Sean White‘s Solar and Energy Storage Podcast

Get Grounded! and Bonded! A reading from PV and the NEC on 690 Chapter VI Bonding and Grounding, Based on the 2023 NEC

This podcast is a reading from Chapter 6 of PV and the NEC 3rd Edition based on the 2023 NEC by Sean White and Bill Brooks. You can buy the book on Amazon at: https://a.co/d/amFqNko

 

Bonding and Grounding is something that causes a lot of arguments and this book will get to the bottom of it. 

 

Topics:
690 Part V Bonding and Grounding
690.41 PV System DC Circuit Grounding and Protection
 
Grounding Electrode
Grounding Electrode Conductor (GEC)<
Equipment Grounding Conductor (EGC)
Ground
Grounded Conductor
Solidly Grounded
Functionally Grounded
Ground Fault
Ground Fault Detector-Interrupter (GFDI)
Ground Fault Circuit Interrupter (GFCI)
 
690.42 Point of PV System DC Circuit Grounding Connection
690.43 Equipment Grounding and Bonding
 
UL 2703
UL 3703
 
250.97 Bonding for Over 250V to Ground
Table 250.122 EGC Based on OCPD
690.45 Size of Equipment Grounding Conductors
690.47 Grounding Electrode System
 
Additional Electrodes vs. Auxiliary Electrodes
 
To learn more and get all kinds of free information, go to www.solarSEAN.com

Speeding the Energy Transition: Sean White on the Clean Power Hour Podcast with Tim Montague and John Weaver

Sean White featured on the Clean Power Hour podcast with Tim Montague's co-host John Weaver on September 28, 2023. We are reposting this podcast, which you can also listen to on Tim Montague's awesome Clean Power Hour podcast, which you can find at www.cleanpowerhour.com
Sean White was at the University of Colorado in Denver during this podcast.

We had a great time chatting to one another and discussing:
1. The events at the just concluded 2023 RE+ Convection
2. White House launches clean energy youth workforce program amid labor shortage concerns
3. We talk about the Erthos technology and what it means to the clean energy revolution
4. Companies that were present at the RE+ and the new upcoming technology

Check out Tim Montague on:
Website: www.cleanpowerhour.com
Youtube: www.youtube.com/@cleanpowerhour
Twitter: www.twitter.com/tgmontague
LinkedIn:www.linkedin.com/company/clean-power-hour?trk=public_post_follow-view-profile
Email: tim@cleanpowerhour.com

Tim Montague's co-host is:

John Fitzgerald Weaver
Known online as “The Commercial Solar Guy,” Solar professional and project developer. John Fitzgerald Weaver works as the General Manager of CSG Developers LLC and a technical writer for pv magazine USA, where he covers solar industry data, equipment and manufacturers, trends, regulations and much more!

Reach John Fitzgerald Weaver here!
LinkedIn Account: www.linkedin.com/in/johnfitzgeraldweaver/
Company Website: www.commercialsolarguy.com/
RSS Feed: www.commercialsolarguy.com/news/

For more information on solar, storage and everything else, go to www.solarSEAN.com

Hydrogen RC race cars at RE+ with Max Accordino

If you were walking around RE+ in Vegas, you may have noticed a track and all of these remote control race cars and wondered what that was about. That was the Horizon Hydrogen Grand Prix Pro (H2GP Pro)!

 

Here is what we talked about:

 

Horizon Hydrogen Grand Prix Pro = H2GP Pro

STEM kits

STEAM Science Technology Engineering Art Math

RE+ Las Vegas Remote Control Race Cars

Hydrogen Element

Hydrogen Fires

Lead Acid Batteries making Hydrogen

Fuel Cells vs. Internal Combustion Engines with Hydrogen

Toyota Hydrogen Combustion Engine

JTB Hydrogen Engine

Fuel Cells Need Clean Air

Combustion of Hydrogen Makes Water

Stoichiometry 2 H2 + O2 = H2O

Toyota Murai

Electrolysis is same Stoichiometry

CPAP Machine is Electrolyzer making Oxygen and Getting Rid of Hydrogen

Hydrogen Colors

Green Hydrogen = Electrolysis (electricity and water)

Brown Hydrogen

Grey Hydrogen = Natural Gas Derived = 95% of H2 in the World

Steam Reformation = Preexisting Hydrocarbons to make Hydrogen, Such as Municipal Waste

