200-300€ per month to 15€, and the hook up fee you pay for the meter is 13€... so basically saving 185-285€ per month, and we dump enough to the grid to cover 2 thrifty neighbors consumption, or 1 energy hog. Our entire system, with install came to 12k€ and change.
We run 2 central rooftop AC units, dishwasher, clothes washer and a water heater, 2 TV and all the lights on and no worries.
Our conclusion after a little over a year since the install is, WHY THE HECK DIDN'T WE DO IT SOONER!!!!
