Most rooftop solar installs don't provide power when the grid is down. The primary goal is to avoid sending power out to the grid where it could injure people working to restore power, but more recently it's been expanded to avoid energized lines extending out from the panel where they could injure a firefighter on the roof. When we installed solar in 2018 we selected an inverter which offers an outlet that provides best-effort power during grid outages when the sun is shining. I'd try to sell you on it, but the newer rules mean my inverter wouldn't be legal for a new install. I suspect this doesn't pass a cost-benefit test, especially when you consider the risk of serious disasters. Since the harms of allowing it are concentrated (firefighters) while the benefits are diffuse (everyone with solar) and speculative (very uncommon for a disaster to be this serious), however, it got banned. Still, I wanted to make sure mine was still working, and especially that it would be able to charge…
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