Big Bang and Hydrogen Atoms

Landfill Gas to Make Hydrogen

Carbon Capture

Turquoise Hydrogen = Pyrolyses

Blue Hydrogen = SMR Steam Methane Reformation and Carbon Capture

World Economy Forum

Round Trip Efficiency of Hydrogen with Green Hydrogen 35%

Hydrogen is Lighter than Lithium-Ion

Hydrogen Electric Airplane

Rocket Equation

World’s Record for Lithium-Ion Battery

Electric Trucking

Autonomous Driving

Cheating with race cars design

The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County by Mark Twain

Bulgaria Team Underdog

Los Angeles Team Wins

Telemetry Systems

Hacking other Team’s Telemetry Systems

Anti Hacking Software

Danika Patrick and NASCAR

Formula E with Lithium-Ion vs. Fuel Cells

Symbio from France Fuel Cells

Hydrogen is the Future of Racing

Sustainable Diesel = Diesel Made From Corn

F1 to Hydrogen

Explosions with Storing any Energy

Recycling

Critical Mass Bike Riders Car Explosion

One Less Car

Horizon Educational Global Headquarters in Czech Republic

H2GP Foundation

501c3

Grants

Sponsorship

STEM Kits with Electrolyzer and Fuel Cell

Remote Control

Wind Solar Ethanol

Solar Hydrogen Science Kits

Pinewood Derby

Rubber Band Energy Storage

Free Hydrogen Curriculum

Wind, Solar, Ethanol Science Kits

Flinstone power

 

You can find them at:

www.horizoneducational.com

Instagram: www.instagram.com/horizoneducational/

Facebook: www.facebook.com/HorizonEducational/

LinkedIn: cz.linkedin.com/in/max-accordino

Youtube: www.youtube.com/channel/UCYHcXEZdZp8Zw2kmr3_I2Fw

 

To find out more and educate yourself, go to www.solarSEAN.com or www.HeatSpring.com/sean

Vehicle to Grid (V2G & V2X) David Slutzky Fermata Energy Founder and Chairman of the Board

Learn about bidirectional EV charging/discharging with former White House and EPA policy advisor Clinton Administration, former County Supervisor in Virginia, Faculty at University of Virginia 23 years, Commerce, Architecture, Engineering who has a Philosophy degree and is an entrepreneur who started multiple companies. David Slutzky started Fermata Energy in 2010.

 

Here are some of the topics we covered:

V2G Vehicle to Grid

V1G smart charging

V2X Vehicle to Everything

V2B Vehicle to Building 

V2L Vehicle to Load

Behind the meter

Load management<

Power quality

VARs

CAISO

Independent System Operator

Grid vs. Utility is different

ISO is grid made up of different utilities

VPP

Duke and Ford F-150 Lightning

TEPCO

Fukushima brought on V2X

CHAdeMO protocol

Nissan Leaf bidirectional in 2013

Offboard DC charger

Software platform

Vehicle battery comes free with leather seats and air conditioning

EV battery warranty with V2X

AI software

Data science<

Grid facing market opportunities

Vehicle to grid services provider

Defining 100% state of charge (SOC)

2000 Ford Ranger EV

Setting parameters of SOC to protect battery

LFP NCA NMC

4.2 volts per cell (VPC) at full charge

Child labor in the Congo and cobalt

Climate

Early adopters

Storage in EVs dwarfs stationary grid storage

Beacon power flywheels

University of Virginia vs. Virginia Tech

UL testing of bidirectional EV chargers

UL 1741 SB

UL 1741 SA

UL 1741

Siemens

CCS

North American Charging Standard = Tesla

<5A continuous = 10,000kWh/yr at 240V

Curtailing over $1B/yr of solar and wind in California

Discharge behind the meter to reduce demand charges

$200-$300 per month with 15kW EV to grid with Leaf

Utility demand response programs

National Grid summer demand response program<

Bidirectional Nissan Leaf makes in 57 hours in a summer for $4500 in the evenings (after work)

Onboard and offboard inverter/chargers

EV1

Rav 4 EV

Chevy S-10 EV

Avcon

GBT charging standard in China

Chao G charging is CHAdeMO in China

VW Dieselgate

Self certify

Electrify America

Chademo 3.0

Father of EVs in Japan

99.3% uptime of EV chargers in Japan

Much worse uptime in US

SGIP (Self Generation Incentive Program) subsidies in California should apply to EV to grid

Over 90% of EV charging happens at home

Interconnection agreement of inverter is probably going to be a stationary inverter and not a roaming onboard inverter

Weight of onboard inverter

Using big inverter that spins wheels to feed the grid

Raising capital and talking to oil companies

Panasonic

Chevron

Oil companies future is renewables and are important sources of capital

Yogaville

Buckingham County

Dominion Pipeline

 

David Slutzky 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-slutzky-2a77875

Fermata Energy 

https://fermataenergy.com/

 

To learn more, go to www.solarSEAN.com or www.HeatSpring.com/sean

Terence Parker gets surprised by Johnny Weiss, Solar PV History!

