Panel To Inverter Oversizing Explained

When gathering designs and proposals for your next solar system you may notice in some of the options that the Solar panel kw (PV) is higher than the Inverter's rated kw.

This is because most inverters in today's market are capable of DC [Solar] oversizing by 150% and up above the inverter capacity, meaning that if you had a 5kw inverter, the system is capable of 7.5kw of solar to make up for losses in performance from shading and other factors.

Generally, this helps the inverter get to its peak rating when the sun hits all the panels in the right spot!

The time of day, orientation and any shading effects will be environmental considerations with your installer in the initial design stage.

One caveat in Australia however is the Clean Energy Councils regulations surrounding solar, when the system is a grid tied only setup without batteries, the system must only have a DC oversize of 133% meaning with a 5kw inverter the maximum STC able array is 6.6kw.

This gives you, the customer even more reason to think about a battery addition with your solar installation as the Clean Energy Council allow up to 200% DC oversizing to claim STC's if there is a battery system on site due to having another device on site to absorb the surplus generation.

For further information relating to this topic please feel free to reach out to discuss in detail.

Blog post credit: Haiden Winkler