Relaxation in photovoltaic system certification and relief for plug-in solar devices in sight

2023-05-30

The Federal Ministry of Economics has presented various draft regulations. The German Solar Industry Association also hopes that the disproportionate requirements for system certificates for photovoltaic systems with an output of 135 kilowatts or more will be eased quickly. In the case of photovoltaic balcony systems, the permissible output could be increased to 800 watts in the short term, as well as other measures to reduce bureaucracy.

In the recent past, the system certificate has proven to be a real bottleneck when connecting photovoltaic systems with an output of 135 kilowatts or more.

Photo: Avantag Energy

With the EEG 2023, the federal government has already relaxed the requirements for the system certificate for photovoltaic systems from 135 kilowatts. With a new ordinance, further changes to the Electrotechnical Properties Verification Ordinance (NELEV) and a new Technical Requirements Ordinance (TAV) are planned. This was preceded by months of consultations between the solar industry and politicians. The Federal Association of the Solar Industry (BSW-Solar) is hoping for quick implementation, as it explained on Thursday.

The aim of the association in the months of consultations that preceded the draft was that new photovoltaic systems can be connected to the power grid more quickly and cost-effectively in the future without complex and very expensive system certification. This could be successful, at least for photovoltaic systems with an output of up to 500 kilowatts. According to the draft submitted, they are to be exempted from the obligation to obtain a system certificate if they feed a maximum of 270 kilowatts of their output into the grid. The BSW-Solar also considers the fact that the very complex grid connection rule VDE AR-N 4110 (medium-voltage directive) would no longer have to be applied to these systems to be a major simplification, but the simpler VDE AR-N 4105 (low-voltage directive). This requirement should apply regardless of

"This removes another major market barrier," explained Carsten Körnig, General Manager of BSW-Solar. "Thanks to the consideration of grid and solar technology issues that took place when the compromise was reached, hopefully the regulations will be passed quickly." They are currently still in the association hearing.

Simplification for plug-in solar devices

Another draft speaker should also deal with simplifications for plug-in solar devices. The aim is to simplify the registration of the systems, also known as photovoltaic balcony systems, which currently have to be reported to both the grid operator and the market master data register. The increase in the permissible power from 600 to 800 watts is also planned, as various media reports citing the draft. In addition, the Schuko plug should be sufficient for the connection in the future. Various market participants had requested this in advance. There was also a petition that had more than 100,000 signatures and was therefore recently debated in the Bundestag committee.

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