This podcast is full of solar history, so we give a shout out to the solar historians 100 and 1000 years from now!! Hey people who have not been born yet! Check us out!!

Terence and Johnny have been doing solar PV since the 1980s and have known each other since the early days.

Terence tells the story how he was on a small airplane in the South Pacific in the 80s wearing a solar shirt and Ward Bower, the inventor of the grid-tied inverter, tapped him on the shoulder, which started his solar career full steam. Before that he was a marine biologist trying to figure out how to get electricity on a 12 acre island, so he could study oysters. The moral of this story is to always wear a solar T-shirt.

Johnny Weiss is famous for starting Solar Energy International (SEI) in 1991 and has been working with PV modules since the mid 1980s.

The story of how we decided to do this podcast goes... Johnny invited me to see the SEI campus a few weeks ago and I asked him to be on the podcast. I told him how Terence Parker was going to be on it, and he had great things to say about Terence, so we decided to make Johnny the surprise guest. Johnny was very helpful at helping me interview Terence, so he is probably going to help me interview more historical figures.

Here are some of the names we dropped and things we talked about:

Arco Solar

MREA

SEI

Bob Ramlow

Solis

Solar Bridge

Ken Olsen

Home Power

Richard Perez

Borneo

Sri Lanka

Brazil

World Bank

Sandia

Unisolar

Out of the jungle

Ward Bower

Walked the PCH

Diving for oysters

Remote work

Set Long Beach Convention Center on fire (need a follow up podcast on this one)

Vestas

Offshore wind

Small wind

Mick Sagrillo

Bob-O Schultze

LinkedIn pages

 

Terence Parker (not to be confused with Trey Parker of South Park)

https://www.linkedin.com/in/terence-parker-2844a15/

 

Johnny Weiss (same last name as mine, but in a different language):

https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnny-weiss-b025106/

 

To find out more, go to www.SolarSEAN.com and get NABCEP certified!

Lithium-Ion Battery Silicon Anodes with Matt Kappers CEO The Coretec Group

Matthew Kappers is the CEO of The Coretec Group. The Coretec Group is known for their expertise in silicon nanoparticles to push the boundaries of silicon engineering and battery development. They are using their main expertise to develop an anode with a high concentration of silicon that will significantly boost the performance of lithium-ion batteries.

In this podcast we are going to talk about anodes and how these anodes could potentially be used with other types of batteries and other types of electrolytes. Let us hear from Matthew Kappers on how he and his team work with anodes, which is what makes their company so special! 

 

Besides being an informative discussion, it was also a good conversation, which you can now join!

 

Here is a list of the topics we cover:

1. Coretec Group's Endurion battery technology
2. Silicon nanoparticles
3. Anodes
4. Solid Electrolyte Interface (SEI) layer
5. Increasing lithium ion battery capacity by 100% with 20% silicon
6. Most EV batteries have no silicon
7. 100% silicon anode would increase capacity 10x
8. Drop in solution
9. Partner with battery manufacturer
10. Patents
11. Silicon vs. silicone
12. Specific energy is per weight
13. Energy density is energy per volume
14. Most people say energy density when they mean specific energy
15. Lithium anode battery (not rechargeable)
16. Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) cobalt mining
17. Lithium Iron Phosphate (LFP) cathodes
18. Lithium Nickel Manganese Cobalt Oxide (NMC) cathodes
19. Lithium Nickel Cobalt Aluminum Oxide (NCA) cathodes
20. CRTG stock ticker
21. Slurry technology
22. Driving an EV across the country with one charge
23. Rocket equation for Cannonball Run
24. Earth by weight there is more iron than anything else
25. Battery recycling
26. 2nd life batteries
27. Vehicle to grid (V2G)
28. EV less expensive per kWh than home battery
29. Lead toxicity
30. Lithium nontoxic

Visit The Coretec Group here:
Website: www.thecoretecgroup.com
Youtube: www.youtube.com/@thecoretecgroup7034
Twitter: www.twitter.com/CoretecGroupInc
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/the-coretec-group-inc

Find out more, educate yourself, go to www.solarSEAN.com

 

Take Sean's Energy Storage Boot Camp and be in the know!

Martin Pochtaruk CEO of Heliene Solar Manufacturer in US and Canada

Learn how solar is manufactured right here in the USA with a long time CEO of a US (Minnesota) and Canada (Ontario) solar manufacturer. Heliene Solar started up in 2010 and is still growing, especially with the Inflation Reduction Act climate. In this podcast Martin Pochtaruk takes us down an assembly line so you can learn from start to finish how a modern solar module is made.

