Anionic
New User
- Location
- California
- Occupation
- Estimator
So this is my first post and I have worked a bit to do some due diligence, but I am not finding the answer. I greatly appreciate this forum and have been lurking for a couple years just learning what I can. So here is the question.
My friend and I recently installed a 9kW enphase system on his detached 2 story garage. The panels are on the roof and the strings enter a soladek box on the roof and they run through the attic and down the inside of an exterior wall in EMT and they exit the wall a few feet above the ground and then their is a 90 pull section and then it converts to PVC and goes underground about 40 ft and up on the exterior of the main house to the combiner box. Everything is per code except one item the inspector noted. They are saying that we need to install a disconnect on the garage. We have a disconnect 40 ft away on the house by the combiner box, but they want one at the garage as well. Well we have 6 conductors not including the ground. I read through NEC 690.9 and see how it seems to require a disconnect on the garage structure. We probably should have installed the combiner on the garage but my friend wanted all the breakers and disconnect by his main panel for ease of access. Can anyone help me understand this and confirm that it is required by code to have another disconnect on the circuits on the garage in addition to on the house. So that would mean we need to install a means to disconnect each string at the garage or we could run a circuit from the disconnect on the house and put them in series so if either is open the whole circuit is open. but that would add another 100' of wire and additional voltage drop etc. which i would hope to avoid. Maybe putting a small exterior breaker panel for all the string circuits on the garage exterior, but does a small breaker subpanel count as a disconnect? Also, is there some magic in section 230.6 that would allow no disconnect if we run the EMT up the exterior of the garage and into the attic through the eave? would that allow us to avoid having another disconnect on the garage? Thanks in advance. Its always crazy to me how many disconnects these solar systems have. On my house i have the breaker at the main then 1 ft. to the right there is a big disconnect with the lever and 1 ft over from that the solaredge inverter has a big black DC disconnect. The guy that helped me do my solar system said really there is some code that says you only need one solar disconnect within line of sight from the panel but I haven't found anything like that in the code.
My friend and I recently installed a 9kW enphase system on his detached 2 story garage. The panels are on the roof and the strings enter a soladek box on the roof and they run through the attic and down the inside of an exterior wall in EMT and they exit the wall a few feet above the ground and then their is a 90 pull section and then it converts to PVC and goes underground about 40 ft and up on the exterior of the main house to the combiner box. Everything is per code except one item the inspector noted. They are saying that we need to install a disconnect on the garage. We have a disconnect 40 ft away on the house by the combiner box, but they want one at the garage as well. Well we have 6 conductors not including the ground. I read through NEC 690.9 and see how it seems to require a disconnect on the garage structure. We probably should have installed the combiner on the garage but my friend wanted all the breakers and disconnect by his main panel for ease of access. Can anyone help me understand this and confirm that it is required by code to have another disconnect on the circuits on the garage in addition to on the house. So that would mean we need to install a means to disconnect each string at the garage or we could run a circuit from the disconnect on the house and put them in series so if either is open the whole circuit is open. but that would add another 100' of wire and additional voltage drop etc. which i would hope to avoid. Maybe putting a small exterior breaker panel for all the string circuits on the garage exterior, but does a small breaker subpanel count as a disconnect? Also, is there some magic in section 230.6 that would allow no disconnect if we run the EMT up the exterior of the garage and into the attic through the eave? would that allow us to avoid having another disconnect on the garage? Thanks in advance. Its always crazy to me how many disconnects these solar systems have. On my house i have the breaker at the main then 1 ft. to the right there is a big disconnect with the lever and 1 ft over from that the solaredge inverter has a big black DC disconnect. The guy that helped me do my solar system said really there is some code that says you only need one solar disconnect within line of sight from the panel but I haven't found anything like that in the code.
