It's actually a big difference. Breaking any given POCO rule does not necessarily mean violation of an actual law. In the real world that means a lawsuit with significantly higher burden(time/cost) to prove in a court of law which can make it less likely to be pursued.
I don't know about that. Are you a lawyer? Most lawsuits have nothing to do with breaking a law, they have to do with breaching contracts or causing damages. For small customers, any lawsuit is a time and burden cost regardless of how good a case there is, so it very rarely comes to that anyway, if ever. But conversely, it's relatively easy for them to turn off your power.
That's true but it seems POCO's don't like to disconnect paying customers.
I have seen systems in Hawaii where a PV system with microinverters is connected to a water heater element. The water heater can run on PV to store the energy as hot water or the utility but it's not possible to feed the PV to the utility. The POCO, which is pretty strict about PV in general, allows these with no interconnection agreement.
EU allows for plug-in grid-tie inverters up to 800W without requiring permitting or approval for similar reasoning. Sure makes all the concerns about parallel generation at any scale being a serious safety issue look rather exaggerated.
No, it makes parallel generation in the EU up to 800W allowed without approval. In the US back in the 80s when PV was being codified utility workers were very concerned that when working on deenergised power lines they would be exposed to PV generated voltages from inverters connected to the denergised lines. They did not set a floor value, it was any PV. That has just followed us through to today. Just like the lockable visible blade PV disconnect switch. Like a utility truck full of locks going from house to house and locking out PV systems when line work was being done is going to happen. At one time that was the utility plan and drove the requirement that now is an anachronism.
So the US code was originally set due to utility workers concerned about safety without exceptions for low power grid-tied inverters even though the inverters are designed to shutoff in grid outages. I suspect the original code in EU was also set without exceptions for similar reasons. I hope the general consensus agrees with you that it's anachronism now. But I wonder if the utility workers in US have changed their minds and wouldn't try to block proposals to make exceptions for low power grid-tied inverters.
They have no incentive to change and would surely stand against if asked. The impetus for change would have to come from organized consumers. (Which if we further discuss might get 'political'.)
I have a hard time understanding that concern. I admit I am not a lineman and unfamiliar with their specific procedures, but I can't imagine a crew playing Russian roulette with any MV line unless it is completely isolated from every source and load. At any moment you could have a brother in law doing something stupid with a generator.
Although in most cases during a grid outage a household inverter or generator that kept running without being isolated from the grid would be feeding into what is essentially a short circuit. It wouldn't run for long.
Right, unless its a small section of line with only a few houses on it. Either way, I doubt lineman are making assumptions about the line being dead. And the same thing applies to PV inverters: even if its not a 1741 inverter, its almost certainly going to trip out from a perceived overload. So whether it be a generator or PV, I am not buying this rogue back feed killing lineman idea.
But it's not just linepersons who could get electrocuted. What if a small child touched the downed wire?
Certainly possibilities, although seems extremely unlikely to me. Mostly ungrounded 4800 around here, unlikely a downed line is going to trip out anyway.