 

Here are some of the terms we cover:

 

Encapsulant

An encapsulated mosquito in a solar cell (a Jurassic Park event)

Electroluminescent

Microcracks

Busbars

Lamination

Half-cells

Junction boxes

Potting

Multi-arm robot

Silicon cement

High voltage testing (1500V)

Flash testing

Current voltage curve

1.5AM

STC

Factory temperature

PID (Potential Induced Degradation)

PERC (Passive Emitter Rear Contact)<

TOPCon = 3 processes on top of a PERC cell

N-type

P-type

Heterojunction

Polysilicon

Ingot

Wafer

Cell

China

Ontario Canada Feed-in-tariff (FIT)

Sarnia Ontario

Sault Ste Marie

Solar modules are like windows

 

Check out: www.heliene.com

 

To learn more about how solar is manufactured, and everything else about solar and storage, go to www.solarSEAN.com

Energy Storage Systems (ESS) and the NEC with Bill Brooks and Sean White Part 2

In this podcast we have Bill Brooks talking energy storage system (ESS) Codes, with emphasis on the National Electrical Code (NEC).

Be sure to get Sean and Bill’s latest book, which is the 3rd edition of PV and the NEC, based on the 2023 NEC.

To find where to get different versions of the NEC including the 2023 NEC for free check out the NEC tab at solarSEAN.com. 

Disclaimer: This podcast was recorded in 2021.

Keywords

NEC Article 706 for Energy Storage Systems, UL 9540, Article 480, nominal voltage, cycling batteries, UL 1973, residential code, UL 1989, AHJ, inspector advice, communications between battery and inverter, flywheels, flow batteries, UPS, Australia and Hawaii, NexTracker, inverter output circuit, nameplate on ESS, apparent power, fault currents limited, maximum output current definition, LG chem battery, power converter, OSHA NRTL, ETL, Intertech, UL, SMA, UL standards writing entity vs. UL testing entity, 2021 International Residential Code, Tesla Powerwall, storage inverter, Ginlong, 9540A, liquid cooled vs. air cooled, Enphase Barbecue, Enphase in boiled water, ESS disconnecting means, readily accessible, unbalanced interconnections, single-phase inverters on 3-phase services, voltage rise, 705.12 Load-Side Connections, 710 Stand Alone Systems, plaque or directory, wire sizing, ampacity, overcurrent protection device, rounding up wire size to common overcurrent protection device size, energy storage is a source and a load, using continuous current instead of surge current, inverter input circuit current, diversion loads, C40 charge controllers without maximum power point tracking and diversion loads, energy storage as a diversion load, hot water loads, pulse with modulation (PWM), 150% correction factors for diversion loads, dc-to-dc converters, required ampacity for continuous current vs. continuous current, commercial and industrial (C&I).

Links:

Bill Brooks, P.E.: www.brooksolar.com

www.solarSEAN.com

www.HeatSpring.com/SEAN 

David Bliss, CEO of Faraday Microgrids

David Bliss is the CEO/Founder of Faraday Microgrids. Besides being a renewable energy CEO, David Bliss also has a medical degree and is a qualified General Surgeon and Licensed California Pediatric Surgeon. There are many people in the renewable industry with a wide variety of skills!

Faraday Microgrids is a licensed general contracting company. Some of their accomplishments pertain to pioneering systems for hospitals and healthcare institutions. Faraday Microgrids constructed the first renewable energy microgrid to interconnect to a vitally important power branch of a California hospital at the Kaiser Permanente site in Richmond. Faraday Microgrids is wide open to develop and design projects. They focus on essential sectors including healthcare, industrial, manufacturing, and community safety.

You may also contact David Bliss and his team by checking here!

Faraday Microgrids’ Website: www.faradaymicrogrids.com
Faraday Microgrids’ Office: 949-305-7820

To find out more and educate yourself, go to www.solarSEAN.com

Podcast Episode 100! What Brings Us Together

There are so many reasons to go solar and so many people with different opinions of why. Rather than arguing about why everyone needs to go solar, let's get together, as humans and install more solar and storage! Forgetting about our differences and working together on this project, is what will have the greatest effect. Instead of letting politics divide us, let's come together and

 

Here are some of the reasons that people go solar:

 

Saving money

Climate change

Green jobs

Oil wars

Giving our money to dictators

Energy independence

Neat technology

Backup power

Living off grid

Disconnecting from utilities

Prepping for the worst

Going green

Clean air

Good health

 

Personally, I like going solar for all of these reasons, but just because someone else is politically against some of these things, does not mean that we should alienate them from this great family of an industry!

 

This podcast is being released during my RE+ NEC workshop with Bill Brooks. I have taught this workshop at every RE+/SPI since 2012! Celebrate! Good times!

 

To learn more about solar and storage and to get NABCEP certified, go to www.solarSEAN.com